Methodological Reflections on Studying Gender‐Sensitive Parliaments Cross‐Nationally: A “Most Significant Change” Approach

Petra Ahrens, Silvia Erzeel and Merel Fieremans
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Petra Ahrens: Faculty of Social Sciences, Tampere University, Finland
Silvia Erzeel: Department of Political Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium
Merel Fieremans: Department of Political Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

Politics and Governance, 2024, vol. 12

Abstract: Whilst cross-national comparative analyses provide distinct opportunities for the study of gender-sensitive parliaments, the inherent challenge in conducting comparisons necessitates a continued search for innovative methods. This article responds to this need by proposing the “most significant change” (MSC) approach (Davies & Dart, 2005), which centres on collecting and analysing “stories of significant change.” Drawing on our own application of MSC in an international study commissioned by INTER PARES, we show that MSC’s bottom-up, inductive, and participatory approach proved valuable in uncovering hitherto unknown instances of gender-sensitive changes across countries, illuminating the broader impact of such changes beyond parliaments and incorporating practitioners’ perspectives. The flexibility of MSC also enabled context-specific applications, which we illustrate through three examples from Cyprus, Germany, and Trinidad & Tobago. By offering a complementary approach to compare parliaments’ gender sensitivity across countries, our study provides a novel perspective for future comparative analyses in the field.

Keywords: comparative politics; gender equality; gender‐sensitive parliaments; parliaments; research methods (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cog:poango:v12:y:2024:a:8117

DOI: 10.17645/pag.8117

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