“Daughter-of-Him and Wife-of-Him”: Gender Analysis of Women’s Representation in the 2024 Pakistan General Elections
- Ritvik Singh Sabharwal
- 6 days ago
- 14 min read
Updated: 4 days ago
As published in the Volume 2(2) of Ramjas Political Review
Abstract
In ‘King of the Mountain: The Nature of Political Leadership,’ author Arnold Ludwig used statistics to assert that leadership among humans was a gendered phenomenon. Even in contemporary politics, women’s leadership is restricted and conditioned by gendered power relations. As the conservative nation of Pakistan elected its new parliament, asymmetrical dynamics of power between genders within democracies were reasserted. Pakistan's 2024 Parliamentary Elections offer a unique case study for providing insights into women’s relationships with political power and elections, which are dictated by their relationships with male leaders and political dynasties. It also answers questions regarding the absence of women from decision-making processes.
Keywords: Gender, Pakistan, Dynasticism, Elections, Electoral patriarchy.
Introduction
Power among humans is a product of asymmetrical beliefs as to what gives a person authority over the other. The disempowerment of one generates the currency of power for the other. For most of human history, social cleavage, which has served as the greatest axis of disempowerment in society, has been the gender divide. As the abstraction of gender has become increasingly reified, the space for women to acquire power in real terms has decreased. Psychologist Arnold Ludwig performed a long-term study of political leaders across the globe in the 20th century. In his reporting treatise, ‘King of the Mountain: The Nature of Political Leadership’ (2002), he concluded firmly that “With notable exceptions, the one thing you cannot be as a ruler is a woman.” He foresees that this statement that he posits will attract a barrage of counterarguments. Therefore, he backed his statement with the data, that out of all the nonceremonial leaders in the world in the 20th century, only one was a woman (Ludwig, 2002).
Ludwig provides an interesting classification of women leaders in the modern world. He broadly divides them into two groups. The first are those who earn their positions by virtue of their own popularity, and the second are those whose power in politics is predicated upon their connection to a popular male relative. These leaders are in no way less potent than their male counterparts and may be as charismatic, tough, and powerful as their masculine contemporaries, but they owe their political careers to their fathers, husbands, or brothers (Ludwig, 2002). Leaders in this category can emerge as powerful figures in their own right, yet their roots in politics are conditioned by the patriarchal idea of dynastic succession and carrying forward the legacy of their male relatives. There is no doubt that Indira Gandhi, Khaleda Zia, Sheikh Hasina, and Isabel Peron are powerful and popular leaders. However, they still owe their political mileage, at least in part, to Jawaharlal Nehru, Zia-Ur-Rehman, Sheikh Mujib, and Juan Peron. For the second category of women leaders, who rise to positions of power without familial connections to popular male leaders, the picture vis-à-vis patriarchy is not any better. Leaders such as Margaret Thatcher, Golda Meir, Jenny Shipley, and Julia Guillard were all perceived to be practitioners of masculinist politics (Ludwig, 2002).
Methodological Overview
The author of this paper uses the framework established by Arnold Ludwig to demarcate women leaders whose political position is a result of their familial ties to male leaders to analyse the results of the 2024 Pakistan general elections, and establish the impact of patriarchal gender relations on electoral politics in Pakistan. The author utilises historical analysis to situate these results within the history of gendered politics in Pakistan to present a larger picture of the case study. Qualitative interpretivism serves as a basis for investigating literature sources and news reports to understand how the social-gender divide translates into asymmetrical gendered power relations in Pakistan’s politics.
Literature Review
In recent years, there has been a renaissance of studies on the politics of gender in Pakistan. There has been a proliferation of studies on femininities, masculinities, and patriarchal control of public spaces of media, politics, and academics. There has also been a steady growth of studies on the intersection of cleavages of class, ethnicity, caste, and religion with patriarchy in Pakistan. This new wave of research has been spearheaded by scholars such as Farzana Bari, Farida Shaheed, Ayesha Khan, Khalida Ghous, Beena Sarwar, Mariam Mufti, Khawar Mumtaz, Afiya Shehrbano Zia, Bina Shah, and Asma Barlas.
Two major areas of academic research have dominated the study of patriarchal influences in Pakistani society. The first type of research is case studies, that look at macrocosmic cases of masculinist control and transgressions against women’s rights. These include studies such as Muhammad Javed Akhtar and Shahla Gull on the representation of women in the local politics of Multan (Akhtar & Gull, 2021) and Asiya Jawed, Ayesha Khan and Komal Qidwai on women involved in protest movements across Pakistan (Jawed, Khan, & Qidwai, 2021). The other f ield of research on women’s presence in Pakistan’s polity is social analysis and ethnographic research, which includes works like Azeema Begum’s piece on women’s participation in Pakistani politics (Begum, 2023) and Farida Shaheed’s work on the relationship between religion and gender in Pakistan (Shaheed, 2010).
The 2024 election became the next stage in the trajectory of women’s presence in Pakistan’s political space. By taking inspiration and reference from both categories of works mentioned above, this paper aims to trace and problematise how women’s access to power in Pakistani society is shaped and conditioned by patriarchy.
History of Women’s Presence in Pakistan’s Politics
Pakistan’s founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, had envisioned gender equity in the new state he created (Akhtar & Gull, 2021). However, only two women held seats in Pakistan’s constituent assembly – Begum Jahan Ara Shahnawaz and Begum Shaista Ikramullah. The impact, participation, and influence that women had in the movement to create Pakistan were not mirrored at all by the share of the decision-making process they were able to obtain in the new country (Bari, 2010). In the early part of Pakistan’s history, only two women politicians held influential positions in politics. These were Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah (sister of Pakistan’s first Governor-General, Mohammad Ali Jinnah) and Begum Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan (wife of Pakistan’s first Prime Minister, Liaquat Ali Khan). Fatima Jinnah ran for the President of Pakistan against the military ruler Ayub Khan in 1965. She lost the election in the face of intense misogyny (Shaheed, 2010), but initiated a wave of popular participation by women in Pakistan’s politics (Saiyid, 2001). Begum Ra’ana was instrumental in forming the most active gender equity advocacy group in Pakistan, the All-Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA) in 1949, and later also served in many government roles, including as ambassador to various countries and Governor of Sindh province (Malik, 1997). During Field Marshal Ayub Khan’s rule in Pakistan (1958 to 1969), women were put into educational institutions and became a crucial part of the workforce (Grünenfelder, 2013). In the 1970s, the People’s Party under Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto gained power and implemented the current Constitution of Pakistan in 1973, which ascribed full formal equality to women (Akhtar & Gull, 2021), at least in theory. In the same period, Pakistan also witnessed Ashraf Khatoon Abbasi become the first woman deputy speaker of the Pakistani parliament (Malik, 1997).
The 1977 coup by General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, caused a major decline in women’s status in all spheres of Pakistani society. Under Zia (1977-1988), women were completely removed from political participation, had their legal rights severely restricted, and became the target of a narrow-minded and bigoted islamisation programme. Zia’s regime partnered with right-wing clergy to inhibit women’s expression into the chaddor (veil) and char-diwaari (home). Through the use of dress codes, media censorship, Hudood (limitation) ordinances, and biased Zina (extramarital affair) laws, Zia attempted to kill any resistance to patriarchy by conflating it with Islam (Shaheed, 2010).
The post-Zia era saw two major developments that completely transformed the gender polity of Pakistan and destroyed the hopes of many misogynists that Zia’s imposed religious patriarchy would be permanent. The first was Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto’s election for the prime ministership in 1988. Not only did Benazir, daughter of the deposed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, shatter many patriarchal glass ceilings by becoming the first female head of government in an Islamic country, but she also put women at the front and centre in her political campaigning and policy choices (Weiss, 1990). Although Benazir was not able to completely repeal Zia’s regime of misogyny, she both symbolically and in a few concrete ways defanged it (Malik, 1997). The other seismic shift was the publication of the book My Feudal Lord by Tehmina Durrani in 1991. Durrani was the ex-wife of Ghulam Mustafa Khar, an extremely powerful landlord and influential politician who previously served as the Governor and Chief Minister of Punjab and was a federal minister as well. Durrani revealed in her book that Khar had repeatedly abused her in a myriad of ways, with impunity (Durrani et al., 1994). Durrani’s act of revealing her story opened a proverbial can of worms. It revealed the rotten nexus between patriarchy, religion, feudalism, class, and politics that had subjugated women across Pakistan in all spheres. In particular, it highlighted how local notables such as landlords and tribal chieftains used traditionalism as a garb to hide the abuse they meted out on women (Malik, 1997). My Feudal Lord played a critical role in mainstreaming the conversation about the gendered nature of power in Pakistan.
It was under the rule of dictator Pervez Musharraf (1999-2007), that reserved seats for women in national, provincial, and local governments were permanently embedded in the government structure after a long history of temporary measures. However, these reserved seats are not sufficient to represent the total population of women (Khan & Naqvi, 2020). Despite all of these developments, women have largely been “missing women” in Pakistan’s polity (Ali & Akhtar, 2012).
Pakistan’s 2024 General Election & Ludwig’s Framework
Pakistan’s National Assembly has 336 seats, wherein, 266 seats are openly contested, while 60 seats are reserved for women and 10 for religious minorities. The number of women elected to the national assembly on unreserved seats rose in the elections of 2008 from 2002, and again in 2013 from 2008. However, in the 2018 National Assembly Election, the number of winning women candidates dropped for the first time in the 21st century (Khan & Naqvi, 2020).
In the 2024 elections, only 11 per cent of the total contesting candidates were women (Hasnain, 2023). Women faced immense barriers as they voted and participated in the electoral process, due to social pressures (AFP, 2024), unfulfilled quotas (Junaidi, 2024), socioeconomic structural problems (Ahmed, 2024), labour exploitation (Iqbal, 2024), and the repeated failure of mainstream political parties in fulfilling their promises to women (Irfan, 2024). The last condition in particular has signalled to women that political parties are either unable or unwilling to give women a slice of the pie of power. The transsexual community faced even more hurdles in becoming part of the democratic exercise (Baig, 2024). As a result, the turnout among women decreased significantly from 46.89 per cent in 2018 to 41.3 per cent in 2024 (Fazal, Khan, & Irfan, 2024). The decrease in women turnout represents a reversal of the gains made by women voters and candidates since the restoration of democracy in Pakistan in 2008. As Pakistan’s political spectrum became more polarised into pro-Imran Khan and anti-Imran Khan factions, women’s representation issues were not given space in mainstream discussions.
Despite this, several important positive developments have occurred. For the first time, a woman from a religious minority community was chosen by a mainstream party to run for an unreserved seat (Bacha, 2023). The number of registered women voters also rose (I. Khan, 2023), and the gender gap among voters fell further (U. Khan, 2024).
Pakistan Today reported on February 12, 2024 that, out of the 839 women candidates running for the National Assembly, only 12 managed to win in their respective constituencies (Staff Report, 2024). The winning candidates are listed in the appendix. Of the 12 winning candidates, 10 are linked to powerful male politicians as daughters, wives, and nieces. Even among women candidates from the major parties who lost their elections, the most prominent names are those women who are linked to powerful male politicians through family, such as Mehrbano Qureshi (daughter of former Federal Minister, Shah Mehmood Qureshi), Samar Bilour (granddaughter of former President, Ghulam Ishaq Khan), Rehana Dar (mother of former member of National Assembly, Usman Dar), and Saira Afzal Tarar (daughter-in-law of former President, Muhammad Rafiq Tarar).
On the whole, Ludwig’s thesis on the genesis of women leaders holds for Pakistan’s politics in general and becomes even clearer if we analyse the 2024 Pakistani general election. From Fatima Jinnah and Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan to Benazir Bhutto to the current elected women parliamentarians, a majority of women leaders in Pakistan’s politics are reliant on the name and fame of their male relatives. With the arguable exception of Benazir Bhutto (Jangbar, 2021), most of these “wife-of” and “daughter-of” women leaders in Pakistan’s politics are unable to make a name for themselves independent of their husbands, fathers, or other male relatives. They lack any political power of their own and are either vehicles for a family legacy or proxy candidates for men who are unable to contest elections for some reason.
A Gender Analysis of Women’s Electoral Performance in Elections
There are two critical questions that we must answer at this juncture. First, why do women remain on the peripheries in the halls of power? Multiple theorists answer this question in a myriad ways. However, it should be noted that the absence of women from decision-making tables is a deliberate ploy of patriarchy and not its unintended consequence. As Gail Omvedt points out, the exclusion of women from the spheres of political power is a result of a concerted effort to normalise practices that subjugate women in the political sphere (Omvedt, 2005). From a structuralist perspective, the entire political machinery is made in such a way that women do not have the same ease of access as men do (Saiyid, 2001). They have to contend with a misogynist media (Khan & Naqvi, 2020), tokenism and relegation to lower ranks of leadership (Begum, 2023), and a society where religious identities have been weaponised to make women second-class citizens (Shaheed, 2010). The cards are stacked against women leaders from within the family itself, where they are treated inequitably, and are furthermore subjected to an interlaced web of multiple socio-economic restrictions (Javed, 2021). The absence of a single cause for the dearth of female leadership in Pakistan is what allows for the vacuum to perpetuate. The family, which acts as the primary instrument for preventing the rise of female leadership, is also the tool through which dynastic women leaders in Pakistan come to the fore. When the father, brother, or husband can no longer represent himself, then the daughter, sister, or wife is called by “family duty” to represent him. A female legislator in Pakistan, and in much of the world is not representing herself or women or even her constituents. She is, for all intents and purposes, a surrogate for a male politician. Her popularity, power, image, and constituencies are built upon the influence of her male relatives. In this way, a “wife-of” or “daughter-of” politician, no matter how powerful or popular, does not entirely own her agency and position. The very nature of her leadership is based on a relationship of dependency with a male politician. She is acting as a front for a masculine entity beyond herself and is hence an inadequate agent for solving the deep-rooted problems that women face in society.
The second question is whether the inclusion of women leaders in power structures enhances women’s position in society in general. In the case of Pakistan, the veteran politician and parliamentarian, Dr Sherry Rehman vociferously argues that women politicians in Pakistan’s legislatures give voice to the “real women” of Pakistan, and allow for a broader outlook in representation. This is further augmented by concrete changes made in favour of women, which are brought about by an ever-increasing number of female legislators in the country (Rehman, 2021). However, this argument is not accepted by most researchers. Farzana Bari’s research shows that a majority of the seats reserved for women in Pakistan are held by educated, urban, and affluent women, who are tied to political dynasties, upper-class professional communities, and landlord families. These women legislators do not represent the majority of rural, uneducated, and poor socio-economic strata of women in Pakistan. Women candidates are largely chosen by male leaders who dominate mainstream political parties (Bari, 2010). Mainstream political parties act as institutionalised bearers of patriarchy and do not extend financial, logistical, political, or moral support to create independent women leaders. The gates to the halls of power remain closed for women who are not a part of the elite clientelistic framework of patronage between local leaders and political parties (Mufti & Jalalzai, 2021).
Conclusion
Women leaders in Pakistan are, by and large, created and sustained by the power of male politicians, who expect them to act as their agents. Women politicians still rely on men for power, as political parties are dominated by men and because their political fame derives from male relatives. Arnold Ludwig’s proposition that a critical mass of women leaders is constituted by women related to male politicians is certainly applicable in Pakistan in light of the 2024 general elections. These elections have proven that despite electoral processes being theoretically neutral, the people of Pakistan are more likely to elect women who carry forward the name of a male politician they support. As Maryam Nawaz, a “daughter-of” former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, took oath to become the Chief Minister of Pakistan’s Punjab province on 26 February 2024, we can assume that “daughter-of” and “wife-of” culture for women leaders in Pakistan is here to stay.
References
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Appendix
Winning Candidates | Constituency | Party | Wife of- Or Daughter of- |
Shandana Gulzar Khan | NA-30 Peshawar | PTI-IND | Daughter of former MNA Gulzar Khan |
Aneeqa Mehdi Bhatti | NA-67 Hafizabad | PTI-IND | Daughter of former MNA Mehdi Hassan Bhatti & Sister of former MNA Shaukat Ali Bhatti |
Ayesha Nazir Jutt | NA-156 Vehari | PTI-IND | Daughter of former MNA Chaudhary Nazir Jutt |
Anbar Majeed Niazi | NA-181 Layyah | PTI-IND | Wife of former MNA Majeed Niazi |
Zartaj Gul Wazir | NA-185 DG Khan | PTI-IND | - |
Syeda Nousheen Iftikhar | NA-73 Sialkot | PML-N | Daughter of former MNA Pir Zahray Shah & Wife of former MNA Syed Murtaza Amin |
Maryam Nawaz | NA-119 Lahore | PML-N | Daughter of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Niece of former Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif |
Tehmina Daultana | NA-158 Vehari | PML-N | Niece of former Punjab Chief Minister Mumtaz Daulatana |
Shezra Mansab Ali Khan Kharal | NA-112 Nankana Sahib | PML-N | Daughter of former MNA Rai Mansab Ali Khan |
Shazia Marri | NA-209 Sanghar | PPP | Daughter of former MNA Atta Muhammad Marri |
Nafisa Shah | NA-202 Khairpur | PPP | Daughter of former Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah |
Aasia Ishaq Siddiqui | NA-232 | MQM | - |
Table Source: Election Commission of Pakistan (https://www.elections.gov.pk/national-assembly)
The author, Ritvik Singh Sabharwal, is a student at School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Featured image credit: Geo.tv
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