Quotas are not the problem

One could bet one's own salary on it. A female minister is ending in the cabinet – evidence that women do not fit into politics, unpredictable female deputies have a hold over the government – and here you have it again, they are simply not genetically equipped for it. On the weekend, the Social Democrats did not succeed in electing a vice-chairwoman as set by the party statutes, and this time the quotas were to pay for it – a tool that political parties normally use to help women in politics.

But it is not like that at all. The Social Democratic embarrassment is not proof that quotas do not work. The incumbent vice-chairwoman and at first the only candidate for the position, Jana Vaňhová, deserved to be defeated. She was almost invisible during the four years she has been in the post. She did not talk to journalists, nobody knew her opinions – behaviour typical of her male colleagues across the political spectrum. A typical example would be Pavel Bém, the man governing the capital and until recently with ambitions to rule the whole country. And though she was not the main mover, she was definitely the most visible face of the Ústí nad Labem reshuffle, which did not end with Jaroslav Foldyna, the leader of the Social Democratic ballot, taking the post of the regional governor, but with Vaňhová, the number two on the ballot, taking the post. Moreover,…