Challenging Gender Inequality Within the State: Policy Agencies and Quota Laws in Latin America

Abstract

As part of democratization, Latin American nations created institutions to increase women’s political representation and to promote gender equality. This chapter compares the implementation and success of the national gender machinery in Chile (Servicio Nacional de la Mujer) to Argentina’s pioneering gender quota law. Both institutional mechanisms succeded in representing women's interest in certain policy areas. Yet, neither policy agencies nor gender quotas can fully combat women’s marginalization within the apparatus of the state as a whole. The chapter suggest that institutional layering, meaning the evolution of new formal rules and informal practices, can either challenge or uphold elite mes's dominance over the policy agenda.