Why People Back Gender Quotas in Morocco and Tunisia: Government Performance Matters

📍 What This Study Asks

This paper investigates what drives citizens' support for electoral gender quotas in less democratic settings, focusing on two Arab countries—authoritarian Morocco and transitioning Tunisia—both often cited for progressive gender policies.

📊 Original Surveys in Morocco and Tunisia

• New survey data collected in Morocco (authoritarian) and Tunisia (transitioning).
• Both countries chosen for their recent gender-policy visibility and differing political contexts.

🔎 How Citizens Form Attitudes Toward Quotas

• In environments where political information is limited, citizens rely on assessments of government performance to form views about gender quotas.
• Electoral legitimacy—the extent to which elections and legislatures are seen as fair and effective—also shapes quota support because quotas are closely linked to how electoral institutions operate.

🧾 Key Findings

• Empirical evidence strongly supports the expectation that perceived government performance predicts support for gender quotas.
• Perceptions of electoral legitimacy independently influence quota support, reflecting the institutional connection between quotas, elections, and legislatures.
• Important gender differences emerge in these relationships, indicating men and women respond differently to performance and legitimacy cues.

⚖️ Why It Matters

These results shift attention away from individual political knowledge and toward regime performance and institutional legitimacy as drivers of public attitudes on representation in authoritarian and transitioning contexts. Findings have implications for how advocates and policymakers frame quota proposals and for research on representation in non-democratic settings.