Women have played a marginal role in Nauru’s Parliamentary history. There are currently no women Members of Parliament, and there has only ever been one female MP. Nor are measures in place which aim to redress this situation, despite growing acknowledgement that broad political reform is crucial, given the country’s history of governance-related difficulties, dissipation of financial revenues and the impending exhaustion of phosphate exports. This study investigates the barriers to women’s participation in Parliament. It is intended to explore ways of generating a more facilitating environment for women’s participation in the political arena. How can women come to play a more significant role in policy formulation and decision making? What reforms might ensure that women come to be seen, heard and recognised?

The research conducted to enable completion of this study focuses on the operation and conduct of Nauru’s voting system, asking whether electoral reforms might enhance the position of women. Nauru has an internationally unusual electoral system; voters cast a preferential ballot in multi-member constituencies. Each voter is required to record as many preferences as there are candidates. All preferences are then immediately tallied. A first preference is worth ‘1’, a second preference ‘0.5’, a third preference ‘0.33’,
a fourth preference ‘0.25’ and so on. Seven constituencies return two members to Parliament, and one constituency returns four members. Clearly, usage of multi-member constituencies, which is elsewhere in the world often identified as beneficial to women’s political participation, has not assisted the position on Nauru. A further reaching investigation is required, both of structural-institutional obstacles to women’s participation and of scope for concerted action by women’s groups and civil society organisations to challenge male dominance over the political arena.

The research underlying this study was based on interviews, and discussions among focus groups, and was aimed at identifying obstacles to women’s participation in politics. Many of these barriers were found to be bound up with prevalent attitudes, negative perceptions abut women’s potential contribution or conservative views regarding women’s position in Nauruan society. Often, as in other parts of the Pacific, weak sex balance in Parliament was identified with ‘tradition’. Such attitudes persist, in part, because few women have been able to break the mould by emerging as recognised national leaders. Nevertheless, women do play an important role in Nauruan society, both inside and outside formal employment. Women perform strongly in the professions, in education and in the civil service. In this sense, there is something of a mismatch between women’s position in public life and their negligible involvement in national politics. As Nauru turns towards a greater recognition of the need for wholesale economic reform and transformation of entrenched political mismanagement, this report suggests that the time is ripe to consider creating a more enabling environment for women’s involvement in politics.

The report also considers formal barriers to women’s participation. It looks at the country’s Constitution, land laws, and at the distribution of revenues arising from phosphate exports. It looks at constraints inhibiting women putting themselves forward as candidates for election, and in particular at the ‘platforms’ where citizens gather to hear prospective candidates appeal for support from electorates. It examines the practice of transferring registrations from one constituency to another in pursuit of electoral advantage. It considers whether reserved seats for women might provide a workable option in Nauru, or whether enhanced women’s participation might better be left either as an issue to be promoted by women’s organisations themselves or for a time when suitable candidates emerge on the national stage.