evidoria

← Back to browse

Good practice Imported

Algeria's Gender Candidate Quota (Organic Law 12-03) and Its 2021 Rollback

Algeria · Algiers · See the Algeria profile · See the Algiers profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 75% 41/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Algeria's 2012 quota law (Organic Law 12-03) lifted women's share of parliamentary seats from 7.7% to 31.6% by rejecting non-compliant lists outright. A 2021 electoral reform replaced the enforceable quota with a nominal parity rule, and women's representation collapsed back to 8

7.7 %
Women's seat share, 2007 election
31.6 %
Women's seat share, 2012 election
8.11 %
Women's seat share, 2021 election
Algeria's Gender Candidate Quota (Organic Law 12-03) and Its 2021 Rollback

Details

Maturity
Discontinued
Promoter
Algerian People's National Assembly (Organic Law 12-03 / 2021 electoral law reform)
Period
2007-2021
Keywords
politics, electoral law, gender quotas, legislature

Context

Algeria's 2012 Organic Law 12-03 introduced a sliding-scale candidate quota (20-50% women, varying by constituency) with hard enforcement: non-compliant lists were rejected outright and parties received extra funding per woman elected.

Results

Women's parliamentary seat share rose from 7.7% (2007) to 31.6% (2012) — one of the largest single-election jumps recorded worldwide — and held at 25.76% (2017). In 2021, Algeria replaced the closed reserved-seat list with an open list and a non-binding 'parity' requirement; women's share collapsed to 8.11%.

Conclusions

One of the starkest documented illustrations that a candidate quota's design and enforcement mechanism, not just its stated target, determines whether it converts into actual seats.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Low (< €50k)
Time to results
Short (< 1 year)
Staffing & skills
electoral commission list-compliance reviewers

Conditions for success

  • closed-list system with binding rejection of non-compliant lists
  • financial incentives tied to women elected

Common failure modes

  • 2021 switch to an open list with a non-binding parity requirement removed the enforcement mechanism, reversing a decade of gains

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

Indicative funding routes for practices of this type — always check each programme's current calls and eligibility rules.

Do you run this practice? Claim it — verified implementers get a public contact pathway and can propose corrections.

Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

Similar practices you may find useful