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Good practice Imported

Kazakhstan's Combined 30% Quota for Women, Youth & Persons with Disabilities on Party Lists — A Cautionary Case

Kazakhstan · Astana · See the Kazakhstan profile · See the Astana profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 80% 37/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Kazakhstan's 2020 law requires 30% of party-list candidates be women, youth or disabled combined, not women specifically. A 2024 peer-reviewed study found women's Mazhilis seats fell from 27.4% to 17.6% after 2023; UN Women urges a women-only quota instead.

27.4 %
Women's Mazhilis representation, 2021 election
17.6 %
Women's Mazhilis representation, 2023 election
100 of 146
WEF political-empowerment subindex rank (2023)
Kazakhstan's Combined 30% Quota for Women, Youth & Persons with Disabilities on Party Lists — A Cautionary Case

Details

Maturity
Established
Promoter
Government of Kazakhstan (Central Election Commission, Election Law amendments); critically monitored by UN Women Kazakhstan
Period
2020–present (applied in the 2021 and 2023 Mazhilis elections)
Keywords
electoral gender quotas, political participation, legislative reform, women's political empowerment

Context

In May 2020, Kazakhstan amended its Election Law to require women, youth under 29, and persons with disabilities to together make up at least 30% of each party's candidate list — a combined-category quota, not one reserved specifically for women. Because lists are closed, parties retain discretion over which listed candidates take seats.

Results

A peer-reviewed 2024 study found women's Mazhilis representation fell from 27.4% after the 2021 election to 17.6% after 2023 — the lowest since 2005 — despite the quota remaining formally in force; only 2 of the parties elected exceeded 30% women deputies, and the ruling Amanat party sent just 10 of 62 deputies as women despite meeting the list-level quota.

Conclusions

UN Women's Europe and Central Asia office has publicly called for Kazakhstan to adopt a separate, women-specific quota, explicitly because the current combined quota is diluted by youth and disability candidates.

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

Conditions for success

  • a women-specific (not combined-category) reserved quota, per UN Women's recommendation

Common failure modes

  • combined quota diluted by youth/disability candidates
  • closed-list system lets parties reorder who actually takes seats

Commonly funded by

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Data sources

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

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