<p>The present study is focused on the female parliamentary members as agents: those who forced their way through the power structures, those who were elected to political commissions of trust, and those who managed to pursue political issues in the maledominated environment. The overall aim of the study has been to investigate the roots of the female parliamentary members’ political actions and their ability to act strategically and purposfully in order to obtain power in the Swedish bicameral Riksdag. By depicting a collective biography of the female parliamentary members I have investigated how the individual female politicians advanced in their careers and explained the changes over time.</p><p>Four problem areas were investigated. The gender structure in the Riksdag was studied through mapping of the female parliamentary members’ backgrounds and career routes. The women’s political interests and work in the Riksdag were studied. In addition I investigated whether there was any cooperation among the female parliamentary members and whether on some occasions they cooperated in order to promote common female interests and also whether there were women in the Riksdag who worked and cooperated in order to level out the gender differences in society. Finally the female parliamentary members’ views of the parliamentary and party work were studied.</p><p>When the Riksdag was first opened to female members the structures isolated them. The men did not admit them into the work of the Riksdag on the same conditions. The women were restricted by the gender order of the Riksdag, but some agents could still modify the structural conditions. Some of the female agents broke their isolation by acting collectively. Their work on the female issues gave them legitimacy in time. They acquired channels in order to work for their interests. They widened their areas of interest and in time they managed to take part in the work of the committees and parliamentary groups. They were then rewarded with assignments. The male parliamentary members admitted the female parliamentary members into politics. They also started co-operating with the men to an increasingly high degree. At the end of the period of investigation the female parliamentary members became more and more integrated in the work of the Riksdag. The great usefulness of the female parliamentary members’ work did not manifest itself however until the 1970s, when they were very successful in their political endeavours and the female representation increased considerably.</p>

The present study is focused on the female parliamentary members as agents: those who forced their way through the power structures, those who were elected to political commissions of trust, and those who managed to pursue political issues in the maledominated environment. The overall aim of the study has been to investigate the roots of the female parliamentary members’ political actions and their ability to act strategically and purposfully in order to obtain power in the Swedish bicameral Riksdag. By depicting a collective biography of the female parliamentary members I have investigated how the individual female politicians advanced in their careers and explained the changes over time. Four problem areas were investigated. The gender structure in the Riksdag was studied through mapping of the female parliamentary members’ backgrounds and career routes. The women’s political interests and work in the Riksdag were studied. In addition I investigated whether there was any cooperation among the female parliamentary members and whether on some occasions they cooperated in order to promote common female interests and also whether there were women in the Riksdag who worked and cooperated in order to level out the gender differences in society. Finally the female parliamentary members’ views of the parliamentary and party work were studied. When the Riksdag was first opened to female members the structures isolated them. The men did not admit them into the work of the Riksdag on the same conditions. The women were restricted by the gender order of the Riksdag, but some agents could still modify the structural conditions. Some of the female agents broke their isolation by acting collectively. Their work on the female issues gave them legitimacy in time. They acquired channels in order to work for their interests. They widened their areas of interest and in time they managed to take part in the work of the committees and parliamentary groups. They were then rewarded with assignments. The male parliamentary members admitted the female parliamentary members into politics. They also started co-operating with the men to an increasingly high degree. At the end of the period of investigation the female parliamentary members became more and more integrated in the work of the Riksdag. The great usefulness of the female parliamentary members’ work did not manifest itself however until the 1970s, when they were very successful in their political endeavours and the female representation increased considerably.

This thesis aims to explore the link between women’s descriptive representation and substantive representation in the 20th National Assembly of the Republic of Korea according to the different conceptualization of women’s substantive representation. First, the link between women’s descriptive representation and substantive representation is examined by investigating whether women legislators introduce bills for women’s interests and succeed in passing such bills more than men. Plus, women legislators’ impact on the introduction of bills for women’s interests and success to pass such bills is explored separately according to different definitions of women’s interests, feminist and traditional women’s interests. This thesis also seeks to compare the influence of quota women with non-quota women on introducing bills for women’s interest and being able to pass such bills. The effect of legislators’ gender and quota women on women’s substantive representation is analyzed by running multivariate OLS regressions. The result strongly supports the positive impact of female legislators on the substantive representation of women. The regression analysis result indicates that being female is positively and significantly related to all types of women’s substantive representation, except the introduction of traditional women’s interests bills. The positive effect of the female legislators is more robust on the introduction of feminist women’s interests bills than the passage of them. However, the positive effect of the female legislators is stronger on the passage of traditional women’s interests bills than the introduction of them. When I compare the connection between women’s descriptive representation and substantive representation according to the different definitions of women’s interests, female legislators are more positively related to feminist women’s interests than traditional women’s interests. The result mildly supports the positive moderating effect of quota women on the link between women’s descriptive representation and substantive representation. These findings indicate that women legislators and quota women improve women’s substantive representation in the Republic of Korea. Specific effects of female legislators and quota women on women’s substantive representation are varied depending on different aspects of substantive representation and different definitions of women’s interests.