Tam Parl Aff SG

Parliamentary Affairs (2020) 73, 759–789 doi:10.
1093/pa/gsz019
Advance Access Publication 30 June 2019
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Women’s Political Representation in a Hybrid
and Patriarchal Regime: Evidence from
Singapore
Waikeung Tam*
Department of Political Science, Lingnan University, Tuen Mun, Hong Kong
* Correspondence: [email protected]
This article investigates women’s political representation in a hybrid and patriar-

chal regime—Singapore. Specifically, it examines whether female legislators in
Singapore put more emphasis on women’s rights and traditional women’s con-
cerns than male legislators. We answer this question through conducting content
analyses of the questions raised by legislators at the plenary meetings during the
10th–12th Parliaments of Singapore (2002–2015). Our results demonstrate that
female legislators in Singapore were more likely to provide substantive represen-
tation on women’s interests than male legislators. Besides gender, this study
shows that legislators’ political affiliation crucially affected the likelihood of them
to represent traditional women’s concerns but not women’s rights. Opposition
legislators were more likely than People’s Action Party legislators to ask questions
on traditional women’s concerns. Finally, legislators’ ethnicity mattered, given
that ethnic minority legislators (Malay, Indian and Eurasian legislators) were more
likely to raise questions on women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns (ex-
cept environment) than Chinese legislators.
Keywords: Gender, Ethnicity, Legislator Policy Preferences, Political

Representation, Singapore, Women’s Representation
1. Introduction
Does the presence of women in politics make a difference to the substantive rep-
resentation of women? Does the gender of legislators affect their representational
behaviour? Does it matter which women hold seats in the legislature? For exam-
ple, are ethnic minority women legislators more likely to promote women’s inter-
ests than non-ethnic minority women legislators? This study of Singapore seeks
to address the foregoing questions on gender and political representation.
# The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Hansard Society; all rights reserved.
For permissions, please e-mail: [email protected]
760 Parliamentary Affairs
Scholars of political representation have long interested in studying the relation-
ship between women’s descriptive and substantive representation. Much of the
literature relates to the USA, Western Europe and Latin America. In their over-
view of the field of gender and politics, Paxton et al. (2007, p. 275) encourage
researchers to devote more effort to analyse women’s representation in non-
Western regions like Asia.
Inspired by Paxton et al.’s call, a growing literature on women’s political repre-
sentation in Asia has been produced. Costa et al. (2013), Tam (2017a,b), Jacob
(2014) and Rai and Spary (2018), for example, have examined the impact of legis-
lator gender on women’s substantive representation in Timor-Leste, Hong Kong
and India, respectively. This article contributes to this growing body of research
on women’s political representation in Asia by examining women’s political rep-
resentation in Singapore—a hybrid and patriarchal regime. Specifically, it
explores whether female legislators in Singapore put more emphasis on women’s
rights and traditional women’s concerns than male legislators. We answer this
question through conducting content analyses of the questions raised by legisla-
tors at the plenary meetings during the 2002–2006, 2006–2011 and 2011–2015
sessions of the Parliament of Singapore (i.e. the 10th–12th Parliament). Apart
from adding to the growing literature on women’s representation in Asia, our
study also sheds new light on two areas. First, this article explores an important
and yet under-researched topic in Singapore’s parliamentary politics, namely the
representational behaviour in a hegemonic-party dominated parliament. Most
studies on Singapore’s parliamentary politics focus on parliamentary elections
and overlook the actual behaviour of legislators after they are elected. Secondly,
responding to Simien (2007), Smooth (2011) and Taylor-Robinson’s (2014) call
for incorporating intersectionality more fully into research on political represen-
tation, particularly the impact of intersectionality of gender and ethnicity on po-
litical behaviour, this study addresses how gender and ethnicity of Singapore’s
legislators interacted to influence their representational behaviour.
This article proceeds as follows. First, it reviews the literature on women’s rep-
resentation in the political process, gender differences and legislator policy prefer-
ences, and Singapore’s parliamentary politics. Secondly, it discusses the
Parliament of Singapore, focusing on its hegemonic-party dominated nature, and
gender and ethnic composition. The third section outlines the data and methods
of this study. The fourth section presents the major findings of this study. There
is then a discussion before the final section concludes.
2. Literature review
The literature review discusses important works on three major themes: the sig-
nificance of women’s descriptive representation to the political process, the effect
of gender differences on legislator policy preferences paying particular attention
Women’s Political Representation 761
to whether female legislators put more emphasis on women’s interests than male
legislators, and Singapore’s parliamentary politics.
2.1 Significance of women’s descriptive representation to the political process

Existing works on political representation have demonstrated the importance of
women’s descriptive representation to the political process. Lawless (2004), for
example, finds that women represented by women tend to have more favourable
assessments of their members of Congress. Schwindt-Bayer and Mishler’s (2005)
analysis of the data from 31 democracies in the mid-1990s shows that both male
and female citizens’ perceptions of the legitimacy of the legislature were improved
by increased numbers of female legislators. According to Barnes and Burchard’s
(2013) analysis of Afrobarometer data from 20 African countries, increases in
women’s presence in the national legislature are associated with enhancement of
women’s political engagement relative to that of men. This helps to narrow the
gender gap in political engagement. Women’s descriptive representation in legis-
lature can also increase women’s belief in women’s ability to govern, as argued by
Alexander (2012). More importantly, the relationship between women’s presence
in legislature and women’s beliefs in their ability to govern is a virtuous cycle of
mutually reinforcing changes in women’s empowerment as political leaders.
Finally, Moreland and Watson’s (2016) study of capital punishment laws in 125
countries show that women’s legislative representation is significantly correlated
with the abolition of capital punishment.
2.2 Gender differences and legislators’ policy preferences

A rich body of research has contended that the identities and life experiences of
legislators shape their preferences and representational behaviour. Burden
(2007), for example, argues that legislators’ preferences depend partly on their
personal traits and backgrounds, among which is ‘gender’. It is assumed that the
different life experiences and perspectives that women possess (e.g. motherhood
and the traditional caretaking responsibility) contribute to differences in policy
preferences between female and male legislators. Compared to male legislators,
female legislators are expected to put more efforts to advancing ‘women’s rights’
and ‘traditional women’s concerns’. Before reviewing existing literature, we elab-
orate the concepts of ‘women’s rights’ and ‘traditional women’s concerns’.
Molyneux’s (1985) study of ‘strategic gender interests’ and ‘practical gender
interests’ offers a useful framework. Strategic gender interests center on eliminat-
ing women’s subordination by promoting gender equality, women’s emancipa-
tion like the rights to abortion, and ending violence and discrimination against
women. Women’s rights are a central component of strategic gender interests.
Practical gender interests focus on the practical concerns that women face within
the gender division of labour. Issues related to children and families, healthcare,
education, social welfare and environment are practical gender interests.
Numerous studies have been conducted to evaluate whether female legislators
put more efforts to advancing ‘women’s rights’ and ‘traditional women’s con-
cerns’ than their male counterparts. In her analysis of the lower houses of 12 state
legislatures, Thomas (1991, 1994) finds that female legislators introduced more
bills on women’s rights, children and families. However, compared to their male
colleagues, female legislators did not assign a higher priority to healthcare, educa-
tion, welfare and environment. Jones’ (1997) study of the Argentina Chamber of
Deputies and the US States House of Representatives in the 1993–1994 legislative
year also observed that female legislators in these legislatures were significantly
more likely to introduce bills related to women’s rights and children and families
than male legislators. But there was not much gender difference regarding other
traditional women’s concerns. Swers’ (2002) research of the 103rd and 104th US
Congress shows that female legislators were more likely to support and vote for
women’s issue bills, such as abortion and protection of women against violent
crimes than their male counterparts. In their analysis of floor speeches in the US
Senate during 1999–2000, Osborn and Mendez (2010) highlights that female sen-
ators devoted a significantly higher percentage of their speeches to women’s
rights and families. However, when it came to discussion of other traditional
women’s concerns like welfare and education, there was no significant difference
between female and male senators. MacDonald and O’Brien (2011) also show
that female members of the US House of Representatives sponsored feminist bills
more frequently than male members during 1973–2002.
Gender differences in legislators’ policy preferences are also observed in
Britain and Latin America. Childs and Withey (2004) find that labour women
members of parliament (MPs) were more likely than labour’s men to sign both
women’s and feminist women’s early day motions in the 1997 UK parliament.
Catalano’s (2009) study of the British House of Commons during 2005–2007
shows that female MPs participated disproportionately in debates on healthcare
issues (a traditional women’s concern) than male MPs. More importantly, female
MPs used these debates to raise women’s concerns, like protection of women
from violence and sexual exploitation. Regarding Latin America, Htun et al.
(2013) find that between 1983 and 2007, female legislators of the Argentina
Congress were more active than male legislators to initiate bills on women’s
rights. Contrary to the positive impact of women’s descriptive representation on
substantive representation as reported by Htun et al. (2013), Franceschet and
Piscopo (2008) and Franceschet (2011) highlight the importance of the broader
institutional environment in affecting the efforts of female legislators to promote
women’s interests. Franceschet and Piscopo (2008) investigate how the
institutional features and gender bias in the legislative environment have under-
mined the effectiveness of gender quotas to enhance women’s substantive repre-
sentation in Argentina. Franceschet (2011) adopts a gendered institutionalist
approach to explore how the formal and informal organisational rules in legisla-
tures such as the location of policy gate-keepers and the norm of consensus-
seeking and conflict avoidance have shaped the process and outcomes of wom-
en’s substantive representation in Argentina and Chile.
The foregoing literature has a strong focus on cases in the USA, Western
Europe and Latin America. Inspired by Paxton et al.’s (2007) call for more re-
search on women’s political representation in Asia, a growing body of scholarship
on this topic has emerged. Tam (2017a,b) examine the relationship between
women’s descriptive and substantive representation in the semi-democratic legis-
lature in Hong Kong. His research shows that women legislators are more active
than men to advocate women’s rights. Costa et al. (2013) find that the establish-
ment of a cross-party parliamentary women’s caucus in Timor-Leste played a
crucial role in enabling women legislators in that new democracy to pass a parlia-
mentary resolution on gender-responsive budgeting in 2009. Jacob (2014) and
Rai and Spary (2018) investigate the dynamics of the efforts by women
MPs in promoting women’s interests in the most populous democracy in the
world—India.
Political representation scholarship has also examined Asian democratic
regimes that are patriarchal such as South Korea and Japan. However, this schol-
arship focuses on women’s descriptive representation rather than the link be-
tween women’s descriptive and substantive representation. Park (1999), for
instance, explains women’s political under-representation in South Korea in the
first decade after the country embarked on democratisation in the late 1980s.
Chin (2004) investigates the reasons behind the failure of Korean feminists to in-
crease women’s descriptive representation in local legislatures during the 1990s.
Finally, Lee and Shin (2016) study how the clientelist practices by party leaders in
South Korea have undermined the effectiveness of candidate gender quotas in en-
hancing women’s political representation in elected offices. Concerning women’s
political representation in Japan, Bochel and Bochel (2005), Eto (2010) and Kage
et al. (2018) study the major factors contributing to under-representation of
women in elected offices in Japan, such as the conservative attitude towards gen-
der equality and socially mandated family roles for women. Nevertheless, these
studies pay little if any attention to the question of gender and women’s substan-
tive representation in Japan.
The foregoing discussion demonstrates that a growing literature on women’s
political representation in Asia has emerged. While providing important insights
into the dynamics of women’s representation in Asia, there is still much fruitful
ground for research on this topic. First, given the diversity of socio-political
systems in Asia, women’s political representation in many Asian countries is
under-studied. Secondly, except for Costa et al. (2013), Jacob (2014), Tam
(2017a,b) and Rai and Spary (2018), the existing studies focus on women’s de-
scriptive representation, especially the major hurdles to election of women to par-
liaments. The impact of gender on women’s substantive representation is under-
researched. Our study contributes to the growing body of work on women’s po-
litical representation in Asia not only because this topic is unexplored in the
Singapore context but also because it provides an opportunity to examine the re-
lationship between gender and women’s substantive representation in a hybrid
and patriarchal regime.
Are female legislators more likely to promote women’s rights and traditional
women’s concerns than males under a hybrid and patriarchal regime like
Singapore? The next paragraphs review the major features of Singapore’s political
system and the existing works on Singapore’s parliamentary politics so as to pro-
vide an informed context for our discussion later.
2.3 Singapore: a hybrid and patriarchal regime

Students of democratic development like Diamond (2002, p. 25) have described
Singapore as a hybrid regime. One salient feature of the hybrid regime is hege-
monic electoral authoritarianism whereby a hegemonic party repeatedly secures
overwhelming electoral victory under unfair conditions. Singapore has a hege-
monic party system as the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) has won the vast
majority of the parliamentary seats since Singapore’s independence in 1965. This
enduring dominance resulted from various measures adopted by the PAP, in-
cluding calibrated coercion (press controls) (George, 2007), tightening restric-
tions on civil society (Lyons, 2000), clientelism (Chua, 2000), and manipulation
of electoral rules like the introduction of the group representation constituency
scheme (Mutalib, 2002; Tan and Grofman, 2018). Singapore’s opposition parties,
thereby, face severe institutional disadvantages. As mentioned by Tan (2015b,
p. 55), except for the Workers’ Party (the leading opposition party), opposition
parties in Singapore are inactive between elections and under-institutionalised.
Only the Workers’ Party and the National Solidarity Party have functioning
committees.
The aforementioned repressive measures in turn have denied opposition par-
ties in Singapore any meaningful opportunity of competing for power. Slater
(2012, p. 19) highlights that meaningful amounts of power never change hands in
Singapore’s hybrid regime. The lack of meaningful electoral competition is likely
to weaken the hegemonic party’s incentive to whole-heartedly appeal to women’s
votes. This may help to explain why the PAP-dominated parliament did not ac-
tively promote women’s rights during the period of this study. As will be
discussed later, the number of parliamentary questions on women’s rights almost
remained unchanged during the period of our study, whereas other types of par-
liamentary questions experienced dramatic growth.
Singapore adopts a unicameral parliamentary system. Before 1984, all MPs
were elected by universal suffrage. The Singapore government introduced two
new paths to become MPs in 1984 and 1990, respectively. In 1984, the non-con-
stituency MP (NCMP) system was adopted. Under the NCMP system, when the
opposition failed to capture any seat in the election, the three highest-scoring op-
position candidates would become MPs through the NCMP scheme. In 1990, the
government introduced the nominated MP (NMP) scheme under which up to
nine NMPs will be seated in the Parliament. NMPs must not be members of any
political party. They serve a two-and-a-half-year term and may be reappointed
for another term only. The general public and seven functional groups can sub-
mit names of individuals for consideration to become NMPs. An eight-member
Special Select Committee, chaired by Speaker of Parliament and dominated by
PAP MPs, makes the decision (K. P. Tan, 2014).
Singapore is a patriarchal state. The PAP government has championed the pa-
triarchal value of man as the head and primary provider of household (E. Tan,
2008). A variety of gender-biased policies have made women subordinate to men
in different spheres of public life and three cases are discussed here. The first con-
cerns unequal benefits for female civil servants. Until 2004, only male civil serv-
ants were entitled to benefits for their spouses and children. Responding to
demands for change, the government extended the benefits to female civil serv-
ants in 2004. However, in announcing this decision, Prime Minister Lee Hsien
Loong pointed out that women still had to ‘make sure your husband looks after
you’ (Teo, 2007, p. 429). The second concerns a gender-biased citizenship law.
Before the 2004 constitutional amendment, female Singaporeans could not pass
on citizenship by descent to their foreign-born child. The child would be granted
citizenship only if his/her father was a Singapore citizen by birth. Rather than
promoting gender equality, the removal of this gender-biased citizenship law in
2004 was mainly caused by continued decline of population growth in Singapore
and the subsequent need to attract foreign talents. After the constitutional
amendments, the PAP government still emphasised that Singapore remained a
patriarchal society (E. Tan, 2008, pp. 79 and 85). The last case concerns the intro-
duction of paternity leave by the government in 2013. The paid paternity leave is
only 1 week, which is hardly matched by the 16-week maternity leave. The differ-
ence shows that women still take up the major responsibility for childcare. A key
message revealed by these three cases can be captured by K. P. Tan’s (2009, p. 45)
comment: ‘Singapore women are still being considered (by the PAP government)
as responsible for reproducing the nation, their bodies seen as machines for
producing the future workforce . . . Women’s concerns, however, do not have se-
rious attention from the government.’
Singapore is a largely conservative society as well. According to a survey con-
ducted with about 4000 Singapore residents in 2013, for example, many of the
respondents opposed pre-marital sex, having a child out of wedlock, and homo-
sexual relations (Yuen-c and Mokhtar 2014). More importantly, male dominance
over women is a salient feature of Singapore’s society and culture. As put forth by
Purushotam (1997, p. 542), submissiveness to males (e.g. daughter to father and
wife to husband) is common in everyday life in Singapore. Wives, for example,
have to negotiate with their husbands before they can seek employment.
Accordingly, women are not autonomous individuals. The possible impact of
Singapore’s conservative social values on women’s representation will be explored
in Sections 4 and 5.1
Women were seriously under-represented in the Parliament of Singapore be-
fore 2001. Between 1970 and 1984, there was no female legislator (Tan, 2015a).
From the sixth to ninth Parliament, elected female MPs accounted for less than
5% of the total number of MPs. It was not until the 10th Parliament that there
was an obvious increase in women’s presence, as elected female MPs accounted
for close to 10% of the total number of MPs. If female NMPs are included, the
figure went up to 17.5% (Table 1). Women’s presence witnessed further improve-
ment in the 11th and 12th parliamentary sessions, as elected female MPs in-
creased to 16.7% and 18.5% of the total number of MPs, respectively. The figure
increased to about 26% if we include female NMPs and female NCMPs (Table 1).
The Parliament of Singapore has not adopted gender quota to guarantee female
legislative representation. As argued by Tan (2015a), the increase in women’s
presence in Singapore’s Parliament was caused by the adoption of a party quota
for female candidates by the PAP in 2009 and the growing number and sizes of
the group representation constituency.
The ethnic composition of the Parliament of Singapore also merits our atten-
tion. As will be discussed later, ethnicity of MPs is an important factor affecting
an MP’s likelihood to advance women’s interests. Singapore is a multi-ethnic
country. According to the General Household Survey 2015, Singapore consisted
of ethnic Chinese (77%), Malays (12%), Indians (8%) and others including
Eurasians (3%). The government introduced an ethnic quota policy in 1988 with
the adoption of the electoral system of group representation constituencies
(GRCs). Under GRCs system, voters cast their votes for an entire team of three to
1
Given that both regime and society in Singapore are patriarchal, the findings of our study (the repre-
sentational behavior of MPs in Singapore) can either be caused by the patriarchal regime or society, or
both. It is beyond the scope of this article to provide a definite answer to this question and it will be
left for future research.
Table 1 Number and percentage of female MPs in the Parliament of Singapore (1985–2015)
Parliamentary Total Elected Female Female Percentage of Percentage of Total
session number of female NMPs NCMPs elected female total number number
female MPs MPs as total of female MPs of MPs
MPs number of MPs as total
number of MPs
Sixth parliament 3 3 0 0 3.8 3.8 79

Seventh parliament 4 4 0 0 4.8 4.8 84
Eighth parliament 4 2 2 0 2.2 4.4 91
Ninth parliament 8 4 4 0 4 8.1 99
Tenth parliament 18 10 8 0 9.7 17.5 103
Eleventh parliament 27 17 9 1 16.7 26.5 102
Twelfth parliament 28 20 7 1 18.5 25.9 108
Source: Calculation based on https://www.parliament.gov.sg/history/list-of-mps-by-parliament. Accessed on

8 April 2018.
Table 2 Ethnic composition of the Parliament of Singapore (2002–2015)
Parliamentary session Chinese Malay Indian Eurasian Percentage of Total

MPs MPs MPs MPs ethnic minority number
MPs as of MPs
total number
of MPs
Tenth parliament 77 12 13 1 25.2 103

Eleventh parliament 75 12 12 3 26.5 102
Twelfth parliament 81 14 12 1 25 108
Source: Calculation based on https://www.parliament.gov.sg/history/list-of-mps-by-parliament. Accessed on

8 April 2018.
six candidates of a single party, with at least one candidate from an ethnic minor-
ity community (K. P. Tan, 2014). Table 2 shows the ethnic composition of the
10th–12th Parliaments. Ethnic minority MPs (Malay, Indian and Eurasian MPs)
accounted for about one-fourth of the total number of MPs.
Having outlined the major features of Singapore politics and its parliament,
we review the existing works on Singapore’s parliamentary politics. The extant re-
search on Singapore’s parliamentary politics focuses on parliamentary elections,
including the electoral systems, campaign strategies, and factors influencing the
electoral outcomes (Chong, 2012; N. Tan, 2014; Singh, 2016; Weiss, Loke and
Choa, 2016). While providing insightful analysis of the dynamics of parliamen-
tary elections, the aforementioned works have two limitations: first, they have sel-
dom examined the actual behaviour of MPs after they are elected to the
Parliament. Indeed, scholars of legislative studies have highlighted the
importance of studying the actual behaviour of legislators once they are elected
(Martin et al., 2014). Secondly, the existing studies have not investigated the be-
haviour of Singapore MPs from a gendered perspective. Specifically, are female
MPs in Singapore more likely to advance women’s interests than their male coun-
terparts under a hybrid and patriarchal regime? This article addresses this impor-
tant but under-researched question.
3. Data and methods

This study covers the 10th–12th Parliaments of Singapore (2002–2015). The de-
pendent variable is the policy preferences of MPs, which is measured by analysing
the questions (both oral and written) raised by MPs at the plenary meetings. The
parliamentary Question Time generally lasts for one and a half hours and each
MP may ask up to five questions at any plenary meeting and not more than three
of these questions shall be for oral answer. Questions should be sent to the Clerk
in writing not later than seven days before the sitting day on which the answer is
required. The Speaker of the Parliament, however, can permit a question to be
asked without notice if it is of an urgent character or concerns a matter of public
importance.2
This study uses parliamentary questions raised by MPs to assess their policy
preferences. As argued by Martin (2011, p. 260), analysis of the contents of parlia-
mentary questions allows researchers to understand the policy preferences, inter-
ests and agenda of individual legislators.3 Students of legislative politics in both
authoritarian and democratic regimes have demonstrated the usefulness of this
research method. Malesky and Schuler (2010) conduct content analyses of ques-
tions asked during the 12th session of the Vietnamese National Assembly, in or-
der to examine the policy preferences of the delegates in an authoritarian
parliament. In his study of whether female legislators are more likely to represent
women’s interests than their male counterparts in Hong Kong’s semi-democratic
legislature, Tam (2017b) conducts content analyses of the parliamentary ques-
tions asked at the plenary meetings as well. Scholars of legislative politics in
Western and Asian democracies have also utilised parliamentary questions to
measure the policy preferences and interests of individual legislators. Based on
examination of the parliamentary questions tabled by MPs, Saalfeld (2011) and
Kolpinskaya (2017) investigate the impact of minority ethnic MPs on the
2
Clause 20 of the Standing Orders of the Parliament of Singapore, accessed at https://www.parliament.
gov.sg/docs/default-source/default-document-library/standing-orders-of-the-parliament-of-singapore.
pdf on 24 August 2018.
3
Lovenduski (2014) argues that Question Time in Britain is performative rather than substantive,
although she focuses on Prime Minister’s Question Time.
substantive representation of minority-related issues in the British House of
Commons. Finally, Jacob (2014) relies on parliamentary questions raised during
the Question Time to investigate the impact of the gender of legislator on their
legislative activities in the lower house of the Indian parliament.
The PAP is a cadre party and the party leadership exercises strong party disci-
pline over its MPs (Tan, 2015b, p. 63). It is likely that PAP MPs may not have
complete autonomy regarding the parliamentary questions they raise. Thus, the
questions asked by individual MPs may be assigned by the party, rather than indi-
cating their policy preferences. It is also possible that PAP’s female MPs may feel
more obliged to ask questions on women’s interests because of the adoption of a
party quota for female candidates by the PAP. While these possible influences of
the party cannot be dismissed, we found no evidence that the PAP has restricted
its MPs concerning the types of parliamentary questions that can be raised. In
our review of the literature on Singapore’s politics and the websites of the
Parliament of Singapore and the PAP, we only noticed that the PAP leaders have
emphasised that the party must ensure that its MPs vote according to the party’s
line in the debates of motions and bills. For example, on the website of the
Parliament of Singapore, the PAP mentions that the party whip is to ensure that
there are enough party members in the Chamber to support the party’s position
and that MPs vote according to the party’s line.4 Party control over the content
of parliamentary questions has not been mentioned. This may be because MPs
are not required to vote during the Question Hour. Concerning opposition par-
ties, we likewise found no evidence that they have exercised control over the ques-
tions that their MPs asked. The leading opposition party, the Workers’ Party,
does not have shadow ministerial positions.5 Therefore, the parliamentary ques-
tions asked by opposition MPs should reflect their policy preferences, instead of
their shadow ministerial positions.
Although studies of women’s political representation like Rai and Spary
(2018) and Catalano (2009) have adopted introduction of bills and participation
in debates to assess the policy preferences of individual legislators, our study of
Singapore does not use these measures for the following reasons. In Singapore,
bills are virtually always drafted by the government’s legal officers and introduced
by a cabinet minister. Though MPs are allowed to introduce Private Member’s
Bills, this has merely happened three times in Singapore’s history (K. P. Tan,
2014, p. 31). Accordingly, bill introduction does not enable us to investigate the
policy preferences of the majority of MPs (PAP backbenchers, opposition MPs
4
See the following webpage of the Parliament of Singapore, accessed at https://www.parliament.gov.sg/
about-us/structure/party-whip on 24 February 2019.
5
See the official website of the Workers’ Party, accessed at http://www.wp.sg on 24 February 2019.
and NMPs) in Singapore. While recognising the value of debate participation in
helping us to understand MPs’ policy preferences, space limitation makes it diffi-
cult for us to include this measure in the present study. We will examine gender
and women’s political representation from the perspective of debate participation
in further research.
The questions asked by Singapore MPs were coded according to seven policy
areas. The first was women’s rights. The next five—children and families, health-
care, education, social welfare and environment—are traditional women’s con-
cerns. The final category included all other types of questions. Two examples are
provided here to show how the questions were coded. In the parliamentary meet-
ing on 20 January 2014, MP Lee Bee Wah asked the Minister for Social and
Family Development whether the government has done any study to find out the
reasons for low female representation on the boards of public-listed companies in
Singapore and whether the Ministry has any plans to encourage companies to in-
vite more women to serve on the board of directors.6 Since this question focused
on the status of women (gender equality) and women’s participation in public
affairs, it was coded as ‘women’s rights’. The second example is concerned with
social welfare. On 8 July 2013, MP Mary Liew asked over the past five years how
often the payouts of Public Assistance and ComCare funds have been adjusted in
tandem with inflation, and whether the payouts are adequate for daily sustenance
for the recipients considering inflation.7 Since this question is concerned with the
adequacy of Public Assistance and ComCare scheme in protecting the livelihood
of the disadvantaged, it was coded as ‘social welfare’.
This study has three independent variables: an MP’s gender, party affiliation
of an MP and ethnicity of an MP. Regarding an MP’s gender, female MPs were
coded as ‘1’ and male as ‘0’. Given the different identity, experiences and perspec-
tives that women possess like motherhood and the traditional caretaking role, the
first hypothesis of this study is:
Hypothesis 1: Female MPs were more likely than male MPs to raise parlia-
mentary questions on women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns.
This study includes MPs’ party affiliation as an independent variable. Existing re-
search like Catalano (2009) and Osborn and Mendez (2010) investigates whether
party affiliation by itself can influence MPs’ policy preferences. In the case of
Singapore, would the PAP MPs devote less efforts to promoting women’s rights
6
The Singapore Hansard, 20 January 2014, accessed at https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/home on 24 April
2018.
7
The Singapore Hansard, 8 July 2013, accessed at https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/home on 11 April
2018.
than opposition MPs, given that the PAP is a socially conservative party that
champions the patriarchal view of man as the head of the household and woman
as the family’s caregiver (see Section 1; E. Tan, 2008; Tan, 2015a).8 Moreover, the
hegemonic electoral authoritarian regime and subsequent lack of meaningful
electoral competition may have weakened the incentive of the PAP to whole
heartedly appeal to women voters. The PAP MPs, thereby, may have less incen-
tive than opposition MPs to advocate women’s rights. To address these issues,
this study treats an MP’s party affiliation as an independent variable, with the
PAP MPs coded as ‘1’, opposition MPs as ‘2’,9 and NMPs as ‘3’.10 The second hy-
pothesis of this study is as follows:
Hypothesis 2: Compared to opposition MPs, PAP MPs were less likely to
ask parliamentary questions on women’s rights.
This study also hypothesises that opposition MPs were more likely than PAP
MPs to ask questions on traditional women’s concerns and other types of ques-
tions. This is because compared to PAP MPs, opposition MPs have more incen-
tive to use parliamentary questions as a tool to hold the governing party
accountable like extracting information for scrutiny (Martin, 2011; Vliegenthart
and Walgrave, 2011).
Hypothesis 3: Compared to PAP MPs, opposition MPs were more likely to
ask questions on traditional women’s concerns and other types of questions.
This study includes ethnicity of MPs as an independent variable and examines
how ethnicity and gender of MPs interacted to affect representational behaviour
of MPs in Singapore. Intersectionality has received increasing attention from
scholars of gender and representation in the past decades. Weldon (2006, p. 236),
for example, argues that any complete gender analysis must incorporate analysis
of race, class, sexuality and other axes of inequality, and examine interactions
8
Singapore’s opposition parties can almost be all characterized as left-leaning parties. They are much
less patriarchal than the PAP. The Workers’ Party, for example, opposed the PAP’s patriarchal
Graduate Mother Scheme in 1983, which sought to promote marriage and child bearing of highly edu-
cated women (Ortmann, 2010, pp. 62 and 169). Indeed, some studies such as Tremblay and Pelletier
(2000) and Htun and Power (2006) have shown that left-leaning parties tend to be more likely and ac-
tive in supporting feminist rights.
9
During the period of our study, Singapore’s Parliament only had 12 opposition MPs. Nine came
from the Workers’ Party, two from the Singapore Democratic Alliance and the remaining from the
Singapore People’s Party. In view of the small number of opposition MPs and the fact that most of
them came from the Workers’ Party, we grouped all opposition MPs together in the data analysis, so
that the significance of being an opposition MP can be statistically examined.
10
Nominated members of parliament are non-partisan, as they must not belong to any political party.
among them. This is because these interactions shape gender norms and practices
in many ways. In her review of the field of gender and legislatures, Taylor-
Robinson (2014, pp. 256 and 259) highlights the need to incorporate intersec-
tionality more fully into study of representation, in order to understand how
intersectional identities affect representation and definitions of women interests.
For legislators who wear multiple representational hats (e.g. women legislators
from minority groups), their intersectional identities may have important
implications for their policy priorities. Smooth (2011, p. 438) likewise urges
students of women’s representation to pay more effort to assess how differen-
ces among women according to their race, class and other categories of differ-
ence can influence the definition of women’s interests and the representation
of such interests.
Scholars of women’s representation, including Lovenduski (1998, p. 351),
Simien (2007), and Reingold and Haynie (2014), highlight that race, ethnicity
(and other personal traits) are closely intertwined with gender to shape political
behaviour. An increasing number of studies on gender and legislator policy
preferences in multi-ethnic countries such as Fraga et al. (2006), Orey et al.
(2006) and Reingold and Smith (2012) have analysed how ethnicity of MPs
had intertwined with gender to affect political outcomes. Given that both
women and ethnic minorities are politically minority groups in Singapore
(and many countries), it is likely that ethnic minority MPs in Singapore may
be more sympathetic with women’s interests than Chinese MPs.11 Thus, we
test the fourth hypothesis.
Hypothesis 4: Ethnic minority MPs (Malay, Indian and Eurasian MPs)
were more likely to raise parliamentary questions on women’s rights and
traditional women’s concerns than Chinese MPs.12
11
It should be noted that there may also be cases where intersectionality between gender and ethnicity
can undermine women’s interests. The literature on gender and nationalism has demonstrated the
conservatism of ethno-territorial nationalist discourse. Racioppi and See (2001), for example, find that
intersectionality between gender and ethnicity (Protestant women) in Northern Ireland helped to
maintain male hegemony within unionism and create a gender regime that was highly conservative.
Thapar-Bjorkert (2013) provides an excellent overview of how ethno-territorial nationalism had
undermined women’s rights. One example concerns the development of Serbian nationalism within
Yugoslavia. In view of the fear that Serbia might lose Kosovo to Albania, the reproductive potential of
women was emphasized. Women’s contribution to Serbian national rebirth came from her ability to
produce little Serbs and to bear fighters. Abortion was thus often projected as a threat to the nation
(Thapar-Bjorkert, 2013, p. 812). For a broader discussion of the impact of ethno-territorial national-
ism on gender regime, see Walby (2006) and Thapar-Bjorkert (2013).
12
Malay, Indian and Eurasian MPs were grouped together as ethnic minority MPs in the data analysis.
Chinese MPs were coded as ‘1’ and ethnic minority MPs as ‘2’.
Following Hypothesis 4, this study proposes the fifth hypothesis:
Hypothesis 5: MPs with dual identity, specifically female ethnic minority
MPs, were more likely to raise parliamentary questions on women’s rights
and traditional women’s concerns than female Chinese MPs, male ethnic
minority MPs and male Chinese MPs.13
The demographic variables of MPs, including their tenure (years serving as an
MP), age and the education level, were controlled in the data analysis. Our analy-
sis included tenure of MPs because research has demonstrated that MPs’ tenure
is a crucial factor affecting their legislative performance and behaviour. Jeydel
and Taylor (2003), for example, show that MPs’ tenure substantially influences
legislative effectiveness (turning a bill into law), since longer tenure enables an
MP to acquire useful experiences of the legislative process. Beckwith (2007) sug-
gests that newly elected women MPs may be less likely to support progressive or
radical legislative proposals than incumbent MPs. In the case of Singapore, we
would like to examine whether the length of tenure affects an MP’s likelihood to
ask parliamentary questions on women’s issues. Our analysis included MPs’ age
as well. Age matters in the study of legislative behaviour because legislatures are
often characterised by strong hierarchies based on seniority (Erikson and
Josefsson, 2019). The hierarchical situation may be more serious in the
Parliament of Singapore in light of the hybrid and patriarchal regime. We would
like to explore whether MPs’ age has affected their representational behaviour.
For example, has the strong hierarchy in the Parliament of Singapore discouraged
younger MPs from pursuing women’s rights?
Existing research on women’s political representation has included the class
background of MPs as an independent variable. In their comparative study of
India and the European Union, for example, Hoskyns and Rai (1998) argue that
researchers cannot fully understand the dynamics of feminist politics without
considering the dimension of class. Class differences among women MPs affect
how interests are identified and how problems can be negotiated. Our study of
Singapore, however, does not include MPs’ class as an independent variable. This
is because the class variation among Singapore’s MPs is very small. The ruling
PAP is an elitist and pro-capitalist party and most of its MPs have the upper mid-
dle class background. Only a very small proportion of them have substantial trade
unions and working-class experience (Tan, 2015b; K. P. Tan, 2008). Therefore,
given such a small variation in MPs’ class background, its significance cannot be
statistically examined.
13
Reingold and Smith (2012) and Reingold and Haynie (2014) also find that female ethnic minority
legislators in the USA stand out in introducing bills related to women’s interests.
The data for this study were primarily collected from the official website of the
Parliament of Singapore, which provides rich detail about the operation of the
Parliament, including the proceedings of the meetings (Singapore Hansard) (see
https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/home on 5 March 2018). The Singapore Hansard
records verbatim the proceedings of every plenary meeting. Information about
the questions raised by MPs at the plenary meetings was collected from the
Singapore Hansard. One coder read the proceedings of every plenary meeting
during the 10th, 11th and 12th Parliaments and coded all the questions. Twenty
per cent of the parliamentary questions (out of the total 6678) were randomly
chosen for coding by a second coder. Cohen’s j was run to determine if there was
agreement between two coders’ judgment on the categorisation of policies on
1336 cases. There was strong agreement between the two coders’ judgments, j ¼
0.82 (95% CI, 0.7986–0.8414), p < 0.001. Information about MPs like their de-
mographic backgrounds came from the websites of Parliament and the Singapore
government. Finally, the two major newspapers in Singapore—The Straits Times
and Lianhe Zaobao—served as supplementary sources of information.
It should be noted that our data analysis excluded the Speaker of the
Parliament because the Speaker is responsible for presiding the parliamentary
meeting and does not raise any questions. MPs held ministerial positions were
also excluded because they did not ask any questions.
4. Findings
Table 3 reports descriptive data on the questions raised by MPs. In total, MPs
raised 6678 questions between 2002 and 2015 and they were included in our analy-
sis. Two important findings are highlighted here. First, although accounting for be-
tween 17.5% and about one-fourth of the total number of MPs during the period
of our study, female MPs asked almost 80% of women’s rights questions (Table 3).
The figures provide preliminary support that Singapore’s female MPs put greater
emphasis on women’s rights than male MPs. Secondly, the number of women’s
rights questions did not experience any growth during the period of our study
(remained at about 30), whereas the number of questions on traditional women’s
concerns and other issues witnessed a tremendous increase (Table 3). Such huge
differences between the trend of women’s rights questions and that of all the other
categories of questions may imply that women’s rights (elimination of women’s
subordination) was not among the top concerns of the majority of MPs in
Singapore.14 We will come back to this question in Section 5.
14
It should be noted that analysis of parliamentary questions is just one major method to assess legisla-
tor policy preferences. Researchers have also examined legislator policy preferences through other
perspectives like introduction/sponsorship of bills and participation in parliamentary debates.
Table 3 MPs’ gender and initiation of questions by thematic area in the 10th–12th Parliament of Singapore (2002–2015)
Parliamentary session Gender Number of Number of Number of Number of Number of Number of Number of
women’s children and healthcare education social wel- environment others
rights families questions questions fare questions questions
questions questions questions
Tenth Female (n ¼ 18) 25 (81) 29 (59) 68 (44) 87 (71) 28 (64) 19 (79) 363 (44)
parliament Male (n ¼ 85) 6 (19) 20 (41) 86 (56) 35 (29) 16 (36) 5 (21) 453 (56)
Total (N ¼ 103) 31 (100) 49 (100) 154 (100) 122 (100) 44 (100) 24 (100) 816 (100)
Eleventh Female (n ¼ 27) 23 (77) 56 (75) 121 (60) 85 (56) 54 (64) 29 (45) 665 (51)
Total (N ¼ 102) 30 (100) 75 (100) 202 (100) 152 (100) 84 (100) 64 (100) 1296 (100)
Twelfth Female (n ¼ 28) 23 (77) 73 (53) 133 (37) 96 (30) 63 (39) 37 (37) 753 (31)
Total (N ¼ 108) 30 (100) 138 (100) 358 (100) 316 (100) 163 (100) 100 (100) 2430 (100)
Notes: Values are represented as n (%). Total number of questions asked: 6678, of which 1240 in the 10th Parliament; 1903 in the 11th Parliament; 3535 in the 12th Parliament.
Source: Singapore Hansard.
Women’s Political Representation
775
Table 4 Determinants of Singaporean legislator policy priorities (as shown by the number of
questions raised) during 2002–2015
Variables B SE Wald Exp(B)
Women’s rights
Gender
Female 2.35 0.28 72.05*** 10.49
Political affiliation
PAP 0.49 0.38 1.65 0.61
NMP 0.84 0.41 4.10* 0.43
Ethnicity
Minority 0.87 0.24 13.66*** 2.40
Age 0.03 0.02 3.60 1.03
Tenure 0.11 0.03 9.58** 0.90
Education level
Undergraduate or below 0.22 0.22 0.99 0.80
Children and families
Gender
Female 1.28 0.13 93.13*** 3.59
PAP 0.96 0.17 30.26*** 0.38
NMP 1.66 0.22 54.75*** 0.19
Ethnicity
Minority 0.40 0.15 7.39** 1.50
Age 0.02 0.01 3.49 1.02
Tenure 0.13 0.02 41.61*** 0.88
Education level
Healthcare
Gender
Female 0.73 0.08 85.01*** 2.07
PAP 1.08 0.10 119.98*** 0.34
NMP 2.14 0.16 185.72*** 0.12
Ethnicity
Minority 0.18 0.09 3.95* 1.20
Age 0.00 0.01 0.25 1.00
Tenure 0.10 0.01 87.92*** 0.90
Education level
Undergraduate or below 0.25 0.08 9.96** 0.78
Education
Gender
Female 0.49 0.09 30.18*** 1.64
PAP 0.96 0.12 65.91*** 0.38
NMP 1.44 0.15 90.46*** 0.24
Ethnicity
Minority 0.25 0.10 5.89* 1.28
Age 0.01 0.01 2.21 1.01
Continued
Table 4 Continued
Tenure 0.15 0.01 107.60*** 0.86

Education level
Undergraduate or below 0.20 0.09 4.93* 0.82
Social welfare
Gender
Female 0.88 0.13 48.91*** 2.42
PAP 1.29 0.15 71.78*** 0.28
NMP 2.17 0.23 91.81*** 0.11
Ethnicity
Minority 0.53 0.14 14.69*** 1.70
Age 0.00 0.01 0.17 1.00
Tenure 0.13 0.02 46.58*** 0.88
Education level
Environment
Gender
Female 0.75 0.16 22.03*** 2.11
PAP 0.56 0.26 4.71* .57
NMP 0.56 0.28 3.98* .57
Ethnicity
Minority 0.28 0.18 2.36 1.32
Age 0.03 0.01 5.66* 1.03
Tenure 0.12 0.02 24.88*** 0.89
Education level
Others
Gender
Female 0.35 0.03 118.87*** 1.43
PAP 1.16 0.04 869.26*** 0.31
NMP 1.65 0.05 911.80*** 0.19
Ethnicity
Minority 0.11 0.04 8.02** 0.90
Age 0.00 0.00 0.53 1.00
Tenure 0.10 0.00 517.38*** 0.91
Education level
Ethnic minority related
Gender
Female 0.55 0.29 3.55 1.73
PAP 2.41 0.29 71.04*** 0.09
NMP 2.78 0.47 34.77*** 0.06
Continued
Table 4 Continued
Ethnicity
Minority 3.08 0.35 79.61*** 21.79
Age 0.00 0.02 0.01 1.00
Tenure 0.07 0.04 3.95* 0.93
Education level
*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
To study the impact of gender, party affiliation and ethnicity of MPs, I con-
ducted a series of Poisson regression analyses controlling for tenure, age and edu-
cation level of MPs. Table 4 reports the results of these analyses.
Our results show that MPs’ gender, party affiliation and ethnicity signifi-
cantly predicted the number of questions on women’s rights and traditional
women’s concerns asked during the plenary meetings. Our results support
Hypothesis 1, given that female MPs were more likely than male MPs to raise
questions on women’s rights and all traditional women’s concerns. The mag-
nitude of gender difference was largest in women’s rights, as female MPs were
10.49 times more likely than male MPs to raise questions about women’s
rights. The smallest gender difference was in education, as female MPs
were 1.64 times more likely than male MPs to ask questions related to
education (Table 4).
Our results reject Hypothesis 2. There were no significant differences in the
number of women’s rights questions raised between PAP MPs and opposition
MPs, p ¼ 0.20, as well as NMPs, p ¼ 0.23. Our results support Hypothesis 3.
Compared to PAP MPs, opposition MPs were more likely to ask questions on
all traditional women’s concerns and other types of questions. The magnitude
of difference was largest in social welfare, as opposition MPs were 3.57 times
more likely than PAP MPs to raise questions related to social welfare.
The smallest difference was in environment, given that opposition MPs
were 1.75 times more likely than PAP MPs to ask questions about
environment (Table 4).
Our results also largely support Hypothesis 4. Except for questions on envi-
ronment, ethnic minority MPs (Malay, Indian and Eurasian MPs) were more
likely to raise questions on women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns
than Chinese MPs. The magnitude of difference was largest in women’s rights, as
ethnic minority MPs were 2.40 times more likely than ethnic majority (Chinese)
MPs to raise women’s rights questions. The smallest difference was in healthcare,
as ethnic minority MPs were 1.20 times more likely than Chinese MPs to ask
questions about healthcare.
4.1 Interaction effect of gender ethnicity

Given that both MPs’ gender and ethnicity were significant predictors of the
number of questions on women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns (ex-
cept environment), it would be interesting to examine whether MPs with these
two personal traits (being female and ethnic minorities) were more likely to ad-
vance women’s interests. In other words, we explore whether MPs’ gender had
intertwined with their ethnicity to influence their representational behaviour in
the Parliament. A series of 2 3 2 analysis of variances (ANOVAs)15 were con-
ducted, with gender (female and male) and ethnicity (ethnic minority and
Chinese) as independent variables and the number of questions raised as depen-
dent variable. Table 5 shows the descriptive statistics of the number of questions
raised categorised by gender and ethnicity of MPs.
Our results partially support Hypothesis 5. The interaction effect of gender 3
ethnicity was significant for women’s rights, healthcare and social welfare. For
children and families, education and environment, there was no significant inter-
action effect of gender 3 ethnicity. The details are discussed below.
In terms of women’s rights, there were significant main effects of gender
(F(1, 254) ¼ 68.67, p < 0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.21) and ethnicity (F(1, 254) ¼
14.42, p < 0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.05) on the number of questions asked. The inter-
action effect of gender 3 ethnicity was significant as well (F(1, 254) ¼ 16.52, p <
0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.06). The results of Tukey post hoc tests revealed that female
ethnic minority MPs asked more questions about women’s rights than female
Chinese MPs (p < 0.001), male ethnic minority MPs (p < 0.001) and male
Chinese MPs (p < 0.001). Female Chinese MPs also asked more women’s rights
questions than male ethnic minority MPs (p < 0.001) and male Chinese MPs
(p < 0.001). However, male ethnic minority MPs and male Chinese MPs did not
differ in the number of women’s rights questions asked (p ¼ 0.99).
Regarding healthcare, significant main effects of gender (F(1, 254) ¼ 27.10,
p < 0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.10) and ethnicity (F(1, 254) ¼ 7.79, p ¼ 0.01, partial g2
¼ 0.03) were found, while their interaction effect was also significant (F(1, 254)
¼ 17.80, p < 0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.07). The results of Tukey post hoc tests indi-
cated that female ethnic minority MPs raised more questions about healthcare
than female Chinese MPs (p ¼ 0.001), male ethnic minority MPs (p < 0.001) and
15
ANOVA is a statistical technique that examines whether there are any significant differences in a
scale-level dependent variable among the nominal-level independent variables that have two or more
categories.
male Chinese MPs (p < 0.001). Female Chinese MPs, male ethnic minority MPs
and male Chinese MPs did not differ in the number of questions raised related to
healthcare (p > 0.05).
Concerning social welfare, there were significant main effects of gender
(F(1, 254) ¼ 23.26, p < 0.001, partial g2 ¼ 0.08) and ethnicity (F(1, 254) ¼ 7.20,
p ¼ 0.01, partial g2 ¼ 0.03) on the number of questions raised. The interaction ef-
fect of gender 3 ethnicity was significant as well (F(1, 254) ¼ 4.29, p ¼ 0.04, par-
tial g2 ¼ 0.02). The results of Tukey post hoc tests suggested that female ethnic
minority MPs raised more questions about social welfare than female Chinese
MPs (p ¼ 0.04), male ethnic minority MPs (p ¼ 0.001) and male Chinese MPs
(p < 0.001). Female Chinese MPs also raised more questions about social welfare
than male Chinese MPs (p ¼ 0.01). Male ethnic minority MPs and male
Chinese MPs did not differ in the number of questions raised about social welfare
(p ¼ 0.92).
Finally, our results show that MPs’ tenure, education level and age mattered.
First, MPs with longer tenure tended to raise fewer questions on women’s rights,
traditional women’s concerns and other types of questions than MPs with shorter
tenure. Secondly, MPs with higher education level (master’s or Ph.D. degree)
were 1.22 times more likely than MPs with lower education level (undergraduate
or below) to ask questions about education. Thirdly, older MPs were more likely
than younger MPs to raise questions about environment in which there was a 3%
increase in the number of questions raised for each year of age increased. We will
come back to these insights in Section 4.
5. Discussion
This study investigates whether female MPs in Singapore—a hybrid and patriar-
chal regime—are more likely to act for women’s interests. Our results confirm
Hypothesis 1, as female MPs were significantly more likely to raise questions on
women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns than their male counterparts.
The impact of gender on women’s substantive representation was particularly ob-
vious in women’s rights, as female MPs were 10 times more likely than male MPs
to ask women’s rights questions. This is a notable finding in two ways. First, like
their counterparts in Western democracies, female MPs in Singapore were also
more likely to represent women’s rights even under a hybrid and patriarchal re-
gime. Secondly, compared to male MPs, female MPs in Singapore were more
likely to ask questions on all areas of traditional women’s concerns. This finding
is different from many studies on Western democracies, which show no major
difference between female and male legislators on issues considered of traditional
women’s concerns, including healthcare, education, social welfare and environ-
ment (Thomas, 1991, 1994; Jones, 1997; Osborn and Mendez, 2010).
Table 5 Descriptive statistics of the number of questions raised categorised by gender and eth-
nicity of MPs during 2002–2015
Type of questions Female Male
Ethnic minority Chinese Ethnic minority Chinese

(N 5 13) (N 5 58) (N 5 52) (N 5 135)
Women’s rights Mean 2.00 0.78 0.08 0.12

SD 2.71 1.21 0.27 0.46
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 8 5 1 3
Children and families Mean 3.23 2.00 0.63 0.53
SD 3.49 2.69 1.44 1.57
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 10 12 8 14
Healthcare Mean 9.77 3.36 1.15 2.46
SD 12.27 5.03 2.26 5.12
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 35 21 10 41
Education Mean 5.15 3.47 1.67 1.74
SD 5.05 5.17 2.78 5.07
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 14 19 12 46
Social welfare Mean 3.46 1.72 0.94 0.72
SD 3.64 2.38 2.64 1.46
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 11 10 17 8
Environment Mean 1.54 1.12 0.46 0.59
SD 3.57 2.35 1.45 1.25
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 13 11 9 7
Others Mean 23.08 25.53 13.17 15.38
SD 18.71 29.89 21.29 24.39
Min. 1 0 0 0
Max. 62 120 85 126
Ethnic minority related Mean 1.08 0.10 0.98 0.04
SD 1.61 0.31 3.04 0.21
Min. 0 0 0 0
Max. 4 1 20 1
Our results demonstrate that female MPs in Singapore were more likely to
provide substantive representation on women’s interests than male MPs. This
finding may be caused by the fact that female MPs possess different backgrounds
like motherhood and gender role socialisation experiences from men (Burden,
2007). Thus, female MPs may be more likely than men to sympathise with the
cause of women and feel a duty to advance it. NMP Kuik Shiao-Yin’s explanation
for her advocacy for single mothers to receive equal welfare benefits as married
mothers is an illustration. In an interview with mass media, Kuik elaborated her
reasons for supporting the cause of single mothers as follows: ‘As a mother myself
. . . I am grateful that I receive subsidies from the government. At the same time,
it got me thinking, what about all the single mothers out there who are not enti-
tled to such subsidies? We are mothers, all the same . . . I could personally identify
with the struggles of motherhood’ (Das, 2016).
Besides gender, this study shows that MPs’ political affiliation crucially
affected their likelihood to represent traditional women’s concerns but not wom-
en’s rights. Our results do not support Hypothesis 2, as there were no significant
differences in the number of questions asked about women’s rights between
PAP MPs and opposition MPs. However, our results confirm Hypothesis 3, as
opposition MPs were more likely than PAP MPs to ask questions on traditional
women’s concerns and other types of questions. A possible factor of this finding
could be that opposition MPs had stronger incentive to hold the governing PAP
accountable by using parliamentary questions to criticise the PAP policies, press
the government for actions and demand information from the government for
scrutiny.
Our results also find that MPs’ ethnicity mattered, given that ethnic minority
MPs (Malay, Indian and Eurasian MPs) were more likely to raise parliamentary
questions on women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns (except environ-
ment) than Chinese MPs (Hypothesis 4). A possible factor could be that both
women and ethnic minorities are politically minority groups in Singapore, there-
fore ethnic minority MPs may be more sympathetic with women’s interests than
Chinese MPs. Following this line of argument, we should have found MPs’ gen-
der and ethnicity worked in tandem to influence their representational behav-
iour. In other words, MPs with dual identity, specifically female ethnic minority
MPs, would be more supportive of women’s rights and traditional women’s con-
cerns, when compared to other types of MPs (Hypothesis 5). Our results partially
confirm Hypothesis 5, as female ethnic minority MPs were more likely to ask
questions related to women’s rights, healthcare and social welfare. This is one
contribution of this study that highlights how intersectionality between gender
and ethnicity has affected MPs’ representational behaviour in Singapore.
Our results show that MPs with longer tenure tended to ask fewer questions
on women’s rights, traditional women’s concerns and other types of questions
than MPs with shorter tenure. One possible factor is that compared to MPs with
shorter tenure, MPs with longer tenure are more secure in their parliamentary
seats. Thus, they feel less need to use parliamentary questions to signal effort to
their constituents and enhance their chance of getting re-elected (Kellermann,
2016). Our data do not allow us to evaluate this tentative answer and we leave it
for future research.
This study also finds that MPs with higher education level (master’s or Ph.D.
degree) were more likely than MPs with lower education level (undergraduate or
below) to ask questions about education. Two possible factors may explain this
finding. First, for MPs with master’s or Ph.D. degree, their substantial education
experiences enhance their insight and interests in educational issues. Secondly,
some of them are teaching in universities or colleges. Their working experiences
are likely to prompt them to focus on educational issues especially those con-
cerned with tertiary education while serving as an MP. NMPs Ong Soh Khim and
Eugene Tan Kheng Boon who are teaching at National University of Singapore
and Singapore Management University, respectively, for example, had raised 19
and 28 questions on education while serving as an NMP. Many of their questions
were related to tertiary education.
Finally, our study shows that older MPs were more likely than younger MPs to
raise questions about environment. This finding is contrary to some existing
studies which contend that younger people tend to hold a more supportive atti-
tude towards environmental protection and possess a higher level of environmen-
tal awareness than the older generation (Liere and Dunlap, 1980; Honnold, 1984;
Dietz et al., 1998). Our data do not allow us to fully explain why older MPs in
Singapore were more likely than their younger colleagues to ask questions on en-
vironment. It is certainly an important issue for further research.
6. Conclusion
This study examines women’s political representation in a hybrid and patriarchal
regime—Singapore. Specifically, it investigates whether female MPs in Singapore
are more likely to promote women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns
than their male colleagues. This study makes three contributions. First, it adds to
an emerging scholarship on women’s political representation in Asia by analysing
the impact of gender on women’s substantive representation in Singapore—a hy-
brid and patriarchal regime. Secondly, this study enriches the literature on
Singapore’s parliamentary politics by examining what MPs have actually done
once they are elected. There were substantial differences in the representational
behaviour—regarding policy preferences towards women’s interests—between
female and male MPs. Thirdly, responding to Simien (2007) and Taylor-
Robinson’s (2014) appeal to spend more effort to analysing how ethnicity and
gender interacted to affect political behaviour, this study investigates how ethnic-
ity and gender of MPs in Singapore interact to influence their representational
behaviour.
This study finds that female MPs put greater emphasis on substantive repre-
sentation of women’s rights and traditional women’s concerns than their male
colleagues. However, there may be limitations of advancing women’s rights
(a central component of Molyneux’s strategic gender interests) in Singapore
through the Parliament. As shown in Table 3, the number of women’s rights
questions did not experience any growth during the period of our study
(remained at about 30 in each parliament), whereas the number of questions on
traditional women’s concerns and other issues witnessed a tremendous increase.
This may imply that women’s rights were not among the top concerns of the
PAP-dominated parliament. Singapore MPs have paid increasing attention to the
practical concerns that women encounter in their daily life (e.g. caring their chil-
dren and family, healthcare and education). However, when it comes to removal
of women’s subordination, Singapore’s conservative social values (e.g. opposition
to having a child out of wedlock and women’s submissiveness to males) and
PAP’s patriarchal viewpoints might have discouraged MPs, especially male MPs,
from raising more women’s rights questions in the Parliament. If this is the case,
female MPs may be facing substantial hurdles in pursuing women’s rights in the
Parliament. Finally, the lack of meaningful electoral competition under the hy-
brid regime may have weakened the incentive of the PAP’s MPs to wholeheart-
edly appeal to women’s votes. This may also explain why women’s rights
questions did not experience any growth during the period of this study.
Funding
This work was supported by Research Grants Council of Hong Kong [Early
Career Scheme (grant number CS14A1)].
Conﬂict of Interest
The author has no conflicts of interest to report.
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Parliamentary Affairs (2020) 73, 759–789 doi:10.

This article investigates women’s political representation in a hybrid and patriar-

Keywords: Gender, Ethnicity, Legislator Policy Preferences, Political

Scholars of political representation have long interested in studying the relation-

2.1 Significance of women’s descriptive representation to the political process

2.2 Gender differences and legislators’ policy preferences

systems in Asia, women’s political representation in many Asian countries is

2.3 Singapore: a hybrid and patriarchal regime

discussed later, the number of parliamentary questions on women’s rights almost

Sixth parliament 3 3 0 0 3.8 3.8 79

Source: Calculation based on https://www.parliament.gov.sg/history/list-of-mps-by-parliament. Accessed on

Table 2 Ethnic composition of the Parliament of Singapore (2002–2015)

Parliamentary session Chinese Malay Indian Eurasian Percentage of Total

Tenth parliament 77 12 13 1 25.2 103

Source: Calculation based on https://www.parliament.gov.sg/history/list-of-mps-by-parliament. Accessed on

3. Data and methods

substantive representation of minority-related issues in the British House of

and NMPs) in Singapore. While recognising the value of debate participation in

Following Hypothesis 4, this study proposes the fifth hypothesis:

Tenure 0.15 0.01 107.60*** 0.86

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.

4.1 Interaction effect of gender ethnicity

Ethnic minority Chinese Ethnic minority Chinese

Women’s rights Mean 2.00 0.78 0.08 0.12

mothers is an illustration. In an interview with mass media, Kuik elaborated her

(a central component of Molyneux’s strategic gender interests) in Singapore

Martin, S. (2011) ‘Parliamentary Questions, the Behaviour of Legislators, and the

Simien, E. (2007) ‘Doing Intersectionality Research: From Conceptual Issues to Practical

Thapar-Bjorkert, S. (2013) ‘Gender, Nations, and Nationalism’. In Waylen, G. (ed.) The

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p < 0.05; p < 0.01; p < 0.001.