Last Tuesday, Dr. Hilke Brockmann, who is working at Harvard University's Center of European Studies and is a professor of sociology at Jacobs University in Germany, gave an open lecture for the students of Prof. Jill Greenlee's (POL) class "Women in American Politics." Brockmann analyzed the effectiveness of the female quota in increasing the number of mothers working in Germany's Parliament and proposed a mother quota to address the lack of mothers in positions of power.

German political parties previously adopted a voluntary female quota in order to increase women's participation in politics. The specific goal was to increase female representation in the German Parliament.

According to Brockmann's research, justification for quotas comes from the fact that a severe discrepancy remains between male and female representation in European government positions. She referenced the European Union Gender Equality database for 2013, which noted that 67 percent of the European Parliament consists of men. The quota, which was only implemented in Germany, has produced little impact on increasing women's roles across Europe as a whole, according to Brockmann.

"There are a few women who reach out for the highest positions, but basically, in most of the country this is a small minority," said Brockmann during her presentation.

Brockmann noted that there is underrepresentation of mothers specifically in Germany due to decreased fertility of German women. Brockmann presented a chart from the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development, which exhibited a drop in German women's fertility rate from about two children per woman in 1970 to 1.49 in 2013.

"[The] majority of women are mothers," explained Brockmann. "But what I wanted to point out is that there is a relatively large fraction of women, particularly in the higher educational sector of women, who remain childless."

According to Brockmann, fertility in Germany decreased in part due to the significant financial burden of having a child.
"For every child, you lose on average up to 18 percent of your income," Brockmann said. "As you age, the motherhood penalty kicks in. This after a long work trajectory adds to enormous gaps at pension between men and women," she continued.

Brockmann stated that men have nearly 40 percent more pension than women in general, and "women with children have much lower pensions than those without." According to Brockmann, pensions in Germany depend on the income of the individual while they participated in the work force. Mothers, due to the reduced income with every child, subsequently receive significantly lower pensions than men and women without children.

According to Brockmann, since the introduction of the female quota the gap between fathers and mothers in legislature has increased. The quota therefore indicates that there are more women involved in politics, but not many of those women are mothers. Brockmann raised the question of whether or not the quota is selective, or if it promotes all women-with or without children-equally.

"I see hints of selectivity," said Brockmann. "A quota helps; it promotes women, but it doesn't promote every woman at the same time. What's overlooked is motherhood."

As a result of the inefficiency of the female quota in integrating mothers into the German Parliament, Brockmann proposed the idea of a motherhood quota in order to target a specific subset of women and reduce the homogeneous composition of the German legislature.

Brockmann said she believes that some of the benefits of a motherhood quota include decreased discrimination against mothers and a diverse parliament that will produce better policies.

However, she said she recognizes that a motherhood quota would be imperfect because it would still leave a somewhat homogeneous parliament. A motherhood quota does not make distinctions between single mothers and mothers with partners to aid in child care.

Also ignored is the number of children that a mother has, as the number of children contributes to the motherhood penalty financially and in terms of work experience. Mothers with more children, according to Brockmann, are out of the work force for a greater period of time. Additionally, Brockmann referenced a study conducted by Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers in 2009 that indicates that mothers are not any happier in full-time jobs leadership positions than they would be in non-leadership and part-time jobs.

"Through an American perspective, ideally the motherhood quota sounds great," wrote Gilberto Calderin '17, an attendee at the lecture, in an email to the Justice. "I just think it will not be successful. I think another way to target this problem is by designing institutions in a way that allows mothers to participate in the system rather than forcing them in and hoping for the best."

Despite the concerns raised regarding the idea of a motherhood quota, Brockmann said she believes in the intent of the plan in integrating mothers into high-level political positions.

"Motherhood representation is an issue. It always has been," said Brockmann.