Women cabinet ministers in Canadian provinces 1976-1994.

• Author: Gary F. Moncrief

Women's participation in leadership circles in Canadian politics has moved beyond "firsts" of various sorts. This is perhaps especially true at the provincial level, yet at this point there has been insufficient study of women holding elite positions. Attention has more often focused on the federal level, and on legislative rather than executive positions. The article, which examines patterns of women's roles in the cabinets of the provinces at three-year intervals over an 18-year period, from 1976 to 1994, presents some general conclusions about the process in Canada.

Across Canada women held only seven cabinet positions in 1976; by 1994, they held 38. Female ministers increased from less than four percent to almost 21 percent of the membership of the ten provincial cabinets over this period. There was a noticeable upward surge in both legislative seats and portfolios held by women between 1985 and 1988. Interestingly, except for 1985, women held a slightly greater share of cabinet posts than legislative seats; in other words, women were slightly better represented in cabinet than in the legislative assembly as a whole.

However, since ministers are drawn from the governing party, it is useful to examine the trends in terms of the percentage of women from the governing party who hold portfolios. The proportion of women in the governing party who hold a position in cabinet is generally higher than is the case for men (1985 is again the exception). Over time, the proportion of women in the governing party who hold portfolios has actually declined slightly. However, this is largely due to the fact that the number of cabinet ministers has declined. In 1976 there were 186 cabinet positions in the ten provincial governments; by 1985 that number had increased to 225. But the overall number of cabinet ministers in 1994 was only 182, indicating an ear of leaner cabinets. Thus, women are holding their own in terms of the number of ministerial offices, compared to their ranks in the legislative majorities.

Are there discernible patterns of women ministers by province or party? In regard to the first of these, numbers are not as relevant as percentages since smaller provinces tend to have fewer people in cabinet than larger ones. In the first year of our study, 1976, half of the provinces (Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Manitoba and Saskatchewan) had no women in the cabinet. In four of the seven years examined, Ontario had the highest...