Segregated Power: Women’s Underrepresentation and Committee Assignments in the Canadian Parliament

Abstract

Parliamentary committees are critical venues of legislative work. Yet women, already underrepresented in most legislatures, are often further marginalized within these powerful substructures. This note examines women’s representation in the Canadian House of Commons’ 24 standing committees, 2006–2025, using an original dataset capturing committee membership and leadership across six Parliaments and four major parties. Our analyses reveal women’s representation as committee members and leaders generally tracks their presence in the House of Commons but gender segregation remains entrenched. Women are overrepresented on “feminine”-coded committees and underrepresented on “masculine”-coded committees. Women are also less likely to hold leadership roles, particularly on “masculine”-coded committees. Contrary to expectations from comparative research, we find limited partisan variation. Shaped by opaque party processes, committee assignments reflect and reproduce gendered institutional logics that privilege men and masculine policy domains, even amid rising descriptive representation.