Access to the Bench and Gender Representation on Angolan Courts: When party affiliation trumps gender

Women have made big inroads into the Angolan formal court system over the past two decades, currently making up around 40% of all judges. Around one third of the judges on the two apex courts are women, making Angolan high courts some of the most gender-balanced in the world. This influx of women judges has taken place in a period of post-war reconstruction and democratization under the auspices of a state dominated by the ruling party, MPLA. Based on a combination of desk study and interviews with Angolan judges, we argue that while party affiliation and commitment to ruling party ideology are the chief factors explaining the access of women to the Supreme Court and Constitutional Court in Angola, access to courts at the lower levels has been moving in the direction of being more based on merit. Contrary to mainstream literature on judging and gender, we have not found any specific formal or informal obstacles that disfavour women’s entry to the bench in Angola, at any level. A history of women in the independence movement and in post-conflict politics may have had a positive effect on women’s access to the courts.