This collection explores how pioneering gender equality policies have shaped women's economic presence in Europe since 2000. Equal pay policies, parental leave reforms, corporate quotas and electoral quotas have raised pressing questions about the effectiveness in promoting equal participation, as researchers quote both quantitative improvement in gender diversity and qualitative lag in cultural change. The chapters in this book present interlocking cross-national and cross-policy comparisons of the three most controversial reforms: equal pay, parental leave, and quotas for political representatives. The contributors address the cultural context in which reforms arose, internally contradictory policies, and the relative effectiveness of fast-track quotas and incentives compared to long-term efforts to change the overall culture of gender. This critical examination of the new millennium's groundbreaking gender policies will appeal to academics and practitioners interested in the progress of gender equality in the economic, political, and social welfare fields.

Diana Auth is Assistant Professor at the Institute of Political Science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany. Her main research areas are comparative welfare state research, gender studies, elderly care research and social gerontology, and policy analysis. Jutta Hergenhan is a Berlin-based political scientist. She is a researcher, lecturer, scientific translator, and editor. From 2012 to 2015, she was the executive director of the Research Group for Gender Studies at the Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany. Her main research areas are gender and politics, language and gender, and transformation processes in the Mediterranean area. Barbara Holland-Cunz is Professor of Political Sciences, with a primary focus on gender studies, and Head of the Research Group for Gender Studies at the Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany. Her main research areas are political theory; women's movements, equality policy, and political participation; and the theory and sociology of science and nature. Contributors Catherine Achin, Paris Dauphine University, FranceFrancesca Bettio, University of Siena, Italy Roland Erne, University College Dublin, IrelandGesine Fuchs, Independent Researcher, SwitzerlandCécile Guillaume, Queen Mary University of London, UKNatalie Imboden, Unia, SwitzerlandSigrid Leitner, Cologne University of Applied Sciences, GermanyHanne Martinek, Uppsala University, SwedenSophie Rouault, Bremen University of Applied Sciences, GermanyChristine Scheidegger, Independent Researcher, SwitzerlandDorota Szelewa, University of Warsaw, Poland