Political Group Formation in the European Parliament: Same, Same or Caring for Equality and Diversity in Party Processes?

After every European Parliament election, we witness the formation of political groups, sometimes even during an ongoing legislature. While some political groups like the EPP, S&D and Greens/EFA remained remarkably stable, others (dis)appeared and changed their national party composition considerably over the years or re-organized with a new name like recently Renew Europe (RE) succeeding ALDE. The procedures of political group formation are rather formalized, yet, not well researched and we know almost nothing about informal aspects of group formation and the relevance of normative standpoints such as promoting gender equality. Research showed that EP political groups not only differ regarding gender balance among MEPs and leadership positions, but also that unequal gendered norms and practices continue to exist and relate to gendered divisions of labour, interaction, symbols and subjectivities. Building on the research on gendered representation and gendered divisions in the political groups, this paper asks how political group formation might be gendered. Is gender a ‘hard’ or ‘soft’ factor in political group formation? Which importance do political groups attach to gender equality when recruiting additional national parties, not only regarding descriptive representation, but also for gender equality as a policy field? Does seniority of political groups play a role or more a left-right divide? Which role do other differences, such as race and ethnicity, age, class, sexuality play? The paper examines what ‘work’ gender does in the ways that political groups in the parliament come into existence and what happens to gender equality norms.