Violence in the German Bundestag - Extent and Dealing with it as a Problem of Equal Participation

Gender-based experiences of violence in parliaments can jeopardize equal representation and participation in this central political institution of representative democracies and become a problem in terms of democratic theory. Even though campaigns such as the Council of Europe's #NotInMyParliament are increasingly bringing the problem to the attention of the public, there has been little systematic research to date that examines the (presumably unevenly distributed) extent and consequences of violence against actors in parliaments and the democratic-theoretical implications. The research question of this contribution is therefore: “What socio-demographic differences exist with regard to how violence in parliament affects and is dealt with?” It is assumed that the extent to which people are affected by violence varies according to gender and other differentiating characteristics and that this phenomenon is dealt with in different ways, resulting in socially unequal obstacles to the equal representation and participation of all population groups. In the “Not in my parliament” project, gender-based personal violence in the German Bundestag is being investigated using a mixed-methods design in order to help close this research gap. For the online survey sub-study, MPs, staff in MPs' offices, staff in the parliamentary groups and staff in the administration were asked about their experiences of violence and how they deal with it. Participants were asked about the frequency of 19 different forms of violence in the areas of digital, verbal and physical violence with increasing severity during the current legislative period (20th German Bundestag). Using a latent class analysis of all the forms of violence surveyed, a distinction can be made between three different groups of affected persons. 1. The “marginally affected” (53,5%) report that they have not or hardly experienced any violence. 2. The “verbally affected” (38,1%) are mainly affected by verbal violence and to a lesser extent by less severe experiences of physical violence. 3. The typical characteristic of the “triple affected” (8,4%) is that they have experienced violence in all three areas with varying frequency and severity. These three groups not only show the presumed different socio-demographic compositions, but also different ways of dealing with violence as a structural problem. This finding thus supports the problematized interconnection of violence with gender and other differentiating characteristics for equal participation.