Despite the overall positive impact of quota laws on representation, their effects are limited by a consistent gap between the number of women candidates and the number of elected women. Parity has not been achieved, pointing to pervasive institutional barriers that quotas are unable to solve. In this paper, we explore the interaction of party strategy with quota laws and their effect on gender parity. Quota laws change the demand of women candidates without necessarily changing the candidate pool. When coupled with gendered valuations of candidates, the tension negatively affects the placement of women in party lists, as well as their electoral prospects. We show that parties judge women and men differently; while high-status women candidates are rewarded with better list placements than low-status women candidates, they still lag behind high-status men. This list placement strategy is intensified when parties face pressures from sudden increases in quota stringency. As quota regimes demand more women, parties penalize them. To support this argument, we focus on the case of Ecuador. Our study is based on a dataset of 13,817 candidates across seven elections. Despite high compliance with quotas, Ecuador's legislature still lacks gender parity, highlighting the role of party strategy.
