Independent Opinion of CEDAW the Local Government Act provide for guaranteed quotas for women in elections,39 in 2018, 15 rural and outlying areas had no women representatives in their townships or town councils. The more grassroot level the election is, the lower the percentage of women elected.40 For more than 10 years, the government has failed to amend the Local Government Act, claiming that public opinion opposes the change. At present, the government encourages political parties to allocate a certain percentage of subsidies they receive to empower women. Since the government has not set standards or evaluation indicators, it is difficult to examine the effects of such encouragement 39 See Article 134 and Additional Article 4 of the Constitution and Article 33 of the Local Government Act for details of the guaranteed quotas for female legislators elected from the nationwide constituency and among citizens residing abroad, city councilors elected in special municipalities from each constituency, county (city) councilors, and township (town, city) representatives.

40 Central Election Commission statistics for the 2020 central and 2018 local elections of public representatives: (1)The percentage of female legislators in Taiwan reached a high of 41.6% in 2020. (2)In 2018, the percentage of female councilors in special municipalities was 35.8 and 32.1% for county (city) councilors. There are 214 election constituencies at this level, of which 113 constituencies have less than one-third female elected candidates and 88 constituencies have less than one-quarter female elected candidates. (3)The proportion of female representatives at the township (town and city) level in 2018 was 24.9%. There are a total of 198 township (town and city) representative councils at this level, of which 149 have less than one-third female elected candidates, 91 have less than onequarter, and 15 do not have any female representatives (Jianshi Township, Hsinchu County; Kouhu Township, Yunlin County; Alishan Township, Chiayi County; Pingtung County’s Hengchun, Ligang, Liuqiu, and Checheng Townships; Yilan County’s Zhuangwei, Dongshan, Datong, and Nanao Townships; Taitung County’s Guanshan and Chihshang Townships; Baisha Township, Penghu County; and Wuqiu Township, Kinmen County). (4)Women account for 22% of the representatives in mountainous indigenous constituencies of the special municipalities. There are six constituencies at this level, of which five have less than one-third female elected candidates, four have less than one-quarter, and one does not have any female representatives.
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