FRIEDRICH-EBERT-STIFTUNG POLITICAL REPRESENTATION OF WOMEN IN ROMANIA led by a woman, followed by the AUR(7.7%), PSD(8.4%), UDMR (12.8%), USR(14.7%) and PLUS(18.4%). For three of the parties – the AUR, PNL and PSD – women are under-represented by comparison with the average for the first five places on the list. With the other three parties – the PLUS, UDMR and USR – the under-representation of candidates from the first two or three places is matched by over-representation, by comparison with the average, for the following positions on the list. It should be noted, however, that for these parties, positions 3-5 tend to be ineligible(depending on the constituency), which may explain the higher presence of women in these positions. Figure 4 Percentage of female candidates in 2016 and 2020 parliamentary elections 40% 35% 30% 28.6% 25% 27.0% 28.7% 30.6% 27.6% 29.3% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0% Chamber of Depu t ies Data source: Permanent Electoral Authority, authors' calculations. Senat e 2016 2020 Parl i ament We now turn our attention from local elections to parliamentary elections, comparing the same electoral points in time, 2016 and 2020, from the perspective of the presence of women on lists of candidates and on the lists of those elected to the Romanian Parliament. The gender distribution of candidates in the last two rounds of parliamentary elections for each of the two chambers and for the entire Parliament is shown in Figure 4. We can observe the same trend in local elections: the presence of women on candidate lists increased slightly between 2016 and 2020, from 27% to 28.6% in elections to the Chamber of Deputies and from 28.7% to 30.6% in elections to the Senate. As we mentioned in the case of local elections, presence on the lists of candidates does not automatically mean winning a seat as Member of the Parliament, this being dependent on being placed on an eligible position on the party list, a decision that is outside the influence of voters(data is presented in Table 3). What we notice in this case is that, although the percentage of women included in lists for Parliament increased between 2016 and 2020, both for the Parliament as a whole and for each of the two chambers, this evolution was not reflected in the percentage of women elected to Parliament: the percentage of women elected to the Chamber of Deputies decreased from 20.7% in 2016 to 18.5% in 2020, while the percentage of women elected to the Senate increased from 15.4% to 18.4%. As a result of the small size of the Senate compared to the Chamber of Deputies, at the level of the entire Parliament the percentage of elected women decreased from 19.1% in 2016 to 18.5% in 2020. The data on the position of women on lists for the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate do not provide a very clear picture and should be analysed in relation to the number of eligible positions for each list. Even so, it is worth mentioning the big difference between the percentage of female»head of the list« observed in the 2016 elections and the percentage observed in 2020 elections: in just four years the presence of women in the first position on party lists decreased massively. Thus, for the four main parties that won seats in Parliament in both rounds of elections, the following trends can be identified:(1) The PSD: The percentage of women at the top of the list decreased from 21% to 16% in the Chamber and from 18.6% to 9.3% in the Senate;(2) The PNL: The percentage decreased from 18.6% to 7%, but in the Senate it increased from 14% to 18.6%;(3) The USR-PLUS: The percentage remained low in the Chamber(9.3%), but in the Senate it decreased from 14.3% to 7%;(4) The UDMR: The percentage has been cut in half in both chambers. 14