while quotas compensate for actual barriers that prevent women from their fair share of the political seats it has been argued that they contradict the principles of equal opportunity since women are given preference over men it has also been observed that quotas are hard to apply in single winner systems where each party nominates a single candidate per district furthermore the reelection of parliament members restricts the rate of member turnover at each election which makes gender quotas difficult to comply with a glance at the number of female heads of state or government reveals that these positions remain elusive for women notable developments in both developing and developed countries include the election of female heads of state or government in iceland in in haiti and the republic of moldova in argentina india and ukraine in chile in and germany and liberia in