Gendered executive power and the limits of inclusion: Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and political leadership in South Africa

This article examines how gendered power operates at the highest levels of executive politics to constrain women’s political authority, even in contexts characterised by strong formal commitments to gender equality. Drawing on a feminist institutionalist framework, it analyses the political trajectory of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, one of South Africa’s most experienced post-apartheid leaders, to interrogate why sustained executive competence does not translate into access to the highest political office. Through qualitative discourse analysis of speeches, policy documents, and media representations, the article shows how Dlamini-Zuma’s authority was constructed through a technocratic–caretaker gender frame emphasising administrative competence and institutional stewardship. Deploying the concepts of the double bind and gender frames, it demonstrates how formal institutional positioning and informal norms constrain political pathways. By foregrounding executive leadership as a gendered institutional site, the analysis highlights how strategies that enhance women’s acceptability within patriarchal political contexts may simultaneously limit their substantive political power.