Culminating with the Millennium Development Goals, gender empowerment has become increasingly tied to economic development in the eyes of the broader donor community, but even more so amongst aid recipient countries since this new economic association has attracted a significant increase in available funds. This is especially the case in the Middle East and North Africa with many Arab countries implementing gender reforms as a presumably low-cost way to placate foreign donors, but also in the interest of improving their global image and attracting or sustaining foreign direct investment. One of the most controversial yet ubiquitous tools to promote women into the public sphere has been the gender quota--a policy trend eagerly embraced by many Arab countries at the beginning of the new millennium. Importantly, not all quotas are created equal. There are three types of legislative gender quotas present in the region (political party quotas, legal candidate quotas, and reserved seats) and they differ relative to the level of formalized commitment to insuring women's presence in political institutions. This paper explores the mix of incentives behind the choice of a particular type of quota as a gender empowerment strategy across the 22 Arab League member states using a competing-risks model. The preliminary analysis finds development assistance has the most significant impact on the adoption of more formally binding quotas such as legal candidate quotas and reserved seats, while foreign direct investment increases the likelihood of adopting political party quotas. The mechanism underlying these findings is elaborated on through a structured-focused comparison of gender quotas in Morocco and Jordan.