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I think it's a good question - why do we set quotas? Men don't, and yet I don't see their chapters closing for size. At my school, frats range from 10-75 men, which is a lot broader range than the sororities have. While men are dubious about joining the 10-man house, otherwise size doesn't make a difference.
I think it's true that women are more concerned about size - a 20-woman chapter on my campus panics, but a 20-man chapter doesn't. Female rushees are less likely to consider a small house than a big one. No offense, but we women seem to be more concerned about peer prestige.
But I don't buy that this is inherent to all women. A lot of women on my campus were very turned off by the notion of formal rush and wouldn't consider joining sororities based on that alone. They thought rush rules and quotas were garbage. And a lot of these would have made good members otherwise.
And as I've seen other people say here, I don't see quotas and ceilings evening things out. Lots of women will suicide rather than put down a smaller sorority on their bid card. They'd rather wait a year for a bid from a bigger chapter. I've seen girls waits two years for a bid from the chapter of their choice. It's kind of sad - I don't think I'd beg that hard for membership in a group that didn't want me more than that! So the big few three chapters on my campus get quota most years, and the other chapters get a lot less. You just can't make girls join chapters they don't want.
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