Search

Begin New Search Topic Suffrage

1. Becoming political: How marching suffragists facilitated women's electoral participation in England

Author:
Mona Morgan-Collins and Valeria Rueda
Publication Date:
11-2023
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Nottingham Interdisciplinary Centre for Economic and Political Research (NICEP)
Abstract:
Previous research identifies that women politicians facilitate other women’s political participation. Can women’s political activism also spur women’s electoral participation? Through the study of the British suffragists, we argue that women activists paved the way for other women’s political participation at the time when women politicians were virtually absent. Constructing a novel micro-level dataset of geocoded data from electoral registers, we leverage a unique historical case of the 1913 Women’s Suffrage Pilgrimage. Using a Differences-in-Differences strategy that compares polling divisions based on the proximity to the Pilgrimage across England, we provide evidence that exposure to the suffragists marching for parliamentary suffrage increased registration of women eligible to vote in local elections. Analyzing contemporary news articles, we then document the pathways through which the suffragists incited other women’s political interest and therefore electoral participation. These findings have implications for the realization of substantive representation after suffrage.
Topic:
History, Elections, Women, Suffrage, Political Participation, and Politicians
Political Geography:
Europe and England

2. The Electoral Impact of Newly Enfranchised Groups: The Case of Women’s Suffrage in the United States

Author:
Mona Morgan-Collins
Publication Date:
06-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Nottingham Interdisciplinary Centre for Economic and Political Research (NICEP)
Abstract:
Did the expansion of women’s suffrage make a dent in electoral politics? I theorize that while women’s suffrage has the potential to sway electoral tides in favor of the newly enfranchised, such effects are conditional on the strength of a social movement that represents their interests. A social movement defines the groups’ shared interests and helps to create an active, informed and mobilized pool of voters that can take electoral action to foster common policy goals. In testing this argument, I use evidence from the adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment in the United States and employ a difference in difference approach that exploits the heterogeneity in the proportion of women across counties. I find support for the argument. The findings have important implications for the study of representation of marginalized groups, as formal inclusion of previously disenfranchised groups may not be sufficient to secure their de facto representation.
Topic:
Politics, Elections, Women, Suffrage, and Electoral Systems
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

3. IFES Experts Contribute to American Bar Association Book on International Election Remedies

Author:
Katherine Ellena and Chad Vickery
Publication Date:
04-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES)
Abstract:
The right to an effective remedy is well established in international law, and stems from the fundamental rights of political participation and universal suffrage. It is the violation of these rights – intentional or otherwise – that necessitates a remedy to restore them. Election experts from the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) were invited to contribute four chapters to a publication of the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Standing Committee on Election Law, entitled International Election Remedies, published in November 2016. In “Measuring Effective Remedies for Fraud and Administrative Malpractice,” Senior Legal Specialist Katherine Ellena and Center for Applied Research and Learning Director Chad Vickery take on the difficult task of addressing what are effective remedies where fraud and malpractice affect the election. They emphasize the need for electoral remedies that protect the integrity of the process and electoral rights. In "Voter Registration," Michael Yard, a former chief of party in Kenya and Uganda, explains that registration of eligible voters is one of the most time-consuming activities undertaken by many electoral management bodies. To further explore this critical component of election administration, Yard explains the difference among passive, man¬datory and optional registration systems. IFES Indonesia Chief of Party David Ennis and former U.S. Elections Adviser Cameron Quinn describe in “Voting and Election Day” the balance between due process and the need for timeliness in addressing problems on Election Day.
Topic:
Elections, Voting, Participation, and Suffrage
Political Geography:
Global Focus

4. Catholicism, Anticlericalism, and the Quest for Women's Suffrage in Chile

Author:
Erika Maza Valenzuela
Publication Date:
12-1995
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Catholic countries typically enfranchised women later than Protestant ones, and analysts have long argued that this delay was due to the influence of Catholic political and Church leaders as well as to the effects of a Catholic culture. By examining the history of the extension of suffrage to women and women's political participation in Chile since the mid-nineteenth century, this paper challenges that widely held notion. It shows that Catholic and Conservative leaders were the earliest voices in favor of extending suffrage to women. It also shows that Catholic women were involved in political and social affairs from an early date in the country's history as an independent nation, and that they developed feminist views. The paper concludes that the delay in enacting a women's suffrage bill for national elections in Chile (1949) was caused by the wariness of the anticlerical parties regarding the effects of such a measure on the balance of electoral forces, especially since the elections were very competitive and the electorate was small. Given the long-standing and visible association of socially prominent and politically influential women with the Catholic Church and Catholic beneficence institutions, there was a widespread expectation-which proved to be correct as seen in the municipal elections in which women first voted beginning in 1935-that women voters would tend to favor the Conservative Party.
Topic:
Democratization, Religion, Women, History, Catholic Church, Suffrage, and Gender
Political Geography:
South America and Chile