Women's right to vote – News, Research and Analysis – The Conversation

A delegation of women attending the Australian Women’s Conference in Brisbane in 1909. State Library of Queensland

July 22, 2025

As female independent MPs descend on parliament, they’re fulfilling the dreams of women across history

Elizabeth Chappell, University of New England

Australia’s earliest female political aspirants were staunchly independent, setting up a tradition that would remain more than a century later.

A group of men and women, including two soldiers, on a porch in Fort Verde, Ariz., in 1886. Buyenlarge/Getty Images

April 25, 2024

Arizona’s 1864 abortion law was made in a women’s rights desert – here’s what life was like then

Calvin Schermerhorn, Arizona State University

Abortions happened in Arizona, despite a near-complete abortion ban enacted in 1864. But people also faced penalties for them, including a female doctor who went to prison.

Catherine Hay Thomson went undercover as an assistant nurse for her series on conditions at Melbourne Hospital. A. J. Campbell Collection/National Library of Australia

January 16, 2020

Hidden women of history: Catherine Hay Thomson, the Australian undercover journalist who went inside asylums and hospitals

Kerrie Davies, UNSW and Willa McDonald, Macquarie University

A passionate crusader for the rights of women and children, Catherine Hay Thomson went undercover to investigate their treatment in public institutions and testified before a Royal Commission.

Helen Zille’s return to the top echelons of the Democratic Alliance has been slammed as an attempt to make the party white again. EFE-EPA/Nic Bothma

November 11, 2019

Party’s woes signify historical dilemma of South Africa’s liberals

Roger Southall, University of the Witwatersrand

The Democratic Alliance’s problems can be traced back to the politicisation of race, which has persisted even after the dawn of democracy in 1994.

After winning the right to vote in 1893, New Zealand’s suffragists kept up the battle, but the unity found in rallying around the major cause had receded. Jim Henderson/Wikimedia Commons

September 18, 2019

NZ was first to grant women the vote in 1893, but then took 26 years to let them stand for parliament

Katie Pickles, University of Canterbury

New Zealand was the first nation to grant women the vote in 1893, but during the pre-war years enduring prejudice against women in politics outweighed any support for women to stand for parliament

A memorial by sculptor Margriet Windhausen depicts the life-size figures of Kate Sheppard and other leaders of the Aotearoa New Zealand suffrage movement. Bernard Spragg/Wikimedia Commons

September 19, 2018

Why New Zealand was the first country where women won the right to vote

Katie Pickles, University of Canterbury

125 years ago today women in New Zealand were the first to win the right to vote. Why did this global first happen in a small and isolated corner of the South Pacific?

Articles on Women's right to vote

Displaying all articles