Professor Dawn Teele was awarded a 3-year grant from the National Science Foundation for research project titled “Political Geography, Electoral Institutions, and the Evolution of Women’s Voting Patterns in Rich Democracies.”

The project investigates how women’s political participation and voting preferences evolved after women gained the right to vote, challenging the long-held scholarly view, and popular perception, that women were initially disengaged and conservative voters. The project reveals that in many cases – especially in countries that used proportional electoral rules or where voting was compulsory – women turned out in higher numbers than men and were not always more conservative, providing a more nuanced understanding of women’s importance in early democratic elections.

The grant will provide research support for the project, which will collect detailed cross-national data from historical electoral records and will conduct in-depth analyses from countries such as Norway, Sweden, Argentina, and Australia, to understand how different electoral systems and political environments influenced women’s voting patterns.

Congratulations, Dawn!