Sufragio femenino en Chile: origen, brecha de género y estabilidad, 1935-2009

• Main Authors: Miguel Ángel López Varas, Ricardo Gamboa Valenzuela
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidad de los Andes 2015-09-01
• Series: Revista de Estudios Sociales
• Subjects: Chile; gender gap; women´s vote
• Online Access: http://res.uniandes.edu.co/view.php/1013/index.php?id=1013

Women’s suffrage was introduced in two steps in Chile: first for local elections in 1934 and later extended to all elections in 1949. This article analyzes the legislative process and the effects of women´s enfranchisement in Chile from a temporal perspective through a documentary and quantitative analysis, by means of ecological inference. Firstly, we argue that the political parties´ strategic calculations about the possible consequences of the women’s vote were fundamental for explaining the Chilean route to women´s suffrage. Secondly, we maintain that the incorporation of women into the electorate did not cause any significant electoral instability. Thirdly, our study of the gender gap shows that even though it favored right-wing and reformist-center parties for a long time, this effect has diminished considerably with the passing of time.