The Paradox of Women’s Electoral Participation What Brazilian women can tell us about democracy

Abstract

Globally, women and men participate in politics to different degrees and in different ways, although women tend to be less engaged, interested and knowledgeable about politics. Yet, they still vote to a greater extent than men in modern democracies. This phenomenon is known as the paradox of women’s electoral participation and the reason for it eludes scholars till this day. In trying to understand the paradox, scholars have mostly looked to western or European democracies for answers and in doing so, a sense of civic duty has been suggested as an explanation. Brazil is a country with a surplus of women casting their votes, even though it possesses many characteristics that are usually associated with low participation generally, and low participation of women in particular. Because of this, Brazil is expected to be an especially intriguing context in which to investigate what gendered aspects might drive women to vote. Through doing qualitative semi structured interviews, this thesis investigates how civic duty might motivate women in Brazil to vote. The thesis finds that although this explanation partly resonates with women in Brazil, it becomes evident that the role of civic duty is far more complex than estimated by previous research. The thesis concludes that the women in Brazil for most part have political motives when voting – indicating that rather than being apolitical, as previously thought, they are political in a different way and, most importantly, motivated to vote by other factors than civic duty towards the state.