Women voting rights

Women and Voting Rights

Question

Is there anything about voting rights and democracy in Islam? Does the Qur'an or the hadith say anything about this in relation to women?

Question from United Kingdom

Answer

The Qur'an has prescribed the following principle in deciding about issues related to the collective affairs of the Muslims:

Their (Muslim's) affairs are decided through consultation among them. ( Al-Shooraa 42: 38)

One of the most important corollaries of the above directive is that in all such collective issues where there is even a potential of a difference of opinion among the Muslims because of which a unanimous decision cannot be arrived at, the opinion of the majority of the Muslims shall be made the collective law in a Muslim state.

Obviously, the system of government in a particular state clearly pertains to the collective issues of its citizens. Thus, according to the Qur'an. the system of government of an Islamic state and its various affairs should be decided through consultation. This consultation may be direct - where an individual takes part in the consultation directly, as was the case in Athens during the times of Socrates - or indirect - where individuals participate in the consultation through their elected representatives. In this perspective, we can say that the system of government in an Islamic state, according to the Qur'an is basically democratic in its nature.

As far as the issue of "voting rights" is concerned, the Qur'an in the same verse ( Al-Shooraa 42: 38) has clearly given the right of participating in the referred consultation to all Muslim citizens. This does not mean that the Qur'an does not give the non-Muslim citizens of an Islamic state the right to vote. What it actually implies, in my opinion, is that according to the Qur'an. no Muslim citizen can be deprived of the right to vote and thereby be deprived of participating in the "consultation" regarding the collective issues of the Islamic state.

As far as the non-Muslim citizens of an Islamic state are concerned, their right to vote shall be determined by the agreement between them and the Islamic state, on the basis of which they were given the status of being citizens of an Islamic state. If this agreement gives the non-Muslim citizens the right to vote, it shall be binding on the state to abide by this agreement.

No distinction has been made in the Qur'an with reference to the participation of men and women in the consultation process.

Some people say that women were not included in the process of "consultation" during the times of the Prophet (pbuh), which implies that Islam does not give women the right to vote. However, it is quite obvious that the Qur'an does not deprive women of voting rights. During the times of the Prophet (pbuh) and those that immediately followed, women generally stayed away from issues related to the state or those related to other collective issues.

Thus, the issue of women's voting rights never arose in those times. In contrast, today's women, with their wider exposure have not only become more interested in political and other collective issues but have also become active in these spheres. In these circumstances, there seems to be no basis of saying that Islam does not give voting rights to women.

18 th February 1999

Answer published by Moiz Amjad

Page 4 – Votes for women

On 19 September 1893, when the governor, Lord Glasgow, signed a new Electoral Act into law, New Zealand became the first self-governing country in the world to grant the right to vote to all adult women. At the time this was a truly radical change: many other democracies did not allow women to vote till decades later.

A movement for change

In the late 19th century a broad movement for women’s political rights, including voting rights, developed in Britain and its colonies, the United States and northern Europe. Its earliest successes would come in colonial and frontier societies like Australasia and the American Midwest.

Suffrage campaigners drew inspiration from two sources. Ideas of equality were championed by John Stuart Mill and British feminists, including Barbara Bodichon and some women’s suffrage societies. With that went the missionary zeal of the American temperance movement, which believed the vote would allow women to save society from the evils of drink.

Against women’s suffrage

Offers of free drinks, trickery, bogus or children’s names, multiple signatures in the same handwriting, sometimes copied from street directories (including the name of at least one prominent suffrage supporter) were all part of the liquor-industry petition against women gaining the vote. But the hoteliers and brewers didn’t get the numbers they needed, and the tactics used meant the petitions were an embarrassing failure.

The New Zealand campaign was driven by the local branch of the American-based Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), founded in 1885. Non-temperance franchise leagues and unions also played an important role. Led by the WCTU’s Kate Sheppard, suffragists organised a series of massive petitions to Parliament. They collected 9,000 signatures in 1891, 20,000 in 1892 and nearly 32,000 – almost one in four women – in 1893.

Opponents mobilised too. Some argued that upsetting ‘natural’ gender roles would endanger the family and society. The liquor industry feared that pro-temperance women voters would put them out of business.

Parliamentary debates

Parliament was divided. In 1878, 1879 and 1887 bills or amendments to enfranchise women (or at least female ratepayers) had only been narrowly defeated. Many leading politicians supported women’s suffrage, including John Hall, Robert Stout, Julius Vogel and John Ballance. Others such as Richard Seddon, who became premier in 1893, were hostile.

In 1891, 1892 and 1893 women’s suffrage bills comfortably passed the House of Representatives (the lower house). On the first two occasions they were defeated in the Legislative Council (the upper house). In 1893 Seddon tried to ensure the same result by lobbying councillors, but his meddling backfired. Two councillors changed their votes to embarrass the premier and on 8 September the upper house passed the Electoral Bill by 20 votes to 18.

The 1893 election

When the governor signed the law on 19 September, suffragists celebrated a famous victory and congratulations poured in from around the world. It was only six weeks until registration closed for the 28 November election, but 109,461 women, or about 84% of those eligible, enrolled to vote. On polling day 90,290 of them (including perhaps 4,000 Maori) voted – two out of every three adult women in the country.

Colonial elections were often rough-and-tumble affairs, and suffrage opponents had warned of ‘boorish and half-drunken men’ harassing ‘lady voters’ at the booths. But the 1893 election was described as the most orderly ever held. The Christchurch Press thought ‘the pretty dresses of the ladies and their smiling faces lighted up the polling booths most wonderfully.’ 1

Celebrating suffrage

New Zealand’s early embrace of women’s voting rights has become a key part of its identity as a world-leading, progressive democracy. In 1990 Kate Sheppard was commemorated (alongside the suffragists’ symbol, the white camellia) on New Zealand’s $10 banknote. The 1993 centenary was marked by nationwide celebrations, conferences, books and memorials.

Women's suffrage

Women's suffrage (also known as woman suffrage ) [ 1 ] is the right of women to vote and to stand for electoral office. Limited voting rights were gained by women in Sweden. Finland and some western U. S.  states in the late 19th century. [ 2 ] National and international organizations formed to coordinate efforts to gain voting rights, especially the International Woman Suffrage Alliance (1904), and also worked for equal civil rights for women. [ 3 ]

In 1893, New Zealand. then a self-governing British colony, granted adult women the right to vote and the self-governing British colony of South Australia did the same in 1895, the latter also permitting women to stand for office. Australia federated in 1901, and women acquired the right to vote and stand in federal elections from 1902, but discriminatory restrictions against Aboriginal women (and men) voting in national elections were not completely removed until 1962. [ 4 ] [ 5 ] [ 6 ]

The first European country to introduce women's suffrage was the Grand Duchy of Finland. then part of the Russian Empire. which elected the world's first female members of parliament in the 1907 parliamentary elections. Norway followed, granting full women's suffrage in 1913. Most European, Asian and African countries did not pass women's suffrage until after World War I. Late adopters were France in 1944, Italy in 1946, Greece in 1952, [ 7 ] Switzerland in 1971, [ 8 ] and Liechtenstein in 1984. [ 9 ] The nations of North America and most nations in Central and South America passed women's suffrage before World War II (see table in Summary below).

Extended political campaigns by women and their supporters have generally been necessary to gain legislation or constitutional amendments for women's suffrage. In many countries, limited suffrage for women was granted before universal suffrage for men; for instance, literate women were granted suffrage before all men received it. The United Nations encouraged women's suffrage in the years following World War II, and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979) identifies it as a basic right with 188 countries currently being parties to this Convention.