Franchise Extension

Franchise extension refers to the historical and ongoing process by which states broaden the electorate—the set of persons legally entitled to vote in public elections. Early modern franchises were typically restricted by property, tax, religion, race, or sex; successive reforms have removed or lowered these qualifications.

Landmark episodes in comparative politics include:

• The United Kingdom's Reform Act 1832, which redistributed seats and modestly widened the property-based male franchise, followed by the Reform Act 1867 and Representation of the People Act 1918 (votes for most men over 21 and women over 30), and the Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928, which equalised the voting age for women at 21.
• In the United States, the 15th Amendment (1870) prohibited denial of the vote on grounds of race, the 19th Amendment (1920) on grounds of sex, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 dismantled discriminatory practices used against Black voters in the South, and the 26th Amendment (1971) lowered the voting age to 18.
• New Zealand became the first self-governing country to grant women the parliamentary vote, in 1893.
• Switzerland extended the federal franchise to women in 1971; the canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden was compelled to do so for cantonal matters by a Federal Supreme Court ruling in 1990.

In political-economy scholarship, franchise extension is a central explanandum. Acemoglu and Robinson (2000, Quarterly Journal of Economics) model it as a credible commitment by elites to redistribute, made under the threat of revolution. Boix (2003) emphasises inequality and asset mobility. Other accounts stress war mobilisation, party competition, and the diffusion of suffragist norms.

Contemporary debates concern lowering the voting age to 16 (adopted in Austria for national elections in 2007, and in Scotland and Wales for devolved elections), enfranchising resident non-citizens, and restoring voting rights to people with felony convictions.