The right to vote, or suffrage, is the legal entitlement of qualified members of a political community to cast a ballot in elections that determine public officials, constitutional questions, or policy referenda. It is a cornerstone of representative democracy and a benchmark used by organizations such as Freedom House and the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute when scoring political systems.
International instruments anchor the right in several ways. Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) states that the will of the people "shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections" by universal and equal suffrage. Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966) obliges states parties to guarantee citizens the right to vote without unreasonable restrictions. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979) and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006, Article 29) extend the right to historically excluded groups.
Domestic frameworks vary widely. Eligibility typically depends on citizenship, age (commonly 18, though Austria and Brazil permit voting at 16), residency, and mental capacity. Many jurisdictions restrict voting for persons convicted of certain crimes — a practice known as felon disenfranchisement — while others, such as Canada and several European states, allow incarcerated citizens to vote.
Expansion of suffrage has been incremental. Key milestones include New Zealand granting women the vote in 1893, the U.S. Nineteenth Amendment (1920), the U.S. Voting Rights Act of 1965 dismantling literacy tests and other barriers, and Saudi Arabia permitting women to vote in municipal elections in 2015.
Contemporary debates focus on:
- Voter identification laws and their impact on turnout
- Felony disenfranchisement and reinstatement
- Non-citizen voting in local elections
- External voting rights for diaspora populations
- Automatic and online registration
For MUN delegates, the right to vote frequently surfaces in committees addressing democratic governance, post-conflict transitions, and electoral observation missions led by bodies such as the OSCE/ODIHR and the African Union.
Example
In 2015, Saudi Arabia held municipal elections in which women were permitted to vote and stand as candidates for the first time, with roughly 130,000 women registering nationwide.