Using recent theoretical developments in the political economy of institutions
and electoral behavior, this book attempts to solve an enduring puzzle in
women's electoral politics, namely why the increasing importance of women's
votes in the 1920s did not imply increasing success for the lobbying efforts of
women's organizations. The book argues that women's exclusion from the suffrage
created terms that led to distinctive patterns of post-suffrage female electoral
politics. These electoral dynamics in turn are responsible for the decline in
the political influence of women's organizations by the mid-1920s.
This book explores why the increasing importance of women's votes in the 1920s
did NOT lead to increasing success