Women and Women's Suffrage: a History of Legal and Legislative Exclusion

• Grant number: 24/17908-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: March 01, 2025
• End date: February 28, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Law - Private Law
• Principal Investigator: Eduardo Tomasevicius Filho
• Grantee: Laura Gabriel Bandeira
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Direito (FD). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Women's suffrage was achieved, by Brazilian women, only with the enactment of the Electoral Code, in 1932. However, this process of conquest was not linear, nor was it solely led by women. Although, since the promulgation of the Constitution of 1891, there was no explicit legislative provision preventing women's suffrage, in practice, there were still ways to exclude women from political participation, whether through legal arguments or through prejudiced beliefs and stereotypes related to the female sex. In this sense, the present research project aims to investigate the process that culminated in the achievement of women's suffrage, which was widely reported by newspapers and periodicals of the time. From this perspective, this scientific initiation project intends to conduct a hemerographic study in order to understand the arguments used between 1931 and 1932 to defend or oppose the implementation of women's suffrage. Furthermore, it aims to analyse normative documents, such as the Constitution of 1891 and the Civil Code of 1916, that were used in speeches against the adoption of women's suffrage. More than that, it seeks to understand whether these past arguments persist in today's society and whether their effects can explain the low representation and political participation of Brazilian women.