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Does Women's Knowledge of Voting Rights Affect their Voting Behaviour in Village Elections? Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial in China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2013

Xiaopeng Pang ,
Junxia Zeng  and
Scott Rozelle
Xiaopeng Pang*
Affiliation:
School of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, Renmin University of China.
Junxia Zeng
Affiliation:
School of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, Renmin University of China.
Scott Rozelle
Affiliation:
Freeman Spogli Institute, Stanford University.
*
Email: [email protected] (corresponding author).
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Abstract

Officials in China claim that voting rates in rural village elections are high. However, the true voting rate is lower, especially for women. We postulate that women are less likely to vote owing to insufficient knowledge about their rights. The objective of this paper is to test whether the knowledge levels of women and village leaders about women's voting rights can affect women's voting behaviour. We report on the results of a randomized controlled trial (RCT) involving 700 women in China's Fujian and Liaoning provinces. Villages were randomly assigned to either a control group or one of three intervention groups. One intervention provided voting training to women only, another provided training to both women and village leaders, and the third provided training to village leaders only. After women received training, their scores on a test of voting knowledge increased, and they more fully exercised their voting rights. When only village leaders were trained, test scores and voting behaviour were not statistically different from the control villages.

Keywords

rural womenpolitical participationvillage electionrural ChinaRandomized Controlled Trialvoting behaviour
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 213 , March 2013 , pp. 39 - 59
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2013

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