Women's Participation: Understanding Continuities between the Precolonial and Postcolonial Periods

This paper explores whether women were more likely to participate in anti-colonial movements in states with a legacy of female leadership. Collective memory of past political participation can shape the degree of involvement in present issues, like mobilization in social movements (Kubal & Becerra, 2014, p. 867) and I argue that women's pre-colonial role in government generates a shared historical identity as participants in political development. The provisional hypothesis is that states with a legacy of women's participation in pre-colonial governance should experience high levels of women's participation in anti-colonial resistance. I test this hypothesis using three case studies with multidimensional indicators of women's participation in precolonial governance.