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by Katie Ziegler
The New Hampshire Senate has become the first legislative chamber ever to have a majority of women members. Thirteen of the 24 members of the Senate are women.
Nationwide, women held 24 percent of the state legislative seats coming into last night's election. Preliminary indications are that this proportion did not change significantly. Check this page for updates.
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That is interesting. How are you defining "legislative chamber" here? Does this apply worldwide, or only within the US? I presume that you are not including city councils (because, 1. I suspect there has been at least one city council with a majority of women before now, and 2. I bet there is no good source of data to tell whether or not some city council has had a majority of women) but am not certain about county commissions, or other such bodies.
Posted by: Don Dresser | November 06, 2008 at 01:28 PM
Thank you, Don, for your question. I should have specified that the New Hampshire Senate is the first state legislative chamber with a majority of female members. You're right, we don't have the data to compare this with other governing bodies, such as city councils, but it would be interesting to know!
Posted by: Katie Ziegler | November 06, 2008 at 01:57 PM
And looking at parliaments around the world (at just the national, not the subnational, level) Rwanda's lower house is the only one that currently has a female majority (56%). Sweden comes close with 47%. See http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm.
Posted by: Karl Kurtz | November 06, 2008 at 02:56 PM
Hello, I came across this piece and it's quite interesting. I'm doing a story for my High School Newspaper and if you wouldn't mind could it be possible if I gave you an interview. I can be reached at jacien630@yahoo.com. Thanks
Posted by: Jacien | December 04, 2008 at 11:49 PM