APSA Women's Caucus

Welcome to the APSA Women’s Caucus homepage.

Please get in touch with the Women’s Caucus representative Sara C. Motta, Umut Ozguc and Federica Caso if you require further information.

Women’s Advancement in Australian Political Science Workshop report is available here.

About Us

APSA Women’s Caucus aims are:

  • to improve the standing of women in the political science profession
  • to promote the study of women and politics

The Women’s Caucus was established at the 1979 APSA conference in Hobart on the initiative of Carole Pateman and Marian Sawer. Click here for an account of the history of the Women’s Caucus prepared with the help of members and published in Australian Journal of Political Science 39:3 (2004), pp. 553-66. (Accidentally left out of Table 3 on gender-focused political science courses were two courses in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of NSW – Sex, Human Rights and Justice taught by Helen Pringle, and Sexuality and Politics taught by Vanessa Farrer).

The annual general meeting of the Women’s Caucus is held during the annual conference of APSA, normally over lunch on the first day of the conference. Every two years, during the AGM, a Women’s Caucus representative is elected to serve on the APSA Executive, and other business is discussed, as reported in the minutes.

Please see our Facebook page and feel free to send its convener Blair Williams any information you think might be useful for the members and should be posted.  

The Women’s Caucus has counterparts in other political science associations:

Prizes

The Women’s Caucus is responsible for three prizes:

  1. The biennial Thelma Hunter PhD Prize for the best thesis on women and/or gender and politics. The inaugural prize was awarded in 2018. (NB: From 2018 the PhD Prize replaced the Women and Politics Essay Prize. Click here for a list of the prize winners since 1982. The essay prize was awarded for the last time in 2016.)
  2. The biennial Carole Pateman Book Prize.
  3. The annual Academic Leadership Prize. 

Reviews Undertaken

The Women’s Caucus has also taken responsibility since 1979 for initiating regular reviews of the status of women in the profession and, since 1981, for reviews of the APSA policy adopted that year that ‘the study of women should be incorporated in all politics courses’. 

Meeting Up

Women’s caucus members meet face to face, network and discuss Women’s Caucus matters at a dedicated lunchtime meeting at the annual APSA conference. In between times, Facebook and Twitter are good ways to keep in touch and share information. 

Other Activities

Other activities include a cumulative list of Australian theses relating to women, politics and public policy.

This is in two parts: up to 2005 and 2006 to mid 2013.

To date we do not have a list of equivalent NZ theses, but should anyone want to co-ordinate such a list, we would welcome its contribution to this site.

The Women’s Caucus also provides more general resource sharing.

UK Political Studies Studies Association Women and Politics Specialist Group

The UK PSA has a dedicated Women and Politics Specialist Group blog which includes stories from around the globe.  The link to subscribe to the blog is http://psawomenpolitics.wordpress.com/

Data

Organisations