In 1776, Abigail Adams pled with her husband to please “remember theladies” as he left to participate in the U.S. Constitution's all-maledrafting process. Centuries later, many women around the world remainuninvolved in their constitutions’ creation and revision, leavingtheir rights in men's hands.

More than half of current national constitutions were drafted or revised overthe last several decades, so it is no surprise that there has been anaccompanying explosion of scholarly inquiries into the drafting processes.These publications suggest that constitutions share core elements thattranscend differences in cultures, geography, history, and other variables.Taken together, these studies offer a framework for the most successfulconstitutions in terms of both substance and process. Thus, scholars havebeen able to offer suggestions for future constitution-drafting processes.Often, however, like the constitution-drafting processes they describe, theyomit any discussion of women's involvement. This chapter addresses thesignificance of that absence and begins to fill the void.

Many questions regarding women’s participation in the creation and revisionof constitutions remain unanswered. Which countries have included women? Howmeaningful were those inclusions? Does the involvement of womensubstantively change the text of the final document? Is women’s involvementcorrelated with a constitution’s perceived legitimacy? Although theavailable resources are limited, the small group of scholars that havediscussed women’s participation in individual countries make it possible tobegin answering these questions.