ABSTRACT
The struggle for female suffrage became a central element in the efforts of women to acquire access to the positions of power outside the family which men occupied. Most accounts of the process of political democratization in Norway ignore the question of female suffrage, although a few scholars have dealt with it briefly, usually when discussing women's suffrage organizations. In Norway, as in most other countries, women first received the right to vote in local elections. Finland was an exception in that universal suffrage for both men and women was introduced at the same time in 1906. It is natural to see the commitment of the Norwegian Liberal Party to female suffrage during the eighteen eighties as a part of the liberalization process which the party supported at that time. The differing political attitudes of women made themselves felt not only in questions of strategy but also in relation to objectives.
