US midterm elections: Why Bolivia's lawmakers are 50% women

Gender-responsive budgeting (GRB) in Cameroon requires local councils to include women in budget planning and allocate resources to meet their specific needs, resulting in over 500 women in Tiko and Limbe councils gaining access to market infrastructure improvements, vocational training, agricultural support, and business grants that have enabled them to generate income and support their families.

Ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to pick multiple candidates for their vote to be transferred to if their first choice fails to advance, has now been approved in at least 60 jurisdictions, including Alaska, where it helped Democrat Mary Peltola defeat Republican Sarah Palin.

To end prison gerrymandering, the city council in Wilmington, Delaware, counted people who are incarcerated in the local prison at their last address in the city for the 2020 Census. People who are incarcerated there but did not live in Wilmington were not counted.

Seattle’s democracy vouchers program provides residents with four $25 vouchers to donate to local political candidates of their choice, with the goal of making it easier for citizens to participate in local elections while also leveling the playing field for a wider range of candidates. Research on the program found that it has helped increase the number of unique donors and made local elections more competitive.

Since 1924, Australia has had compulsory voting, which requires citizens to cast a ballot or face a small fine. The policy has created a strong culture around voting, and voter turnout has remained high since the law went into effect.

Maine's Clean Election Act provides public funding to political candidates who earn a certain number of small donations from voters, with the goal of making it easier for people from a wider range of demographics to run for office. In 2020, the state set a record with 63 percent of women candidates winning their races, and roughly 69 percent of the women who ran took advantage of the Clean Elections program.

In response to a rise in extremist activism in their school districts, a group of parents, students, and educators in the Hudson Valley formed Defense of Democracy, which rallies at school board meetings, hosts workshops on education activism, collaborates with local elected leaders, spearheads petitions, and more. The group helped two of its endorsed candidates win school board elections and has now grown to roughly 1,500 active volunteers nationwide.

To help fill poll worker shortages and fight mis- and disinformation around the 2022 midterm elections, nonpartisan nonprofit We the Veterans launched a nationwide campaign called Vet the Vote, which recruits veterans and military members to serve as election officials. The campaign has signed up roughly 60,000 poll workers so far.

At least 33 states now involve students in education policymaking through formal advisory roles or positions on state boards, and these youth have helped spearhead changes, such as a Massachusetts rule requiring student feedback to be considered in the teacher evaluation process and a Washington bill creating school-based liaisons to coordinate homelessness services.

In 2019, Alabama passed a law allowing high school students to become interns at election polling sites, where they assist with computerized pollbooks, greet voters, and hand out stickers. In one county, more than 70 students participated last year, and more than 150 applied to work on the recent state primary.