A PRACTITIONER’S GUIDE TO INCREASING WOMEN’S ACCESS TO ELECTORAL JUSTICE extend to the development of gender-sensitive voter and candidate education programs to ensure that all voters and candidates have a clear understanding of the election law and where and how they can file electoral disputes. Women’s rights organizations can partner with legal services organizations and bar associations to increase access to pro bono legal services for women who seek to bring electoral justice claims. In Malawi, where legal services are prohibitively expensive for many people, especially women, interviewees recommended leveraging the pro bono requirements that exist for all lawyers and carving out a specific proportion of time that should be dedicated to women’s access to justice. Given the complexity of election law and cases, pro bono and legal services providers should receive training on how to represent clients effectively in election-related disputes and information on the types of violations that women are most likely to encounter. Election observation organizations and missions can play critical roles in recording incidents of electoral violence against women and documenting how well procedures for addressing electoral violations of all kinds are understood and followed. A number of resources are available to election observers related to gender-sensitive election monitoring,37 and resources specific to election dispute observation provide instructions for observers to record grievances regarding the unequal treatment of women in the electoral process, assess whether women’s complaints are handled in the same manner as others, and take note of when grievances exist but women choose not to file.38 These are important steps but, as noted in the desk review, election observation reports do not adequately cover gender and electoral disputes. Civil society could address this issue by encouraging observation organizations to recruit and train women observers, and political parties to employ women agents as observers and poll station witnesses. Insufficient numbers of women observers and agents can render women-only polling stations or registration centers vulnerable to fraud and intimidation. Another Word on Data: Promising Steps from Kenya and Nepal The lack of sex-disaggregated data on the number, type, and resolution of electoral disputes is a significant barrier to better understanding the nature of electoral violations and access to electoral justice for both women and men. Insufficient data – in particular, sex-disaggregated data – are collected and available on the number, nature, and resolution of election complaints filed in EMBs and the courts. In Kenya, a new electronic CMS offers a promising mechanism to track cases more effectively. With a coordinated EDR filing system, electoral institutions, candidates, political parties, and civil society will be better able to understand the nature of electoral justice claims filed, including information on who files complaints, who the respondents are, whether either or both parties are represented by a lawyer, at what stage of the process complaints are filed, and the nature and ultimate resolution of the complaint. The ECN has instituted a new CMS that it will use to register all disputes. Presently, while gender-disaggregated data on voter registration, candidate nomination, and voter turnout are collected, but data on the sex of the complainants and respondents are not. By improving the new CMS to include sex-disaggregated data on those filing complaints or acting as respondents or plaintiffs, the role of lawyers, and the nature of disputes affecting women, the ECN would have valuable data to examine the number of cases filed by women compared to men, whether women file different types of complaints, and if women’s cases are resolved at higher or lower rates. It is also important to collect data on women as respondents to analyze the types of cases filed against women, the types of remedies and sanctions imposed, whether they were present at the hearing (if there was one), and whether they were provided with adequate defense by the party, for instance. 37 38 See, e.g., International IDEA. (n.d.). Election Coverage from a Gender Perspective A Media Monitoring Manual. See, e.g., Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. (2019b). 22