Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T23:35:56.014Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Do Men and Women Have Different Policy Preferences in Africa? Determinants and Implications of Gender Gaps in Policy Prioritization

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 April 2016

Jessica Gottlieb ,
Guy Grossman  and
Amanda Lea Robinson
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Policies designed to increase women’s representation in Africa are often motivated by the assumption that men and women have different policy preferences. This article finds that gender differences in policy priorities are actually quite small on average, but vary significantly across policy domains and countries. The study leverages this variation to show that the economic and social empowerment of women influences the size of gender gaps in the prioritization of two important domains. In particular, women’s participation in the labor force – an indicator of economic empowerment – narrows the gender gap in the prioritization of infrastructure investment and access to clean water, while social vulnerability widens the gap on prioritizing infrastructure investment. Finally, the article shows that the places where women and men have the most divergent policy preferences – and thus where formal representation is most important – are precisely the places where women are currently the most poorly represented and least active in formal politics.

Type
Articles
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 48 , Issue 3 , July 2018 , pp. 611 - 636
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University (email: [email protected]); Department of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania (email: [email protected]); Department of Political Science, Ohio State University (email: [email protected]). The authors thank Rumi Morishima for excellent research assistance and Leonardo Ariolla and Alice Kang for valuable feedback. The article also benefited from audience questions and suggestions at the 2014 African Studies Association and 2015 American Political Science Association annual conferences. We thank Afrobarometer for making available the data used in this article, as well as circulating a previous version of this article as Afrobarometer Working Paper No. 153. Data replication sets are available at http://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataverse/BJPolS and online appendices are available at http://dx.doi.org/doi: 10.1017/S0007123416000053.

References

Agarwal, Bina. 1994. A Field of One’s Own: Gender and Land Rights in South Asia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Aizer, Anna. 2007. Wages, Violence and Health in the Household. Technical report. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, Michael L. 2008. Multiple Inference and Gender Differences in the Effects of Early Intervention: A Reevaluation of the Abecedarian, Perry Preschool, and Early Training Projects. Journal of the American Statistical Association 103 (484):1481–1495.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arriola, Leonardo R., and Johnson, Martha C.. 2014. Ethnic Politics and Women’s Empowerment in Africa: Ministerial Appointments to Executive Cabinets. American Journal of Political Science 58 (2):495–510.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnes, Tiffany D., and Burchard, Stephanie M.. 2013. ‘Engendering’ Politics: The Impact of Descriptive Representation on Women’s Political Engagement in Sub-Saharan Africa. Comparative Political Studies 46 (7):767–790.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bauer, Gretchen. 2004. ‘The Hand That Stirs the Pot Can Also Run the Country’: Electing Women to Parliament in Namibia. Journal of Modern African Studies 42 (4):479–509.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beaman, Lori, Chattopadhyay, Raghabendra, Duflo, Esther, Pande, Ruhini, and Topalova, Petia. 2009. Powerful Women: Does Exposure Reduce Bias. Quarterly Journal of Economics 124 (4):1497–1540.Google Scholar
Beath, Andrew, Christia, Fotini, and Enikolopov, Ruben. 2013. Empowering Women: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Afghanistan. American Political Science Review 107 (3):540–557.Google Scholar
Becker, Gary S. 1981. A Treatise on the Family. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Bhalotra, Sonia, and Clots-Figueras, Irma. 2014. Health and the Political Agency of Women. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 6 (2):164–197.Google Scholar
Bodman, Herbert L., and Tohidi, Nayereh Esfahlani. 1998. Women in Muslim Societies: Diversity Within Unity. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Box-Steffensmeier, Janet M., De Boef, Suzanna, and Lin, Tse-Min. 2004. The Dynamics of the Partisan Gender Gap. American Political Science Review 98 (3):515–528.Google Scholar
Campbell, A. et al. 1960. The American Voter. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Chaney, Carole Kennedy, Alvarez, R. Michael, and Nagler, Jonathan. 1998. Explaining the Gender Gap in US Presidential Elections, 1980–1992. Political Research Quarterly 51 (2):311–339.Google Scholar
Chattopadhyay, Raghabendra, and Duflo, Esther. 2004. Women as Policy Makers: Evidence from a Randomized Policy Experiment in India. Econometrica 72 (5):1409–1443.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clayton, Amanda. 2014. Electoral Gender Quotas and Attitudes Toward Traditional Leaders: A Policy Experiment in Lesotho. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 33 (4):1007–1026.Google Scholar
Clayton, Amanda B. 2015. Electoral Gender Quotas, Female Leadership, and Women’s Political Engagement: Evidence from a Randomized Policy Experiment. Comparative Political Studies 48 (3):333–369.Google Scholar
Cohen, Dara Kay. 2013. Explaining Rape During Civil War: Cross-National Evidence (1980–2009). American Political Science Review 107 (3):461–477.Google Scholar
Conover, Pamela J. 1988. Feminists and the Gender Gap. Journal of Politics 50 (4):985–1010.Google Scholar
Crowder-Meyer, Melody. 2007. Gender Differences in Policy Preferences & Priorities. Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, IL.Google Scholar
Duverger, Maurice. 1955. The Political Role of Women. Paris: UNESCO.Google Scholar
Edlund, Lena, Haider, Laila, and Pande, Rohini. 2005. Unmarried Parenthood and Redistributive Politics. Journal of the European Economic Association 3 (1):95–119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edlund, Lena, and Pande, Rohini. 2002. Why Have Women Become Left-Wing? The Political Gender Gap and the Decline in Marriage. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 117 (3):917–961.Google Scholar
Finseraas, Henning, Jakobsson, Niklas, and Kotsadam, Andreas. 2012. The Gender Gap in Political Preferences: An Empirical Test of a Political Economy Explanation. Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society 19 (2):219–242.Google Scholar
Fish, Steven M. 2011. Are Muslims Distinctive? A Look at the Evidence. New York: Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franceschet, Susan, Krook, Mona Lena, and Piscopo, Jennifer M.. 2012. The Impact of Gender Quotas. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
García-Peñalosa, Cecilia, and Konte, Maty. 2014. Why are Women Less Democratic Than Men? Evidence from Sub-Saharan African Countries. World Development 59:104–119.Google Scholar
Gidengil, Elisabeth. 1995. Economic Man, Social Woman: The Case of the Gender Gap in Support of the Canada-United States Free-Trade Agreement. Comparative Political Studies 23 (3):384–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilligan, Carol. 1982. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Gillion, Daniel Q., Ladd, Jonathan M., and Meredith, Marc. 2014. Education, Party Polarization and the Origins of the Partisan Gender Gap. Working Paper, University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Green, Eric P. et al. 2015. Women’s Entrepreneurship and Intimate Partner Violence: A Cluster Randomized Trial of Microenterprise Assistance and Partner Participation in Post-Conflict Uganda (SSM-D-14-01580R1). Social Science & Medicine 133:177–188.Google Scholar
Grossman, Guy, Humphreys, Macartan, and Sacramone-Lutz, Gabriella. 2014. ‘I Would Like U WMP to Extend Electricity 2 Our Village’: On Information Technology and Interest Articulation. American Political Science Review 108 (3):688–705.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hochshild, Arlie et al. 1989. The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Hutchings, Vincent L. et al. 2004. The Compassion Strategy Race and the Gender Gap in Campaign 2000. Public Opinion Quarterly 68 (4):512–541.Google Scholar
Inglehart, Ronald. 1977. The Silent Revolution: Changing Values and Political Styles Among Western Publics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Inglehart, Ronald, and Norris, Pippa. 2000. The Developmental Theory of the Gender Gap: Women’s and Men’s Voting Behavior in Global Perspective. International Political Science Review 21 (4):441–463.Google Scholar
Isaksson, Ann-Sofie, Kotsadam, Andreas, and Nerman, Mans. 2014. The Gender Gap in African Political Participation: Testing Theories of Individual and Contextual Determinants. The Journal of Development Studies 50 (2):302–318.Google Scholar
Iversen, Torben, and Rosenbluth, Frances. 2006. The Political Economy of Gender: Explaining Cross-National Variation in the Gender Division of Labor and the Gender Voting Gap. American Journal of Political Science 50 (1):1–19.Google Scholar
Kaufmann, Karen M., and Petrocik, John R.. 1999. The Changing Politics of American Men: Understanding the Sources of the Gender Gap. American Journal of Political Science 43 (3):864–887.Google Scholar
Krook, Mona Lena. 2014. Electoral Gender Quotas: A Conceptual Analysis. Comparative Political Studies 47 (9):1268–1293.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langer, Gary. 1996. The Gender Gap Makes a Difference. ABCNews.com.Google Scholar
Logan, Carolyn, and Bratton, Michael. 2006. Political Gender Gap in Africa: Similar Attitudes, Different Behaviors. Afrobarometer Working Paper No. 58.Google Scholar
Lott, John. 1999. How Dramatically Did Women’s Suffrage Change the Size and Scope of Government? Journal of Political Economy 107:1163–1198.Google Scholar
Mabsout, Ramzi, and Staveren, Irene Van. 2010. Disentangling Bargaining Power from Individual and Household Level to Institutions: Evidence on Women’s Position in Ethiopia. World Development 38 (5):783–796.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacPhail, Fiona, and Dong, Xiao-yuan. 2007. Women’s Market Work and Household Status in Rural China: Evidence from Jiangsu and Shandong in the Late 1990s. Feminist Economics 13 (3–4):93–124.Google Scholar
Mansfield, Edward D., and Snyder, Jack Lewis. 2005. Electing to Fight. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Miller, Grant. 2008. Women’s Suffrage, Political Responsiveness, and Child Survival in American History. Quarterly Journal of Economics 123 (3):1287–1327.Google Scholar
Olken, Benjamin A. 2010. Direct Democracy and Local Public Goods: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Indonesia. American Political Science Review 104 (2):243–267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Phillips, Anne. 1995. The Politics of Presence, Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Shapiro, Robert Y., and Mahajan, Harpreet. 1986. Gender Differences in Policy Preferences: A Summary of Trends from the 1960s to the 1980. Public Opinion Quarterly 50 (1):42–61.Google Scholar
Sorenson, Susan B., Morssink, Christiaan, and Campos, Paola Abril. 2011. Safe Access to Safe Water in Low Income Countries: Water Fetching in Current Times. Social Science & Medicine 72 (9):1522–1526.Google Scholar
Van Staveren, Irene, and Odebode, Olasunbo. 2007. Gender Norms as Asymmetric Institutions: A Case Study of Yoruba Women in Nigeria. Journal of Economic Issues 41 (4):903–925.Google Scholar
Welch, Susan, and Hibbing, John. 1992. Financial Conditions, Gender, and Voting in American National Elections. Journal of Politics 54:197–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weldon, S. Laurel. 2012. When Protest Makes Policy. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
World Bank. 2012. World Development Report 2012: Gender Equality and Development. Technical report. Available from https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/4391. Accessed 24 February 2016.Google Scholar
Yoon, Mi Yung. 2004. Explaining Women’s Legislative Representation in Sub-Saharan Africa. Legislative Studies Quarterly 29 (3):447–468.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, Iris Marion. 2000. Inclusion and Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: PDF

Gottlieb supplementary material

Online Appendix

Download Gottlieb supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 864.5 KB
Supplementary material: Link

Gottlieb et al. Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/ZIWLCJ
Link