Measurement of Women’s Empowerment in Rural Bangladesh

Simeen Mahmud, Nirali M. Shah and Stan Becker

World Development, 2012, vol. 40, issue 3, 610-619

Abstract: Women’s empowerment is a dynamic process that has been quantified, measured, and described in a variety of ways. We measure empowerment in a sample of 3,500 rural women in 128 villages of Bangladesh with five indicators. A conceptual framework is presented, together with descriptive data on the indicators. Linear regressions to examine effects of covariates show that a woman’s exposure to television is a significant predictor of three of the five indicators. A woman’s years of schooling is significantly associated with one of two self-esteem indicators and with freedom of mobility. Household wealth has a significant and positive association with a woman’s resource control but a significant negative association with her total decision-making score.

Keywords: empowerment; measurement; choice; self-esteem; South Asia; Bangladesh (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (30)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:40:y:2012:i:3:p:610-619

DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2011.08.003

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