Women's empowerment in action: Evidence from a randomized control trial in Africa

Oriana Bandiera, Niklas Buehren, Robin Burgess, Markus Goldstein, Selim Gulesci (), Imran Rasul and Munshi Sulaiman

No 2014-30, CSAE Working Paper Series from Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford

Abstract: Women in developing countries are disempowered relative to their contemporaries in developed countries. High youth unemployment and early marriage and childbearing interact to limit human capital investment and enforce dependence on men. In this paper we evaluate an attempt to jump-start adolescent women’s empowerment in the world’s second youngest country: Uganda. In this two-pronged intervention, adolescent girls are simultaneously provided vocational training and information on sex, reproduction and marriage. Relative to adolescents in control communities, after two years the intervention raises the likelihood that girls engage in income generating activities by 72% (mainly driven by increased participation in self-employment), and raises their monthly consumption expenditures by 41%. Teen pregnancy falls by 26%, and early entry into marriage/cohabitation falls by 58%. Strikingly, the share of girls reporting sex against their will drops from 14% to almost half that level and preferred ages of marriage and childbearing both move forward. The findings indicate that women’s economic and social empowerment can be jump-started through the combined provision of vocational and life skills, and is not necessarily held back by insurmountable constraints arising from binding social norms.

JEL-codes: I25 J13 J24 O12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-afr and nep-dev
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (44)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Women's Empowerment in Action: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Africa (2020)
Working Paper: Women’s empowerment in action: evidence from a randomized control trial in Africa (2020)
Working Paper: Women's Empowerment in Action: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Africa (2018)
Working Paper: Women’s Empowerment in Action: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Africa (2014)
Working Paper: Women’s empowerment in action: evidence from a randomized control trial in Africa (2014)
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