Female Empowerment and Intimate Partner Violence

Elisabetta Calabresi () and Núria Rodríguez-Planas ()
Additional contact information
Elisabetta Calabresi: University of Barcelona
Núria Rodríguez-Planas: Queens College, CUNY

No 18207, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: The chapter reviews the economic literature on intimate partner violence (IPV), a widespread human rights violation affecting nearly one in three women globally and generating significant societal costs. It focuses on the relationship between various dimensions of female empowerment and IPV. The chapter begins by outlining key theoretical frameworks—including household bargaining, instrumental violence, male backlash, and exposure theories—as well as the main data sources used to study IPV. It then reviews empirical evidence on how factors shaping female empowerment at the individual, relationship, community, and societal levels influence IPV outcomes. Central themes include labor market dynamics, education, income shocks, family formation, legal frameworks, institutional access, and gender norms. The chapter also considers how these factors interact across levels and discusses additional drivers of IPV not directly linked to female empowerment. The goal is to provide an overview of causal evidence from the economic literature on IPV while emphasizing its complexity and the importance of a context-specific, intersectional approach to both its analysis and prevention.

Keywords: intimate; partner; violence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J1 J12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-10
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp18207.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18207

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().