IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/millen/v15y2024i1p107-137.html

Disempowerment of Women: The Experience of Indian States

Author

Listed:
  • Tanusree Mishra
  • Tanmoyee Banerjee

Abstract

The present study uses National Family Health Survey, 2015–2016 (NFHS-4) data to compute a multidimensional disempowerment index for women from India. A state-level analysis shows that disempowerment levels of women from the states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Bihar are found to be higher, with that of Bihar being the highest. Next, using a multilevel logistic model, the study explores the determinants of the level of women disempowerment. The probability of disempowerment is high among rural unemployed young Muslim women from joint families with low asset and education endowment and who witnessed parental violence as a child. Further, we found that the level of disempowerment of women from the state of Haryana is much higher as compared to its neighbouring state Punjab, where Haryana was an integral part of Punjab till 1966. A non-linear decomposition analysis reveals a significant contribution of Sikh religion on women’s autonomy in Punjab vis-à -vis Haryana.

Suggested Citation

  • Tanusree Mishra & Tanmoyee Banerjee, 2024. "Disempowerment of Women: The Experience of Indian States," Millennial Asia, , vol. 15(1), pages 107-137, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:millen:v:15:y:2024:i:1:p:107-137
    DOI: 10.1177/09763996221081566
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09763996221081566
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/09763996221081566?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Esther Duflo, 2012. "Women Empowerment and Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(4), pages 1051-1079, December.
    2. Ganle, John Kuumuori & Afriyie, Kwadwo & Segbefia, Alexander Yao, 2015. "Microcredit: Empowerment and Disempowerment of Rural Women in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 335-345.
    3. Satya R. Chakravarty & Conchita D’Ambrosio, 2019. "The Measurement of Social Exclusion," Themes in Economics, in: Satya R. Chakravarty (ed.), Poverty, Social Exclusion and Stochastic Dominance, pages 167-189, Springer.
    4. Fairlie, Robert W., 2003. "An Extension of the Blinder-Oaxaca Decomposition Technique to Logit and Probit Models," Center Discussion Papers 28425, Yale University, Economic Growth Center.
    5. Ambe Njoh & Fenda Akiwumi, 2012. "The Impact of Religion on Women Empowerment as a Millennium Development Goal in Africa," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 107(1), pages 1-18, May.
    6. Naila Kabeer, 1997. "Women, Wages and Intra‐household Power Relations in Urban Bangladesh," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 28(2), pages 261-302, April.
    7. Sabina Alkire, James E. Foster, Suman Seth, Maria Emma Santos, Jose M. Roche and Paola Ballon, 2015. "Multidimensional Poverty Measurement and Analysis: Chapter 9 - Distribution and Dynamics," OPHI Working Papers ophiwp090_ch9.pdf, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    8. Sabina Alkire, James E. Foster, Suman Seth, Maria Emma Santos, José M. Roche and Paola Ballon, 2015. "Multidimensional Poverty Measurement and Analysis: Chapter 7 - Data and Analysis," OPHI Working Papers ophiwp088_ch7.pdf, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    9. Joysankar Bhattacharya & Sarmila Banerjee, 2012. "Women Empowerment as Multidimensional Capability Enhancement: An Application of Structural Equation Modeling," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 4(3), pages 79-98, September.
    10. Pierre-André Chiappori & Murat Iyigun & Yoram Weiss, 2009. "Investment in Schooling and the Marriage Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(5), pages 1689-1713, December.
    11. repec:osf:socarx:vhy86_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Raghabendra Chattopadhyay & Esther Duflo, 2004. "Women as Policy Makers: Evidence from a Randomized Policy Experiment in India," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(5), pages 1409-1443, September.
    13. Fairlie, Robert W, 1999. "The Absence of the African-American Owned Business: An Analysis of the Dynamics of Self-Employment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(1), pages 80-108, January.
    14. Audra J. Bowlus & Shannon Seitz, 2006. "Domestic Violence, Employment, And Divorce," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 47(4), pages 1113-1149, November.
    15. repec:qeh:ophiwp:ophiwp090 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Sabina Alkire, James E. Foster, Suman Seth, Maria Emma Santos, José M. Roche and Paola Ballon, 2015. "Multidimensional Poverty Measurement and Analysis: Chapter 2 - The Framework," OPHI Working Papers ophiwp083_ch2.pdf, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    17. repec:qeh:ophiwp:ophiwp088 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Kandpal, Eeshani & Baylis, Kathy, 2019. "The social lives of married women: Peer effects in female autonomy and investments in children," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 26-43.
    19. repec:qeh:ophiwp:ophiwp083 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Hashemi, Syed M. & Schuler, Sidney Ruth & Riley, Ann P., 1996. "Rural credit programs and women's empowerment in Bangladesh," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 635-653, April.
    21. Aradhana Kumari & Srinivas Goli, 2022. "Skewed child sex ratios in India: a revisit to geographical patterns and socio-economic correlates," Journal of Population Research, Springer, vol. 39(1), pages 45-72, March.
    22. Seguino, Stephanie, 2011. "Help or Hindrance? Religion's Impact on Gender Inequality in Attitudes and Outcomes," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(8), pages 1308-1321, August.
    23. Tanusree Mishra & Tanmoyee Banerjee (Chatterjee), 2020. "Child marriage: some facts from selected Indian states," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(3), pages 2093-2110.
    24. Asif Islam & Silvia Muzi & Mohammad Amin, 2019. "Unequal Laws and the Disempowerment of Women in the Labour Market: Evidence from Firm-Level Data," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(5), pages 822-844, May.
    25. Alkire, Sabina & Foster, James & Seth, Suman & Santos, Maria Emma & Roche, Jose Manuel & Ballon, Paola, 2015. "Multidimensional Poverty Measurement and Analysis," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199689491.
    26. Guiso, Luigi & Sapienza, Paola & Zingales, Luigi, 2003. "People's opium? Religion and economic attitudes," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 225-282, January.
    27. Oaxaca, Ronald L. & Ransom, Michael R., 1994. "On discrimination and the decomposition of wage differentials," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 5-21, March.
    28. David Neumark, 1988. "Employers' Discriminatory Behavior and the Estimation of Wage Discrimination," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 23(3), pages 279-295.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gaurav Datt, 2019. "Multidimensional poverty in the Philippines, 2004–2013: How much do choices for weighting, identification and aggregation matter?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 57(4), pages 1103-1128, October.
    2. Dutta, Indranil & Nogales, Ricardo & Yalonetzky, Gaston, 2021. "Endogenous weights and multidimensional poverty: A cautionary tale," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    3. Suman Seth and Gaston Yalonetzky, 2018. "Assessing Deprivation with Ordinal Variables: Depth Sensitivity and Poverty Aversion," OPHI Working Papers ophiwp123.pdf, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    4. Saha, Shree & Narayanan, Sudha, 2022. "A simplified measure of nutritional empowerment: Using machine learning to abbreviate the Women’s Empowerment in Nutrition Index (WENI)," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    5. Alkire, Sabina & Oldiges, Christian & Kanagaratnam, Usha, 2021. "Examining multidimensional poverty reduction in India 2005/6–2015/16: Insights and oversights of the headcount ratio," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    6. Aleksandra Łuczak & Sławomir Kalinowski, 2020. "Assessing the level of the material deprivation of European Union countries," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(9), pages 1-20, September.
    7. Francisco Azpitarte & Jose Gallegos & Gaston Yalonetzky, 2020. "On the robustness of multidimensional counting poverty orderings," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 18(3), pages 339-364, September.
    8. Deniz Sevinc, 2020. "How Poor is Poor? A novel look at multidimensional poverty in the UK," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 149(3), pages 833-859, June.
    9. Suman Seth & Maria Emma Santos, 2019. "On the Interaction Between Focus and Distributional Properties in Multidimensional Poverty Measurement," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 145(2), pages 503-521, September.
    10. Grant J. Cameron & Hai‐Anh H. Dang & Mustafa Dinc & James Foster & Michael M. Lokshin, 2021. "Measuring the Statistical Capacity of Nations," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(4), pages 870-896, August.
    11. Robles Aguilar, Gisela & Sumner, Andy, 2020. "Who are the world’s poor? A new profile of global multidimensional poverty," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    12. Ankita Mishra & Ranjan Ray & Leonora Risse, 2018. "A Multidimensional Dynamic Measure of Child Disadvantage: A Methodological Tool for Policymakers," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 139(3), pages 1187-1218, October.
    13. Micaela Salcedo & Patricia Ruiz-Bravo & Nicolas Barrantes & Jhonatan Clausen, 2025. "Measuring Multidimensional Women’s Empowerment With Data From Partnered Women Across 45 Low- And Middle-Income Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 176(3), pages 1093-1119, February.
    14. Martin C. Evans and Akmal Abdurazakov, 2018. "The Measurement Properties of Multidimensional Poverty Indices for Children: Lessons and Ways Forward," OPHI Working Papers ophiwp115.pdf, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    15. Jhonatan Clausen & Micaela Salcedo & Nicolas Barrantes & Patricia Ruiz-Bravo, 2026. "Multidimensional Poverty and Disempowerment Among Women: Exploring Associations and Overlaps Across 32 Low- and Middle-Income Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 182(2), pages 1-28, March.
    16. Abre-Rehmat Qurat-ul-Ann & Faisal Mehmood Mirza, 2021. "Multidimensional Energy Poverty in Pakistan: Empirical Evidence from Household Level Micro Data," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 155(1), pages 211-258, May.
    17. Londari Yamarak & Kevin A. Parton, 2023. "Impacts of mining projects in Papua New Guinea on livelihoods and poverty in indigenous mining communities," Mineral Economics, Springer;Raw Materials Group (RMG);Luleå University of Technology, vol. 36(1), pages 13-27, January.
    18. Jing Yang & Pundarik Mukhopadhaya, 2019. "Is the ADB’s Conjecture on Upward Trend in Poverty for China Right? An Analysis of Income and Multidimensional Poverty in China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 143(2), pages 451-477, June.
    19. Pinaki Das & Bibek Paria & Shama Firdaush, 2021. "Juxtaposing Consumption Poverty and Multidimensional Poverty: A Study in Indian Context," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 153(2), pages 469-501, January.
    20. Tavares, Fernando Flores & Betti, Gianni, 2021. "The pandemic of poverty, vulnerability, and COVID-19: Evidence from a fuzzy multidimensional analysis of deprivations in Brazil," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:millen:v:15:y:2024:i:1:p:107-137. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.