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Modernization Theory: How to Measure and Operationalize it When Gauging Variation in Women’s Representation?

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  • Daniel Stockemer

  • Aksel Sundström

Abstract

Modernization theory, one of the most influential theories in the social sciences, holds that as the composition of the economy develops, from an agrarian to a postindustrial society, communities will develop post-materialist values, which should lead to a higher representation of women in elected positions. However, while this reasoning is intuitive, there is no consensus on how to operationalize and measure this process. Existing studies use different types of national level proxy measures such as aggregated survey data on public attitudes on gender equality and broad development indicators such as per capita GDP or population density. In this article, we not only highlight that existing strategies are suboptimal as they run the risk of creating ecological inference fallacies for the former type of indicators and measurement error for the second type of factors, but also offer some finer grained operationalization of modernization theory at the regional level. In more detail, we illustrate that modernization is a multifaceted concept, which is primarily characterized by urbanization, women’s increased labor force participation and a strengthening of the tertiary sector. Using an original dataset on 285 European regions we illustrate that any of these three characteristics of modernization has an independent impact on women’s representation. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2016

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel Stockemer & Aksel Sundström, 2016. "Modernization Theory: How to Measure and Operationalize it When Gauging Variation in Women’s Representation?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 125(2), pages 695-712, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:soinre:v:125:y:2016:i:2:p:695-712
    DOI: 10.1007/s11205-014-0844-y
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    2. Roberto Ezcurra, 2025. "Kin-based institutions and women’s political empowerment," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 42(3), pages 745-770, October.
    3. repec:osf:osfxxx:yn23j_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Byung-Deuk Woo & Jeongho Choi, 2025. "The Impacts of Justification of Income Inequality on the Confidence in the Women’s Movements: Empirical Evidence From Asia-Pacific Countries," SAGE Open, , vol. 15(2), pages 21582440251, May.
    5. Sally Sargeson & Tamara Jacka, 2018. "Improving Women's Substantive Representation in Community Government: Evidence from Chinese Villages," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 49(5), pages 1166-1194, September.
    6. Timothy Yu-Cheong Yeung & Izaskun Zuazu, 2020. "The impact of electoral rules on manufacturing industries: evidence of disaggregated data of 61 industries of 55 countries," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 31(4), pages 458-488, December.
    7. Zuazu-Bermejo, Izaskun, 2020. "Graduates’ opium? Cultural values, religiosity and gender segregation by field of study," OSF Preprints yn23j, Center for Open Science.

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