Doctoral Dissertation Research: Disconnected and Uninformed: Dissecting and Dismantling India's Political Gender Gap

尽管发展中国家日益重视赋予妇女权力，但许多妇女仍然基本上被排除在政治进程之外，政治参与方面的巨大性别差距今天仍然存在。纵观地球仪，2009年女性在议会成员中所占比例仅为17%，而1995年为10%。 有证据表明，当妇女积极参与政治时，公益物的分配方式会有所不同，发展成果也会得到改善。 该项目旨在更好地了解发展中国家妇女脱离政治的原因，并确定减少当前政治性别差距的机制。与美国的开创性工作相反，PI认为，妇女参政水平低并不是因为妇女缺乏经济资源。相反，该项目评估了妇女缺乏政治参与的两种替代解释：进入家庭以外社交网络的机会有限以及缺乏对政治制度的接触。为了从经验上填补我们知识中的这一空白并检验这些假设，公共政策研究所与非政府组织Pradan合作，收集并使用来自印度的调查和实验数据，以确定农村妇女参政的决定因素，并评估进入社交网络和政治信息是否会增加妇女的参政。在这样做时，拟议的研究将解决两个主要问题：1）通过性别和政治培训提供政治信息和曝光是否能增加妇女的政治参与？（2）这种政治培训能否激活社交网络，进一步提高妇女的政治参与，并打击限制妇女在政治中作用的现行社会规范？这些问题将通过一系列的实验来回答：一个自然的实验，使用地理回归不连续性（GRD）设计，以确定社交网络的影响和随机对照试验（RCT），以确定政治曝光的影响和它与社交网络的互动效果。网络的随机分配将使用GRD设计来近似，该设计利用任意边界来确定Pradan运营并动员妇女进入小团体的村庄。这样就可以估计网络对妇女参政的平均影响。对于RCT，与非政府组织Pradan一起进行的随机性别和政治培训干预将向妇女提供有关政治制度及其在该制度中的权利和应享权利的信息，并将直接接触现有的政治机构，目的是减少政治参与的信息障碍。通过在大民主区边界两侧提供这一培训，随机对照试验进一步检验社交网络对妇女参政的必要性，以及性别和政治培训激活现有社交网络和进一步产生政治参与的能力。

General SummaryDespite the growing focus on female empowerment in the developing world, many women remain largely excluded from the political process and a substantial gender gap in political participation persists today. Across the globe, women accounted for only 17% of members of parliament in 2009, up from 10% in 1995. Evidence suggests that when women are actively engaged in politics, public goods are allocated differently and development outcomes improve. This project seeks to understand better why women in developing countries are disengaged from politics and to identify the mechanisms through which the prevailing political gender gap is reduced. Contrary to seminal work in the U.S., the PI argues that low levels of women's political participation are not due to women's lack of economic resources. Instead this project evaluates two alternative explanations for women's lack of political participation: limited access to social networks outside of the household and a lack of exposure to the political system. To empirically fill this gap in our knowledge and test these hypotheses, the PI collects and uses both survey and experimental data from India, in coordination with the NGO Pradan, to identify the determinants of political engagement for rural women and evaluate whether access to social networks and political information increase women's political participation.Technical SummaryThis project evaluates two mechanisms aimed at increasing women's political participation. In doing so, the proposed research will address two principal questions: 1) Can providing political information and exposure through gender and politics trainings increase women's political participation? and 2) Can this political training activate social networks to further increase women's political participation and combat prevailing social norms limiting women's role in politics? These questions will be answered through a series of experiments: a natural experiment using a geographic regression discontinuity (GRD) design to identify the impact of social networks and a randomized control trial (RCT) to identify the effect of political exposure and its interactive effect with social networks. Random assignment of networks will be approximated using a GRD design, which leverages an arbitrary boundary to identify villages in which Pradan has operated and mobilized women into small groups. This allows for an estimation of the average impact of networks on women's political participation. For the RCT, a randomized gender and politics training intervention with the NGO Pradan, will provide women with information about the political system and their rights and entitlements within this system and will be directly exposed to existing political institutions, with the aim of reducing informational barriers to political participation. By providing this training on both sides of the GRD boundary, the RCT further tests the necessity of social networks for women's political participation and the ability for the gender and politics training to activate existing social networks and further generate political engagement.