The Quarterly Journal of Economics· 2013Q1
On the Origins of Gender Roles: Women and the Plough*
- 1,862citations
- Q1SCImago
- 2013year
Short summary
Societies that historically adopted plough agriculture exhibit less equal gender norms today, even after controlling for ethnicity and country of residence.
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Key points
- Plough agriculture societies show less equal gender norms compared to non-plough societies.
- Results are consistent across national, district, and ethnic levels.
- Cultural persistence of gender norms is observed in immigrant descendants, linking current attitudes to ancestral agricultural practices.
- Measures of inequality include gender-role attitudes and female participation in work, politics, and entrepreneurship.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Abstract The study examines the historical origins of existing cross-cultural differences in beliefs and values regarding the appropriate role of women in society. We test the hypothesis that traditional agricultural practices influenced the historical gender division of labor and the evolution of gender norms. We find that, consistent with existing hypotheses, the descendants of societies that traditionally practiced plough agriculture today have less equal gender norms, measured using reported gender-role attitudes and female participation in the workplace, politics, and entrepreneurial activities. Our results hold looking across countries, across districts within countries, and across ethnicities within districts. To test for the importance of cultural persistence, we examine the children of immigrants living in Europe and the United States. We find that even among these individuals, all born and raised in the same country, those with a heritage of traditional plough use exhibit less equal beliefs about gender roles today.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2013 · DOI ↗
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Field: Demography
DemographySocial Sciences