EA - Dismantling restrictive gender norms in low-income countries as an EA opportunity by Seema Jayachandran

The Nonlinear Library

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Dismantling restrictive gender norms in low-income countries as an EA opportunity, published by Seema Jayachandran on July 2, 2024 on The Effective Altruism Forum. Introduction I spoke at EA Global: Boston 2023 about ending restrictive gender norms as an EA opportunity. I discussed my research in India, in which we designed and evaluated class discussions about gender equality embedded into the school curriculum. Our randomized control trial (RCT) found that the intervention succeeded in eroding students' support for restrictive norms and the curriculum is now being scaled. Here's an edited transcript of the talk. Key points include: A discussion on economic development vs. gender inequality: despite significant economic growth in India, as indicated by rising GDP per capita and improvements in general well-being, gender inequality measures, particularly the skewed sex ratio, have worsened. Overview of the implementation of an RCT in Haryana aimed at shifting gender norms and attitudes through educational interventions targeting school children. An evaluation of the efforts to change gender norms in low and middle-income countries, assessing their tractability, neglectedness, and significance within broader economic and social frameworks. EA Global Boston: 2023 talk Speaker background: Seema Jayachandran Seema Jayachandran is a Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University. Her research focuses on gender inequality, environmental conservation, and other topics in developing countries. She serves on the board of directors of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) and leads J-PAL's gender sector. She's also a co-director of the National Bureau of Economic Research's programme in developing economics. Overview of gender norms in India I'm going to talk about gender norms with a focus on low and middle income countries. I'm going to mostly talk about India, because that's where my research on this topic is based. I'm going to start with this picture, which shows one of the motivations for why I decided to work on this topic (see slide below). It is a picture of progress and regress in India over the last 60 years. The blue line shows GDP per capita. Over the last few decades, India's economy has grown and that has improved the well-being of people from rural villages to the fancy software campuses in Bangalore. There have been incredible improvements in health and well-being. The red line is the negative progress. It shows the regress that has happened over that same period on one measure of gender equality, namely the 'skewed sex ratio'. So what I'm depicting here is, "for every 100 boys, how many girls are there in society?" It was not parity at the beginning of this period, but it's just gotten worse in subsequent decades. So this is from census data, and it stops in the most recent census in 2011. Right now, there are 92 girls alive for every 100 boys. Impact of technology on existing cultural norms Why has this measure of gender equality deteriorated? At the heart of sex selection, or the preference for sons over daughters, is a cultural norm and need. Values in India emphasize the importance of having a son because, in the joint family system, elderly parents or older adults typically live with their son, who then takes care of them, inherits their property, and fulfills certain religious obligations. Consequently, the practice of favoring sons has evolved into a status symbol and there is stigma associated with not having any sons. I actually believe that this norm has not worsened over recent decades. However, it has conflicted with changes in the economic environment that are usually seen as progress. As depicted in slide 2 below, the use of ultrasounds has become significant. Historically, people always preferred sons, but it was ...