An Introduction to Gender and Wellbeing in Microeconomics

Foundations, Concepts and Policies

Nicky Pouw

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317562788
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

An Introduction to Gender and Wellbeing in Microeconomics explains how to set up the basics of designing a gender-aware approach to microeconomics by constructing creative gender-aware indicators.

Using a wellbeing economics framework, the book argues that economic models should take power differences such as those inherent with gender into account, and be complemented by more qualitative analysis geared to discovering the 'how' and 'why' behind the 'what' questions.

This book will be essential reading for academic and professional researchers, as well as policy researchers in gender and economics, international development, and social and economic policy. It will be invaluable for courses relating gender to the economy, and will enable readers to get a clear and concise understanding of the gendered character of the economy and of economic policy.

1Introduction

A gender-aware approach to the economy puts people at the centre of the economy. A people-centered economics takes concrete economic problems that people are confronted with in their daily lives as the starting point. The people who are engaged in solving economic problems based on multi-dimensional trade-offs are defined ‘resource agents’ in this book. Multi-dimensional trade-offs in wellbeing exist because resource agents exercise agency in multiple economic domains. Since economic problems are complex, a simple uni-dimensional framework does not suffice to study economic problems from multiple angles and interest points. This is where a more comprehensive framework such as the well-being economics framework developed by Allister McGregor and Nicky Pouw (2014, 2016) comes in to facilitate more complex analyses.

Moreover, most microeconomic models do not take power relations into account a priori. Yet, in considering gender inequalities in economic relations, policies, processes and outcomes, power plays a key role in shaping these. This is why economic models should take power differences and relationships into account, and be complemented by more qualitative analysis geared to discovering the ‘how’ and ‘why’ behind the ‘what’ questions. A gender-aware approach implies conducting gender analysis. This book explains how to set up the basics of designing gender-aware modeling approaches and construct gender-aware indicators creatively. Sometimes indicators are mistaken for facts, but indicators are constructs too and informed by theory and opinions.

In Chapter 2 it is explained why a gender-aware approach is important for understanding how resource agents make economic decisions. These decisions involve multiple trade-offs between their entangled resource agency in the paid and unpaid economy, and between different dimensions of wellbeing. The gender-aware approach of this book is embedded within a broader epistemological and theoretical framework of well-being economics. The recent progress made with wellbeing economics is linked to developments and critical debates in heterodox economics and international development studies, which propose a pluralist perspective in economics. Chapter 3 explains the basic principles of a wellbeing economics framework, as well as its underlying ontological and epistemological principles and axioms. The remaining chapters of this book address the different resource agents in the microeconomy, considering their economic wellbeing from a gender-aware perspective: individuals and households in Chapter 4, communities and social groups in Chapter 5, and firms, businesses and entrepreneurs in Chapter 6. The book ends with Chapter 7 on the need for a broader conceptualization of economic performance. The debate around economic performance, how we evaluate it and with the use of methods and metrics, spans the micro and macroeconomy. It can therefore also be seen as pre-emptive thinking about a gender-aware approach to the macroeconomy.¹

The chapters will introduce a set of key concepts and definitions to create a common understanding and build-up basic knowledge. Furthermore, the reader is invited to develop a fresh, gender-aware perspective on these concepts, and about the implications of this more comprehensive approach in terms of modeling relationships in the microeconomy. The theoretical models introduced are but a first step in thinking systematically and creatively about more specific, empirically informed models and relationships. As such, the models form a stepping stone into that direction, which would require a more technical and specialized exposition that is most suitable for any economist to learn, but beyond the scope of this book. The development of gender-aware indicators and policies will also be addressed in Chapters 3 to 7.

Each chapter concludes with a list of key learning points; these form a “red line” through the chapters. Moreover, each chapter includes a set of individual and group assignments and discussion points at the end. A tutor or lecturer can use this to deepen and test students/participants understanding and proficiency of the topics and methodologies explained. The exercises are flexible to re-design, elaboration, and tailoring to contextspecific needs within various classroom or training settings. An important feature of this book is to create more room for creative thinking on economics, from a multiplicity of angles and disciplinary approaches. The exercises are designed to stimulate the creativity of students and readers who engage themselves with this fascinating study of economics.

Note

1Volume II on a Gender-Aware Approach to Macroeconomics is currently in the making.

References and suggested further reading

Pouw, N.R.M. and J.A. McGregor (2014) An Economics of Wellbeing. What would economics look like if it were focused on Human Wellbeing? in IDS Working Paper 436, Sussex, England: Institute of Development Studies.

McGregor, J.A. and N.R.M. Pouw (2016) Towards an Economics of Wellbeing. Cambridge Journal of Economics, 24 October 2016. https://doi.org/10.1093/ cje/bew044

2What is gender-aware economics?

2.1What is gender and why does it matter in economics?

This book explains how economic processes and outcomes are shaped by gender. It provides theoretical, conceptual and methodological explanations of a gender-aware economics by focusing on resource agents and economic problems in the microeconomy.

Gender refers to the socially constructed norms and behaviors of women and men, girls and boys that transcend the identities, roles and relationships performed. In order to make the concept of gender tangible in economic analysis, it is broken down into three dimensions: identity, roles and relationships. Every day, women and men make economic decisions that affect their current state of wellbeing and the wellbeing of people around them. Their decisions also have an impact on the natural environment. Women and men make economic decisions individually, collectively or they get decisions imposed upon them. In this book, we zoom in on multidimensional human wellbeing, which can be assessed in objective and subjective terms in line with McGregor (2004). The human wellbeing concept will be introduced in Chapter 3. Furthermore, in this book when we construct models of individual/household, social groups/ communities and firm-level economic wellbeing the focus is in line with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; 2013). Economic wellbeing is also defined in Chapter 3, section 3.1.

Box 2.1 Gender

Gender is the socially constructed norms and behaviors of women and men, girls and boys that transcend the identities, roles and relationships performed.

Gender identity refers to what it means to be and act as a woman or a man, girl or boy within a particular social environment in a given time and place. Gender roles interact with these socially constructed identities and refer to the different tasks and activities, responsibilities and behaviors women and men are accustomed to and what is considered socially appropriate. Gender relationships are then the socially constructed interactions between (groups of) women and men, expressed in relationships of power, collaboration, friendship, affection, love, competition, domination, coercion and force, etc. Gender relationships are embedded and reproduced through society’s formal and informal institutions, thus permeating institutional structures, laws, rules, norms, customs and traditions. Gender identity, roles and relationships are also co-constitutive of each other. This is why Judith Butler (2010) speaks of gender as being a performative social phenomenon that produces and reproduces itself all the time. Societal institutions, including economic institutions, can reproduce or deepen pre-existing gender inequalities if they are not gender-aware.

Box 2.2 Performativity of gender

Gender is a performative social phenomenon that produces and reproduces itself all the time within a given societal context and period of time.

Source: Butler (2010).

Gender intersects with caste, class, religion, race and ethnicity, but also interacts with age, social and marital status and personal characteristics. In places where women and men work, gender interacts with other social constructs, such as religion, class, race or ethnicity shaping the structures and dynamics of the workforce. These complex interactions between gender and other social constructs are not always clearly visible to an outsider. But once knowing the cultural values influencing such interactions, one can reveal them.

Gender-awareness in economics thus means to be informed and attentive to gender identity, roles and relationships. Furthermore, it implies as economic researcher to be attentive to how gender bias and dynamics can influence economic decisions, processes and outcomes and cause gender inequalities in wellbeing. Economic decisions made today have implications on the wellbeing of future generations. From the natural and physical resource bases people leave behind, wellbeing is determined for the future. There is a great global concern that despite todays’ affluent societies, people live in deep poverty, face structural inequality and hardship, are discriminated against and excluded, dominated, oppressed and maltreated. Globalization has not and will not solve these structural inequalities by itself. It is true that some of the old divides have started to disappear, but others remain and new ones continuously appear. Certain deprivations and inequalities affect entire groups of people, leading to durable inequalities; in the words of Charles Tilly, ‘across categories of: caste, class, religion, race, ethnicity, age and gender’ (1999). Among those durable inequalities, gender inequality is one of the most universal and pervasive one; particularly, difficult political and economic circumstances women and girls tend to bear the brunt. There is a growing recognition that globalization and rising levels of gross domestic product (GDP) are not enough to effectively address structural gender inequalities. Moreover, there is a growing recognition that gender inequalities intersect with other social-cultural or political inequalities and oppression or marginalization, thus creating new forms of inequality in wellbeing.

Considering the more negative side of gender and the economy, we find women and girls more often than not pulling the short end of the stick compared to their male counterparts, especially in cultures where patriarchy rules and subversion is enforced. Women’s economic status, their participation in the economy, and competitive positions and rewards are on average less than men’s. This is considered ‘on average’, as the opposite can also be true. On the more positive side, we find women’s economic status and participation having improved considerably over the past fifty years or so, at least in those societies where democracy and freedom are being respected. But these historical changes do not necessarily correspond with development of new gender-aware economic theory and methods sine qua non. Economic theories and methods are remarkably slow in capturing the changing face of the real-life economy. Following Diane Elson’s (1991) and Marianne Ferber and Julie Nelson’s (1993) seminal works on male bias in economic development, we have written this book more than twenty years later because of the old economic textbooks used in class are still the same. Edith Kuiper argued (2001) that economic theories and methods have been developed and applied from a one-sided, male view on the economy and what economics is and should be all about. For example, a key figure in economics, the economic agent, has long been ascribed a narrow set of male-biased characteristics that not many people in real life can actually relate to. Feminist economists, and later the behavioral economists have denounced this delimiting notion of a ‘homo economicus’, whom supposedly behaves perfectly rational in gender-neutral markets. Rationality in that sense refers to economic decision making by comparing relative prices on a one-dimensional scale. However, people weigh in other, non-market factors as well when making economic decisions. Previous experiences, emotions, benevolence, reciprocity, opportunity costs in the household domain, custom and belief, cultural values, and a sense of social justice may all weigh into the decision. This widening scope of what shapes economic decision-making is why, in this book, economic agents are referred to as resource agents (see Section 2.3).

2.2Gender inequality

For most women and men, the market is not a gender-neutral place, because society is not gender-neutral. Productive resources may be inaccessible, jobs may be out of reach, a proper and just reward may be non-negotiable because of gender inequality. Moreover, women’s and men’s autonomy and dignity in the economy may be seriously compromised by social and political restrictions, and their freedom to speak, act or protest may be suppressed. Social and cultural customs and beliefs work as powerful instruments to exclude women and girls from certain economic domains or include them under unfavorable or precarious conditions in other economic domains (e.g. prostitution, child labor). Religious and political rules may be used to ju...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• 2 What is gender-aware economics?
• 3 Wellbeing economics framework - with Allister McGregor
• 4 The household economy
• 5 Communities and social groups
• 6 Gender and firms, businesses, entrepreneurs
• 7 A different conception of economic performance
• Index