Study: “Women’s Property Rights and Gendered Policies: Implications for Women’s Long-Term Welfare in Rural Tanzania”
PI(s): Peterman, Amber
Affiliation(s): University of North Carolina Chapel Hill
Institutional Partner(s): PRB Dissertation Fellowship
Project Dates:
Start: 2007
End: 2009
Data Source(s): Panel Data Collection
Methods: Gender-Level Fixed Effect, Multivariate Regression Models
Geographic Location(s): Tanzania

Description:
Women’s struggles for equal property and inheritance rights in sub-Saharan Africa have been documented for decades. This study evaluates the effects of community-level women’s property and inheritance rights (WPIR) on women’s economic outcomes using a 13-year longitudinal panel from rural Tanzania. Results indicate that changes in WPIR are significantly associated with changes in women’s employment outside the home, self-employment, and earnings. Results are not limited to subgroups of marginalized women. Findings indicate that lack of gender equity in sub-Saharan Africa inhibited economic development for women and society as a whole. They also indicate that legal rights often have little effect if they are not accompanied by promotion of change in customary law and how communities view the citizenship of their women.

Research Outputs:

Peterman, Amber. (2011). Women’s property rights and gendered policies: implications for women’s long-term welfare in rural Tanzania. Journal of Development Studies, 47(1), 1-30. DOI: 10.1080/00220381003600366

Peterman, Amber, Johnson, Kiersten. (2009). Incontinence and trauma: sexual violence, female genital cutting and proxy measures of gynecological fistula. Social Science & Medicine, 68, 971-979. DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2008.12.006

Peterman, Amber. (2009). Essays in maternal health and human rights: Evidence from sub-Saharan Africa (Doctoral dissertation). The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC.