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Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015
Women’s empowerment is a fundamental human right but attempts to measure progress in this area have been limited. We used 142 nationally representative surveys to quantify empowerment in six domains (Intimate Partner Violence, Family Planning, Reproductive Healthcare, Employment, Education, and Deci...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2022
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Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9473440/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36103466 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272909 |
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author | Rettig, Erica M. Hijmans, Robert J. |
author_facet | Rettig, Erica M. Hijmans, Robert J. |
author_sort | Rettig, Erica M. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Women’s empowerment is a fundamental human right but attempts to measure progress in this area have been limited. We used 142 nationally representative surveys to quantify empowerment in six domains (Intimate Partner Violence, Family Planning, Reproductive Healthcare, Employment, Education, and Decision-Making) for first-level subdivisions of all countries in Sub-Saharan Africa for three years (1995, 2005, and 2015). The possible value for each domain ranged between zero (worst) and one (best). The median value for employment decreased by 0.02, but it increased between 0.09 and 0.16 for the other domains. The average empowerment score increased from 0.44 to 0.53, but it remained low for Education (0.34). While progress was clear and consistent, it was uneven within and between countries, and Sahelian West Africa fell further behind. The expanded understanding of geographic variation and trends in women’s empowerment that we provide should be instrumental in efforts to improve women’s lives. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9473440 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-94734402022-09-15 Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 Rettig, Erica M. Hijmans, Robert J. PLoS One Research Article Women’s empowerment is a fundamental human right but attempts to measure progress in this area have been limited. We used 142 nationally representative surveys to quantify empowerment in six domains (Intimate Partner Violence, Family Planning, Reproductive Healthcare, Employment, Education, and Decision-Making) for first-level subdivisions of all countries in Sub-Saharan Africa for three years (1995, 2005, and 2015). The possible value for each domain ranged between zero (worst) and one (best). The median value for employment decreased by 0.02, but it increased between 0.09 and 0.16 for the other domains. The average empowerment score increased from 0.44 to 0.53, but it remained low for Education (0.34). While progress was clear and consistent, it was uneven within and between countries, and Sahelian West Africa fell further behind. The expanded understanding of geographic variation and trends in women’s empowerment that we provide should be instrumental in efforts to improve women’s lives. Public Library of Science 2022-09-14 /pmc/articles/PMC9473440/ /pubmed/36103466 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272909 Text en © 2022 Rettig, Hijmans https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Rettig, Erica M. Hijmans, Robert J. Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title | Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title_full | Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title_fullStr | Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title_full_unstemmed | Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title_short | Increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa between 1995 and 2015 |
title_sort | increased women’s empowerment and regional inequality in sub-saharan africa between 1995 and 2015 |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9473440/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36103466 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272909 |
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