Women's Empowerment and the Intrinsic Demand for Agency: Experimental Evidence from Nigeria

79 Pages Posted: 26 Dec 2022 Last revised: 16 Feb 2025

See all articles by M. Mehrab Bakhtiar

M. Mehrab Bakhtiar

International Food Policy Research Institute

Marcel Fafchamps

Stanford University

Markus Goldstein

Independent

Kenneth L. Leonard

University of Maryland

Sreelakshmi Papineni

World Bank

Date Written: December 2022

Abstract

Most studies of intrahousehold resource allocation examine outcomes and do not consider the decision-making process by which those outcomes are achieved. We conduct an original lab-in-the-field experiment on the decision-making process of married couples over the allocation of rival and non-rival household goods. The experiment measures individual preferences over allocations and traces the process of consultation, communication, deferral, and accommodation by which couples implement these preferences. We find few differences in individual preferences over allocations of goods. However, wives and husbands have strong preferences over process: women prefer to defer budget allocation decisions to their husband even when deferral is costly and is not observed by the husband; the reverse is true for men. Our study follows a randomized controlled trial that ended a year earlier and gave large cash transfers over fifteen months to half of the women in the study. We estimate the effect of treatment on the demand for agency among women and find that the receipt of cash transfers does not change women's bargaining process except in a secret condition when the decision to defer is shrouded from her husband: only in that case does the cash transfer increase women's expressed demand for agency.

Suggested Citation

Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab and Fafchamps, Marcel and Goldstein, Markus and Leonard, Kenneth L. and Papineni, Sreelakshmi, Women's Empowerment and the Intrinsic Demand for Agency: Experimental Evidence from Nigeria (December 2022). NBER Working Paper No. w30789, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4312036

M. Mehrab Bakhtiar (Contact Author)

International Food Policy Research Institute ( email )

1201 Eye St, NW,
Washington, DC 20005
United States

Marcel Fafchamps

Stanford University ( email )

Stanford, CA 94305
United States

Markus Goldstein

Independent ( email )

United States

Kenneth L. Leonard

University of Maryland ( email )

Symmons Hall, Rm 2200
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742-5535
United States

HOME PAGE: http://faculty.arec.umd.edu/kleonard/

Sreelakshmi Papineni

World Bank ( email )

1818 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20433
United States

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