TY - JOUR

T1 - Eroding Patriarchy

T2 - The Co-evolution of Women's Rights and Emancipative Values

AU - Alexander, Amy

AU - Welzel, Christian

PY - 2015/1/2

Y1 - 2015/1/2

N2 - Some scholars find that top-down improvements in women's rights increase societies' value of gender equality at the grassroots, creating pressure for more adoption and enforcement. Others claim that the extension of women's rights is strongly dependent on value change at the grassroots, operating largely as a bottom-up process. We find that top-down and bottom-up dynamics are mutually reinforcing, creating a co-evolutionary dynamic in women's empowerment. We evaluate the rights/values dynamic with data on as many countries as possible, trace their changes over the longest time span available, and analyze their reciprocal relationship in both directions of impact. This is the first analysis that is at the same time (1) comparative across a diverse, global set of nations; (2) dynamic in looking at change in rights and values over time; (3) bidirectional in analyzing the interplay in both directions of impact; and, (4) controlled for relevant ‘third’ changes.

AB - Some scholars find that top-down improvements in women's rights increase societies' value of gender equality at the grassroots, creating pressure for more adoption and enforcement. Others claim that the extension of women's rights is strongly dependent on value change at the grassroots, operating largely as a bottom-up process. We find that top-down and bottom-up dynamics are mutually reinforcing, creating a co-evolutionary dynamic in women's empowerment. We evaluate the rights/values dynamic with data on as many countries as possible, trace their changes over the longest time span available, and analyze their reciprocal relationship in both directions of impact. This is the first analysis that is at the same time (1) comparative across a diverse, global set of nations; (2) dynamic in looking at change in rights and values over time; (3) bidirectional in analyzing the interplay in both directions of impact; and, (4) controlled for relevant ‘third’ changes.

KW - Politics

KW - Demokratieforschung

KW - Politische Kulturforschung

KW - Gender

KW - development

KW - diffuse effects

KW - emancipative

KW - values

KW - social movements

KW - symbolic effects

KW - value change

KW - women's rights

KW - Gender and Diversity

KW - development

KW - diffuse effects

KW - emancipative values

KW - social movements

KW - symbolic effects

KW - value change

KW - women's rights

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84922420756&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1080/03906701.2014.976949

DO - 10.1080/03906701.2014.976949

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 25

SP - 144

EP - 165

JO - International Review of Sociology

JF - International Review of Sociology

SN - 0390-6701

IS - 1

ER -