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Gender at Work in Africa: Legal Constraints and Opportunities for Reform

Document Cited authorities 1 Cited in Related
Vincent
Published date01 November 2016
Pages518-540
DOI10.3366/ajicl.2016.0171
Author
Date01 November 2016
INTRODUCTION

Expanding women's economic opportunities is critical for meeting the obligations laid out in major human rights conventions and for enhancing countries' development prospects and eliminating poverty. Realising the potential of all people contributes to productivity and a more resilient society. This matters at the national, community, family and individual levels. As a recent qualitative study of women and men in 20 countries across the world concludes, ‘Women's ability to work for pay … may be one of the most visible and game-changing events in the life of modern households and all communities.’1

This article reviews where we stand in terms of women's access to economic opportunities, ranging from working for an employer for a wage to entrepreneurial activities and agriculture, with a specific focus on Africa. We show that there are many systematic constraints, both in law and related to social norms and deprivations. This underlines the relevance of a rights-based approach.

We begin by providing an overview of how women currently fare in terms of economic empowerment at the global level and across Africa before identifying some of the major constraints. Finally, we suggest areas where attention is needed to help overcome constraints related to laws and adverse norms and identify promising approaches where new evidence about what works is emerging.

 WHERE DO WE STAND? Working Women: A Global Overview

Women are disadvantaged relative to men on every global indicator related to economic opportunities. Fewer women participate in the labour force – those who participate tend to be in less secure and lower-paying jobs and sectors, and women on average earn less than their male counterparts for the same work.2 Indeed evidence suggests that globally almost half of women's productive potential is unutilised, compared to only 22 per cent of men's.3

Women comprise about 40 per cent (1.3 billion) of the roughly 3.3 billion people who are in paid work. Somewhat surprisingly, labour force participation of women aged 15–64 globally has actually declined over the last two decades, from 57 to 55 per cent. Male labour force participation rates have also declined slightly, but are still much higher: 82 per cent. Women's participation rates vary widely by region, for example sub-Saharan Africa and Europe and Central Asia have the highest participation rates of any developing region, with almost two-thirds of women participating in the labour force (64 and 63 per cent, respectively), whereas only around one-fifth of women work in the Middle East and North Africa.4

Yet, labour force participation is only part of the story. We also need to think about the nature of work. Women and men are involved in a broad range of work, from running a small unregistered household enterprise in Dhaka to being a subsistence farmer in northern Kenya. These types of jobs account for the vast majority of people's work – especially women's – in developing countries. In India, for example, over nine out of ten workers are in the informal economy, which is estimated to represent some 60 per cent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP). In low-income countries, only a minority of men and even fewer working women are wage employees: fewer than one in five and one in ten, respectively (Figure 1).

Most of the world's working poor, but especially women, work in non-wage jobs on farms and in household enterprises. Source: International Income Distribution Database (I2D2). Unweighted country average of last available year after 2000, based on data from 95 countries, taken from World Bank, Gender at Work (2014).

Informal work is the largest source of employment throughout Africa, Asia and the Middle East, and working women are more likely than working men to be self-employed or work in farming. Women who work tend to be more concentrated in informal sectors; for example, an International Labour Organisation (ILO) analysis across 41 developing countries found that women were more likely than their male counterparts to be in non-agricultural informal employment in 30 countries, including Uganda, where 62 per cent of women are engaged in informal employment compared to 55 per cent of men.5

Women are more concentrated in domestic labour and unpaid work. Recent data from the ILO suggests that over a quarter of female wage workers (27 per cent) in Latin America and the Caribbean and 14 per cent in Africa are domestic workers, and women represent an estimated 83 per cent of domestic workers worldwide.6

Full-time wage employment for an employee is associated with higher levels of well-being, not least because these jobs are more likely to come with higher and more dependable wages, benefits and protections.7 These types of jobs also offer opportunities for developing new skills and are more likely to expand women's agency. Yet, globally, women are less likely than men to have full-time wage jobs. Gallup World Poll estimates suggest that men are nearly twice as likely as women to have a full-time job.8 The share of women who work full-time for an employer is below 15 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa.9 Women are also consistently more likely to work part-time than men. Part-time work has some advantages, in particular increased flexibility, which allows for fulfilment of other family and household responsibilities. However, part-time work tends to involve lower earnings and fewer benefits and protections.10

Women earn significantly less than men. An ILO analysis of 83 countries shows that women in paid work earn on average between 10 and 30 per cent less than men,11 and no country anywhere has reached gender wage parity.12 Gaps persist in high-income countries. In Europe, for example, women earn on average around 16 per cent less than men, ranging from 23 per cent in Austria to 2.5 per cent in Slovenia.13 Analysis based on 2010 data, which controlled for industry and occupation, found large gaps in most countries. In Pakistan, for example, women earned only 36 per cent of what men earned and in Estonia women earned 69 per cent of what men earned.14

Gender differentials across industries and firm types explain much of the pay gap. Economists call this ‘sorting’. Throughout the world women are concentrated in less productive jobs and run smaller enterprises in less productive sectors, with fewer opportunities for business scale-up or career advancement. Fewer women are employed in high growth areas such as science, technology and engineering. Fewer women than men work in the information and communications technologies (ICT) sector, and in some countries the gaps are especially wide – in Jordan women make up less than one-third, and in South Africa, Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom women comprise only around one-fifth of the ICT workforce.15

It is well known that women are grossly underrepresented in senior management roles globally, holding only 24 per cent of such positions. Recent analysis across 13,000 firms in 135 countries found that only 18 per cent of firms have a top manager who is a woman and only 10 per cent of large firms have female management (Figure 2). The change of pace is slow but quotas are working. In fact, Europe is on track to take over from the United States with respect to the number of women board members at top companies. Legal quotas and corporate governance requirements have been driving these changes and Europe now matches the United States with the share of women on boards at 22.5 per cent.16

Women are underrepresented in firms' top management in all regions. Source: World Bank, Gender at Work (2014).

Lower educational attainment places a major constraint on women's economic opportunities. Education levels are rising – almost all girls and boys are enrolled in primary school in all regions, and globally more than 70 per cent of children are enrolled in secondary school. Completion rates at the primary level are also on the rise globally, of 173 countries with data, almost half have completion rates of 95 per cent or higher. Over the last decade, completion rates rose from 78 to 87 per cent for girls, and from 84 to 90 per cent for boys.17 However, in the least developed countries only around 41 per cent of children are enrolled in secondary school and fewer girls than boys are enrolled (14 per cent fewer). And even these levels of participation are relatively recent – fewer than one-third of children in the least developed countries were enrolled in secondary school in 2005 and there were only eight girls for every ten boys. As a result, the current cohort of working-age women in developing countries is much less well-educated.18

Poverty often increases education gaps. Poor children are less likely to enrol or to complete primary and secondary school.19 And there is a gender gap as well. A recent study across 27 countries found that boys from the poorest households were nine percentage points more likely to complete their primary education than girls, while boys and girls from rich households were equally likely to complete primary school.20 In Niger, for example, boys from poor households are almost twice as likely as girls to complete primary school, while boys from richer households are only slightly more likely to complete primary school than their female peers. In contrast, in Zambia girls and boys from poor families are equally less likely to complete primary school (Figure 3). This suggests that while boys' and girls' educational access and attainment varies by country, in all places poorer children are worse off.

Share of 15–19 year olds completing school grades by wealth quintile and gender. Source: Klugman et al., Voice and Agency: Empowering Women and Girls for Shared Prosperity (World Bank, 2014).

Understanding differential opportunities also involves looking at gaps in access to land and capital. Women tend to have less access to and control of physical and financial...

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