Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP18278
Authors: Siwan Anderson; Chris Bidner
Abstract: Changes in cultural norms shift incentives, often in unanticipated ways, and therefore can interfere with the functioning of existing institutions designed to manage such incentives. We explore this issue in the context of gender norms and marital institutions. Our model highlights the relevance of unbundling gender norms; the effect of gender norms on the optimal strength of marital institutions depends on whether they apply to the private or public sphere. We test these, and related, predictions by exploiting a feature of Islamic marriage contracts using household data from Egypt.
Keywords: gender norms; marital institutions; Islamic marriage contracts; Egypt
JEL Codes: No JEL codes provided
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| private gender norms (J16) | optimal strength of marital institutions (J12) |
| public gender norms (J16) | optimal strength of marital institutions (J12) |
| private gender norms (J16) | deferred dower (J12) |
| public gender norms (J16) | deferred dower (J12) |
| private gender norms (J16) | prompt dower (Y60) |
| public gender norms (J16) | prompt dower (Y60) |