Rural Road Infrastructure and Women’s Empowerment in India
研究了印度农村道路建设计划对女性赋权的影响，发现该政策减少了女性出行限制、改善了家庭暴力和家庭内部决策权，并提升了女性教育水平，但对女性就业影响有限。
Abstract The paper examines the impact of a rural road construction program in India on a range of outcomes that capture women’s empowerment comprehensively. While spatial integration can ease mobility constraints and provide women with increased education and employment opportunities, the extent of benefits might be limited by underlying gender norms. The paper identifies the impact of the policy by exploiting the program rule that assigned roads based on the village population in a two-way fixed effect framework. The results suggest that the policy reduces mobility restrictions faced by women and improves norms around domestic violence and intra-household agency. It also finds a positive impact of the policy on female education; however, there is limited impact on female employment. Additionally, the study documents gendered impact of the policy—men benefit more in terms of employment than women. The paper offers important policy prescription on how investment in rural roads can affect women’s lives.