Women and Work: Informal Labor and the Gender Participation Gap in Slums

• In Event: Gender and Politics in Developing Countries

Abstract

The world’s urban population is projected to increase substantially over the next three decades. Much of this growth is expected to accrue to slums in the Global South. Urban slum residents, who disproportionately work in the informal economy, are often unable to access government social policies targeted to formal workers. In the absence of formal social policy benefits, many slum residents turn to informal slum leaders who play a crucial role in lobbying the government for basic services. Preliminary evidence not only suggests that informal workers are more likely than formal workers to rely on these local brokers but also that informal employment can have important implications for policy and candidate preferences. This body of research, though important to understanding political behavior among informal urban laborers, remains largely unexplored – particularly with respect to differences by gender. Women are disproportionately represented in the informal economy, and while women’s employment in the formal sector has been shown to reduce the gender gap in political participation, evidence is lacking on the informal context. In this paper, I develop and test an argument to explain how different mechanisms underpin the relationship between informal employment and political preferences for women and men. I draw on primary survey data, including a conjoint experiment, from more than 8,000 slum households across three Indian cities and 92 in-depth qualitative interviews with slum residents and leaders. I show women are less likely than men to participate in politics, and are more likely to rely on informal brokers when they do so. Both men and women who work outside the home exhibit higher levels of participation than those not in the labor force. However, for men, more formal jobs that offer greater opportunities for skill development are associated with participation in and preferences for more formal institutions. For women, who have more limited social networks than men but are more likely to participate in groups, labor force participation is associated with increased participation and preferences for community-targeted policies, regardless of job skill level. These results have important implications for political behavior as the population of informal laborers living in urban slums continues to grow.

Author

• Emily Rains, Duke University