April 2021 How to Better Capture Women’s Agency Through Decision-making Measures: EAST ASIA AND PACIFIC GENDER INNOVATION LAB Five Tips from Research in the Philippines The East Asia and Pacific Gender Innovation Lab TIPS IN BRIEF (EAPGIL) carries out impact evaluations and • Understand the local context before collecting or interpreting decision-making data inferential research • Do not ask ONLY about who makes decisions to generate evidence • Ask who makes the final decision on what works in • Ask about involvement in the decision-making process closing gender gaps • Ask if respondents could make decisions if desired in assets, economic opportunities, and agency, and how CONTEXT closing these gaps can help achieve Accurately measuring and understanding agency, or one’s ability to make choices and achieve desired outcomes (World Development Report, 2012),1 can support the design and targeting of other development effective development interventions, as well as tracking their impacts. Conversely, gender-blind outcomes. Ultimately, programs that do not consider women’s lower levels of agency than men may not achieve the EAPGIL seeks to desired impacts. For example, Bernhardt et al. (2019) show that cash grants given to female increase the welfare entrepreneurs do not increase their profits because the money is invested in their husband’s of women and men businesses instead of their own. To maximize the effectiveness of development interventions, in East Asia and the it is critical to understand women’s agency and how agency may influence the effectiveness Pacific by promoting of program design. In addition, because promoting women’s agency is also a development the uptake of effective outcome of interest, it is necessary to track how programs shift agency and which interventions policies and programs are most effective at promoting it. A clear understanding of agency and effective monitoring and identified based on evaluation rely on accurate measures of agency. evidence. Women’s decision-making in the household is frequently captured in surveys as a proxy for women’s agency. Women who report being decision-makers in any given domain are considered Agency is closely related to empowerment: the process by which those who have been denied the ability to make 1  strategic life choices acquire such an ability (Kabeer 1999). to have more agency in that domain. However, research from a DEFINING AND MEASURING variety of contexts suggests that this may be a simplification of a WOMEN’S AGENCY more complex and multi-faceted relationship between decision- Agency, defined as people’s ability to use “capabilities making and women’s agency. In particular, there is much left to and opportunities to expand the choices they have and learn about the best ways of measuring decision-making. to control their own destiny,”3 is a multifaceted concept Consider Maria and Carmen, who are women in two different that cannot be condensed into a single survey measure. (fictional) farming households in the rural Philippines. Both Maria Current research has been relying on three categories and Carmen discuss major agricultural decisions with their of measures:4(1) a perception of control over one’s life, husbands; however, the amount of influence they have over the (2) the ability to set goals in line with one’s own values, outcome of that discussion is different. Maria’s husband usually and (3) the ability to act on those goals. Measures of starts these discussions and will make the final decision in line with decision-making are commonly collected in surveys as his opinion even if Maria disagrees with him. In contrast, Carmen a proxy for the third facet of agency, while the second and her husband discuss the decision until both agree on the is often captured through the Relative Autonomy Index best thing to do, regardless of who suggested that idea. Because (RAI). The RAI is a scale that captures autonomy, defined Carmen has a greater ability to influence choices, she has relatively as the extent to which decisions are motivated by more agency than Maria. However, if asked who makes agricultural coercion or by one’s own goals and values. Decisions decisions in their households, both women would say that both motivated by coercion reflect less relative autonomy, they and their husbands are decision-makers. whereas decisions motivated by one’s own goals and Using new analysis from a spousal survey with farming values reflect greater relative autonomy.5 households in the Philippines, we explore which survey questions A core objective of our work is to understand what types can accurately capture the difference in agency of women like of questions about decision-making capture women’s Maria and Carmen. We also conducted qualitative work to autonomy. To achieve it, we compare different decision- understand why different measures of decision-making are better making measures to RAI. As different dimensions of at capturing agency than others. agency are closely correlated, we expect that measures of decision-making that are reflective of agency will be WHAT DID WE DO? associated with higher relative autonomy. As part of a larger impact evaluation on a nationwide land reform We measure the RAI through the use of vignettes, program, EAPGIL carried out fieldwork with farming households in describing different ways of making decisions about the rural Philippines. Our primary sample consists of 421 matched agriculture.6 We ask the respondent if they are similar couples. The majority of our sample was interviewed across six to the protagonists of the vignettes. We give these provinces of the island of Mindanao, while 72 households were protagonists male or female names to match the gender interviewed in the Bicol region of southeastern Luzon. Interviews of the respondent.7 were carried out only with couples who were married or in common-law relationships. The spousal survey included a variety of commonly used measures of decision-making, agency and connected to other cultural phenomena such as gender empowerment, as well as several novel measures. A qualitative relations and social norms. Cross-country studies study was later carried out with 40 couples in the sample, of which have repeatedly found that the relationship between 20 were interviewed jointly and 20 were interviewed individually. decision-making and other outcomes such as nutrition or Couples were asked in-depth about the decision-making process agricultural productivity is complex and varies depending within their household, as well as their preferences for ideal models on the region and context.2 For instance, while social of decision-making and the social norms of their communities. norms dictate that men are the primary decision-makers TIP #1: UNDERSTAND THE LOCAL CONTEXT in household finances in some regions, women may be The concepts of decision-making and agency are inextricably expected to be the primary decision-makers in others. 2 Ghuman, Lee & Smith 2006; Seymour & Peterman 2018; Yount et al 2019; Peterman et al 2021; Akter et al 2017. 3 Sen 1999, 10. 4 For a review and conceptual framework for measuring women’s agency, see Donald et al (2017). 5 Ryan & Deci 2000. 6 A complete questionnaire is available upon request. 7 Full questionnaires are available upon request. Figure 1: Spouses Disagree About Decision-making in a Wide Variety of Domains Major decisions on the 56 Rearing livestock 50 parcel of interest 15 40 Decision whether to 53 Hiring laborers 54 sell parcel of interest 13 20 Growing crops for sale 45 Non-farm self 59 or consumption 22 employment 80 Buying or renting 54 Off-farm wage work 42 farm equipment 14 18 Choosing where and 50 Small expenditures 40 how to sell crops 28 64 Buying agricultural inputs 58 Major expenditures 55 such as fertilizers 20 47 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 Share of Respondents (%) Agree over decision-maker Agree woman is a decision-maker (sole or joint) Note: Bars in green include cases where one spouse reports that the wife is a sole decision-maker and the other spouse reports she is a joint decision-maker. This is coded as “disagreement” in the orange bars. Understanding of what it means to make a decision and sample is no exception: we find that for any given activity, what constitutes a unilateral versus a jointly made decision husbands and wives give the same reports on who makes vary between cultures, languages, ethnic groups and decisions only 50.2% of the time, although this varies other contexts, thus complicating the creation of universal by activity (Figure 1). The large share of discrepancies measures. Before attempting to capture or interpret decision- 8 suggests that asking who makes decisions likely suffers making measures, teams should seek contextual information from consequential measurement issues and provides a from existing studies,9 by collaborating with local researchers, biased picture of decision-making.12 Our results from the and conducting additional qualitative research where Philippines suggest two additional reasons to avoid relying necessary. In our work in the Philippines, using these three on this measure in a similar context. strategies revealed powerful normative preferences regarding First, we find that respondents likely have differing decision-making that explain many of our quantitative results, interpretations of answer options. In our sample, the discussed below.10 majority of differences between spouses’ answers are cases where one spouse reports that the decision was TIP #2: DO NOT ASK ONLY ABOUT WHO MAKES made together with their spouse (a “joint” decision), while DECISIONS the other reports that it was made by only one person (a Women’s self-reported status as decision-makers is “sole” decision). In qualitative interviews with respondents, commonly used to capture decision-making power in joint decisions captured everything from one spouse household surveys. Although simple and relatively easy to notifying the other about the decision without seeking capture, recent evidence from spousal surveys in a variety input to a fully collaborative process in which discussions of contexts suggests a potential problem: when spouses are continued until a consensus was reached.13 Without a asked the same questions about who makes decisions about clear definition of what is meant by making a decision or any given activity, they frequently give different answers.11 Our what would constitute a joint decision, surveys asking who 8 As such, while the findings in this brief are broadly supported by similar work in other countries, more research is necessary to determine to how applicable they are to other contexts. Researchers and practitioners should always start by considering how the context in which they are working may influence measuring and understanding decision-making and agency. 9 To find a broader range of studies, seek evidence from a variety of social sciences, such as sociology, anthropology, or psychology. Actively seek studies written by local researchers. We are grateful to Prudenciano Gordoncillo, Aries Arugay, and Aletheia Valenciano for their valuable contributions on different parts of this study. Useful 10  references for this study on decision-making in the Philippine context included Malapit et al 2020, Medina 2001, Bayudan-Dacuycuy 2011, David 1994, and Contado 1981. We thank Agnes Quisumbing for helpful comments and references. See, for instance, Anderson, Reynolds & Gugerty (2017) in Tanzania; Amugsi et al (2016) in Ghana; Donald et al (2017) in Sub-Saharan Africa; Ghuman Lee & 11  Smith in Asia; and Ambler et al (2021) in Bangladesh. The literature suggests discrepancies arise due to a variety of reasons, including random measurement error (Ghuman, Lee and Smith, 2006), systematically 12  different interpretations of survey questions (Donald et al., 2021, Ambler et al., 2021), asymmetric information (Ambler et al., 2021), social desirability bias (Jejheeboy, 2002), or the effects of enumerator gender (Alwang et al., 2016). This finding is aligned with Bernard et al. (2020) who find that some reasons for considering a decision to be joint are more empowering than others, as 13  well as Acosta et al. (2020) who show that one spouse (generally the husband in their sample) can dominate the “joint” decision-making process, leading to overestimates of the extent to which it captures gender equality. makes decisions will involve significant measurement error, TIP #3: ASK WHO MAKES THE FINAL DECISION which may lead to biased or misleading results if different Our qualitative and quantitative work suggests multiple individuals interpret the questions in different ways. Differences issues with the most commonly used measure of decision- in the way joint decisions are carried out between households making—asking who makes decisions—especially due will also not be captured when only asking about the decision- to the difficulty of defining “joint” decision-making. To maker, leading to imprecise measurement. test how much different interpretations of joint decision- making affect discrepancies found in spousal surveys, we Second, we find that declaring oneself as a decision-maker also ask spouses who could make the final decision in the (either alone or jointly) is not correlated with respondents’ Relative case of disagreement over major agricultural decisions, Autonomy Index (Figure 3; see Box 2 for more information eliminating the “joint” option. We find that in this case on how we measure agency and autonomy). Measurement spouses give the same answer 78 percent of the time, an error may affect this relationship, however. Indeed, when the increase of 22 percentage points. We also find that, while answers of both spouses are compared, we find that cases being a decision-maker is not associated with greater where husbands and wives agree that the wife is a decision- autonomy for women, being the final decision-maker in maker are significantly associated with higher overall autonomy case of disagreement is.15 Nevertheless, in a context in for the wife.14 This clearer relationship with women’s autonomy which men maintain final decision-making authority in the may reflect a more consequential role played by women in the vast majority of cases, the question of who could make decision making process that is recognized by both spouses. the final decision alone is likely insufficient to capture The weak relationship between decision-making and autonomy the nuances of relative levels of agency within a survey may also be linked with social norms and the consequences sample. As such, its use alone or in combination with other of decision-making. Our qualitative work reveals a very strong questions should be determined after fully understanding normative preference for consultative decision-making, with the local context (Tip #1). most respondents preferring some kind of conversation with their spouse before any kind of major decision. Sole decisions TIP #4: ASK ABOUT INVOLVEMENT IN THE were seen as riskier and even disempowering, as the decision- DECISION-MAKING PROCESS maker was more likely to take the blame for any negative Even when women do not make the final decision, they consequences of the decision. may be able to influence it in a myriad of ways during Figure 2: Spouses are Much More Likely to Agree About the Process of Decision-making Than They are on the Decision-maker 100 90 93 80 89 80 Percent agreement 70 60 50 56 56 58 54 54 53 50 40 45 30 20 10 0 Major Decision Growing Choosing Rearing Buying Hiring or Conversation Husband Wife Who usually decisions to sell or crops for seeds for livestock agricultural paying held before present in present in brings up on parcel lease parcel sale or food or inputs such laborers major conversations conversations ideas and consumption cash crops as fertilizer agricultural about about starts the decisions agricultural agricultural conversation? decisions decisions Note: Orange bars represent agreement on decision-making in various domains of agriculture, while green bars represent agreement over the decision-making process. In Ghana and Bangladesh, Seymour & Peterman (2018) similarly find that agreement between spouses affects the relationship between decision-making and 14  autonomy. We find no significant association between being the final decision-maker and men’s autonomy, most likely because husbands are the final decision-makers in 15  the majority of cases. Figure 3: Input into Decisions and the Ability to Make Decisions are More Predictive of Autonomy than Whether One is the Decision-maker 0.35 0.3 Relative Autonomy Index (standard deviations) 0.25 0.2 0.15 0.1 0.05 0 Growing crops Buying and Choosing Rearing Choosing seeds Buying Hiring or paying for sale and selling farm where and how livestock for food and agricultural laborers household equipment to sell crops cash crops inputs such consumption as fertilizer Decision-maker for activity High degree of input in activity Could make own personal decisions in activity Notes: Graph represents the coefficients of each variable regressed on the respondent’s Relative Autonomy Index (RAI), converted into standard deviations. Regression includes controls for province, age, age difference between spouses whether women own agricultural land and have off-farm income, and the gender of the enumerator. Light-colored bars represent coefficients that are not significant at p≤0.05. conversations and negotiations before the decision is decisions women should make. In some cases, not being made. Qualitative work with our sample suggests that is a decision-maker may be more reflective of agency, often the case, with both spouses having varying degrees particularly if men or women are normatively expected to of input in almost all major decisions. In addition to asking be decision-makers in a certain area, but choose not to.17 who makes decisions, we asked respondents in our survey For example, not being a sole decision maker about daily how much input they had into these decisions, a measure meals may be a manifestation of agency for a woman suggested in the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture who chooses to run a business and negotiates with her Index (WEAI).16 We find that having input into decisions partner that he shares in decision-making burden. To related to agricultural activities is a much better predictor capture a more nuanced aspect of decision-making, we of autonomy than being a decision-maker in that activity, ask respondents if they could make their own personal with having a high level of input into a decision associated decisions in various domains if they wanted to.18 We find with a 0.2 standard deviation increase in RAI on average that this measure is very strongly predictive of autonomy, (Figure 3). We find that spouses are much more likely to with the ability to make one’s own personal decisions in agree about the process of making major agricultural agriculture – if one chose – associated with a 0.3 standard decisions than they are to agree about who makes the deviation increase in autonomy (Figure 3). decisions (Figure 2). CONCLUSIONS: WHAT DOES THIS TIP #5: ASK IF RESPONDENTS COULD MAKE DECISIONS IF DESIRED MEAN FOR SURVEY DESIGN? An additional nuance of decision-making that is not Our work in the Philippines suggests that the most captured when asking only about the decision-maker is common decision-making measure used in surveys may the role of choice (or lack thereof). While men and women not reliably capture agency because we do not find the may be decision-makers in an area because they are expected relationship between these measures and empowered to do so, it may also be due to social norms another aspect of agency – autonomy. However, we find that dictate which decisions men should make and which that slight modifications of these measures may improve Alkire et al 2013. 16  17 Kabeer 1999. This and other measures are drawn from the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI), a survey tool designed to capture women’s empowerment in 18  a variety of aspects, including decision-making. EXAMPLE SURVEY QUESTIONS 1. Yes Do you or any member of your household participate in [activity]? 2. No > skip to next activity or module How much input would you say you have in major decisions about 1. No input or input in a few decisions [activity]? 2. Input on some decisions READ OPTIONS ALOUD 3. Input in most or all decisions To what extent do you feel you could make your own personal 1. Not at all decisions on [activity] if you wanted to? 2. To a small extent READ OPTIONS ALOUD 3. To a large extent 1. Self If there were a disagreement about decisions related to [activity], 2. Spouse who would make the final decision? 3. Other household member researchers’ ability to capture agency. A suggested survey changes. Development research would benefit by using module can be found below; the questions shown there measures that are less prone to measurement error, and can be used either to examine general decision-making conclusions based on measures that better capture agency in a particular domain or for a roster of specific activities. would have more policy relevance. Because boosting The first three questions are drawn from the Women’s women’s agency is a targeted development outcome, it is Empowerment in Agriculture Index, which provides multiple important to include indicators in project monitoring and other measures aimed at capturing various facets of evaluation that shed light on whether programs are on track empowerment and agency. 19 to achieve results. In the context of the rural Philippines, An important word of caution, however: while the tracking the input women have in decision-making and questions below have been validated by our work in the their ability to make decisions if desired would be useful Philippines and in other country contexts, this module indicators, as these are both strongly related to agency and is not meant as a replacement for background work on relatively straightforward to ask. understanding the local context and how questions may These findings also shed light on ways that development be interpreted differently in those contexts. Additional or projects can be better designed to promote women’s agency. alternative measures may be more applicable depending Incentivizing women to make decisions in realms they on the purpose and local context of the study. Valuable otherwise have little interest in may not necessarily translate information on the decision-making process and agency into increased agency. Evidence from the literature suggests over decision-making may be gathered through the addition this may only increase women’s time burden, and evidence of further questions on the nature of discussions that occur from our qualitative work suggests that decision-making before a decision is made, including who is part of those can have some negative consequences, including stress or discussions and the likelihood that those discussions can worry about the burden of responsibility for the outcome of change the outcome of the decision. The value of these or the decision. However, interventions that enable women to other decision-making variables may depend in large part have input or make decisions if desired may hold promise, as on the context and intent of the survey, or how translations these aspects of decision-making are linked with women’s of these questions are interpreted by respondents. agency. For example, projects can ensure that women have Such survey modules, or adaptations of them based on the equal access to information that would enable them to make local context, can help both researchers and policymakers informed choices or contribute meaningfully to household better understand women’s agency and decision-making discussions, as well as expanding the choices women are and how they may be affected by interventions or policy able to make.20 Alkire et al 2013. 19  The findings of the impact evaluation to which this work is linked led to an emphasis on involving both spouses in communications and the process related to 20  the land reform intervention. WORKS CITED Acosta, Mariola A., Margit van Wessel, Severine van Bommel, Edidah L. Ampaire, Jennifer Twyman, Laurence Jassogne, and Peter H. Feindt. 2019. “What does it Mean to Make a ‘Joint’ Decision? 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