# **1. Introduction**

Gender inequalities across a variety of dimensions of well-being, education, economic participation, health, access to assets, services, and voice have been highlighted as key features of inequality and poverty in the South Asia region (Klasen and Lahoti 2021, Vijaya, Lahoti, and Swaminathan, 2014; Alkire and Santos 2014). Although progress has been achieved in several of these dimensions, gender inequalities persist and remain unchanged in some areas. A major area of concern is the low female labor force participation (FLFP) in the region. Notwithstanding some within-region differences, FLFP rates in South Asia remain below all other world regions, apart from the Middle East and North Africa, by a large margin (at 23.6 and 19.8 percent, respectively, for 2019)<sup>1</sup> and have remained broadly unchanged since 2001 (Najeeb et al., 2020).

The theoretical and empirical literature consistently recognizes social norms as a key driver of various gender outcomes (Galvan & Garcia-Penalosa, 2018; Heise, 1998; Munoz Boudet et al., 2013; The Social Norms Learning Collaborative, 2021; Weber et al., 2019; The World Bank, 2012; Verick, 2014). A recent review by Jayachandran (2020) illustrates how norms act as a barrier to women’s employment and the impact of various policy measures when strong norms are present. By placing restrictions on women’s mobility, control over finances, roles within the household and attitudes around gender-based violence, cultural norms make it harder for women to participate and thrive in the labor market. Other studies have confirmed this to be true in the specific context of South Asia (Amir et al., 2018; Bernhardt et al., 2018; Heintz, Kabeer, and Mahmud, 2017; Klasen, 2019; Bridges, Lawson, & Begum, 2011).

The role of norms may explain why, in the past two decades, FLFP has continued to be low in the region despite significant gains in GDP growth, women’s educational attainment, and total fertility rate<sup>2</sup> - factors typically associated with improvements in women’s economic participation (Mammen and Paxson, 2000; Goldin, 1994; Olivetti, and Petrongolo, (2016); Luci _et al._ , 2012; Hosney, 2016; Zaheer and Qaiser, 2016; Verick, 2014). Indeed, trends observed in South Asia also do not conform to the traditionally hypothesized U-shaped relationship between economic development and FLFP (Boserup, 1970; Durand, 1975; Goldin, 1995). Examination of data from two time periods – 1995 and 2020 – shows that FLFP in most South Asian countries tends to fall substantially below global employment rates in the U-shaped curve (see Figure _1_ ), at the same level of GDP per capita compared to the rest of the world.

Social norms often influence behavior in combination with or through interactions between households, markets, and formal and informal institutions (The World Bank, 2012). To understand the drivers of gender inequality, it is therefore important to look at changes over time in various macro and micro level

> 1 For women 15+. Source World Development Indicators, using the International Labour Organization, ILOSTAT database. Data retrieved on June 15, 2021. The main outlier in the region is Nepal with rates over 75%. 2 See Annex Figure A1 for graphs on observed trends over time in FLFP, gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate (data from WDI), female educational achievement (data from DHS), and the national total fertility rate (TFR) (data from WDI) across South Asian countries.

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