Here waits the bride? The effect of Ethiopia's child marriage law

McGavock, Tamara

doi:10.1016/j.jdeveco.2020.102580

Cited by 61 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…We tackled our research question using survey data from countries located in different regions of the world combined with novel longitudinal information on policy changes. We drew from simple causal inference techniques to obtain estimates of the effect of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage, in line with the existing literature on the topic relying primarily on difference-in-differences strategies or regression discontinuity designs ( Bellés-Obrero & Lombardi, 2020 ; Collin & Talbot, 2017 ; Dahl, 2010 ; McGavock, 2021 ). In so doing, we reached two different sets of findings.…”

Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…More recently, there have been two careful evaluations of policy changes aimed at banning child marriage by increasing the minimum age at marriage. For instance, Ethiopia raised the minimum age of marriage from 15 to 18 starting in 2000, yet the effect of this change has already been documented ( McGavock, 2021 ). This reform delayed women's marriage, and in particular delayed marriages of girls under 16 by about 17 percent (6.8 percentage points) in areas where early marriage was more common prior to the reform.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Trends in child marriage and new evidence on the selective impact of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage

Batyra

Pesando

2021

SSM - Population Health

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This study adopts a cohort perspective to explore trends in child marriage – defined as the proportion of girls who entered first union before the age of 18 – and the effectiveness of policy changes aimed at curbing child marriage by increasing the minimum legal age of marriage. We adopt a cross-national perspective comparing six low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) that introduced changes in the minimum age at marriage over the past two decades. These countries belong to three broad regions: Sub-Saharan Africa (Benin, Mauritania), Central Asia (Tajikistan, Kazakhstan), and South Asia (Nepal, Bhutan). We combine individual-level data from Demographic and Health Surveys and Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys with longitudinal information on policy changes from the PROSPERED (Policy-Relevant Observational Studies for Population Health Equity and Responsible Development) project. We adopt data visualization techniques and a regression discontinuity design to obtain estimates of the effect of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage. Our results suggest that changes in minimum-age-at-marriage laws were not effective in curbing early marriage in Benin, Mauritania, Kazakhstan, and Bhutan, where child marriage showed little evidence of decline across cohorts. Significant reductions in early marriage following law implementations were observed in Tajikistan and Nepal, yet their effectiveness depended on the model specification and window adopted, thus making them hardly effective as policies to shape girls' later life trajectories. Our findings align with existing evidence from other countries suggesting that changes in age-at-marriage laws rarely achieve the desired outcome. In order for changes in laws to be effective, better laws must be accompanied by better enforcement and monitoring to delay marriage and protect the rights of women and girls. Alternative policies need to be devised to ensure that girls’ later-life outcomes, including their participation in higher education and society, are ensured, encouraged, and protected.

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Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in child marriage and new evidence on the selective impact of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage

Batyra

Pesando

2021

SSM - Population Health

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“…In this sense, China is not unique. Recent work from many other countries indicates that laws alone are insufficient to stem child marriage (Bellés‐Obrero and Lombardi 2020; Collin and Talbot 2017; McGavock 2021). On their own, legal prohibitions do not mitigate the underlying motivations for child marriage such as poverty and gender inequality.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Child Marriage in Mainland China

Fan

Qian

Koski

2022

Studies in Family Planning

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Child marriage, defined as marriage before 18 years of age, has harmful consequences for health and development and is an indicator of gender inequality. We used publicly available data from the 2000 and 2010 censuses to estimate the national and provincial‐level prevalence of child marriage across mainland China. Between 2000 and 2010, the prevalence of child marriage rose from 2.41 percent to 2.85 percent among women and from 0.54 percent to 0.77 percent among men. The 2010 estimates are equivalent to roughly 1.8 million women and 0.5 million men. Child marriage was more common in western provinces among both girls and boys. Provincial prevalence estimates ranged from 0.44 percent in Beijing to 12.94 percent in Qinghai among girls. Among boys, estimates ranged from 0.13 percent in Beijing to 5.03 percent in Tibet. The gender gap widened across much of the country between censuses. Our results indicate that child marriage continues across mainland China despite laws that ostensibly prohibit the practice. They also draw attention to the global nature of child marriage as a threat to gender equality.

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“…Research however shows that the effects of changes in the legal minimum age of marriage are not as straightforward as one might think. Families may choose not to comply with such laws (for example, by "marrying" without a civil ceremony), with this being particularly likely if households have difficulty coping in times of economic hardship (Corno and Voena, 2016) or in places/ethnic groups where social norms and preferences for child marriage are strong (McGavock, 2021). In Indonesia, for example, the common practice of marrying girls under religious law, and not civil law, lessens the scope for changing the legal marriage age to affect the behavior of those who are strongly attached to tradition and social norms.…”

Section: Conclusion and Policy Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Child marriage: using the Indonesian family life survey to examine the lives of women and men who married at an early age

2022

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An understanding of the experiences of men and women who marry before adulthood is important in motivating social change. Using fixed effects estimation (the inclusion of geographic fixed effects at diminishing levels of aggregation and sister fixed effects where possible) on panel data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS), we follow the lives of a sample of 40,800 women and men for up to two decades and examine a wide range of factors associated with child marriage. We examine the lives of both girls and boys who marry early, and the differential experience of girls marrying older men versus young boys. Child marriage is found to be associated with lesser educational attainment, lower earnings and less say in household decision-making, for both men and women. Women are less likely to have a medically-supervised birth and their children are more likely to die, be stunted and perform worse on cognitive tests. Negative factors are mostly exacerbated when young girls marry similarly underage men.

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Here waits the bride? The effect of Ethiopia's child marriage law

Cited by 61 publications

References 42 publications

Trends in child marriage and new evidence on the selective impact of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage

Trends in child marriage and new evidence on the selective impact of changes in age-at-marriage laws on early marriage

Child Marriage in Mainland China

Child marriage: using the Indonesian family life survey to examine the lives of women and men who married at an early age

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