RELIGIOUS POWER, THE STATE, WOMEN’S RIGHTS, AND FAMILY LAW* Mala Htun and S. Laurel Weldon* University of New Mexico and Purdue University
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[email protected] Forthcoming in Politics & Gender November 2014 version *Weldon and Htun are equal contributors to all parts of this project. Research was supported by National Science Foundation SES Grant #0550284. We are grateful for research assistance from Amanda Burke, Annamarie Calasanti, José Kaire, Kimberly Proctor, Crystal Shelton, and our team from the New School and Purdue and for comments from Aline Coudouel, Jorge Domínguez, Tazeen Hasan, Jennifer Hochschild, Aaron Hoffman, Juan Pablo Micozzi, Tamir Moustafa, David Samuels, Denise Walsh, and participants in seminars and panels at the American Political Science Association, Social Science Historical Association, Law and Society Organization, Indiana University, the University of Minnesota, UNRISD, the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, Purdue University, and the University of New Mexico. RELIGIOUS POWER, THE STATE, WOMEN’S RIGHTS, AND FAMILY LAW Abstract Sex discrimination in property rights, marriage and divorce, inheritance, and parenting thwarts women’s quest for equal rights, violates international conventions, and contradicts many national constitutions. While many countries have reformed family and personal status laws to promote equality, dozens continue to enforce discriminatory provisions. What explains variation in the degree of sex equality in family law? Analyzing an original dataset on the characteristics of family law in 70 countries between 1975 and 2005, we show that the political institutionalization of religious authority is powerfully associated with the degree to which family law discriminates against women. State involvement in religion offers a better account of variation in sex equality in family law than a wide variety of religious and non-religious factors such political parties, women in parliament, democratization, and economic development.