IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/exehis/v49y2012i4p399-422.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Deadly anchor: Gender bias under Russian colonization of Kazakhstan

Author

Listed:
  • Aldashev, Gani
  • Guirkinger, Catherine

Abstract

We study the impact of a large-scale economic crisis on gender equality, using historical data from Kazakhstan in the late 19th–early 20th century. We focus on sex ratios (number of women per man) in Kazakh population between 1898 and 1908, in the midst of large-scale Russian in-migration into Kazakhstan that caused a sharp exogenous increase in land pressure. The resulting severe economic crisis made the nomadic organization of the Kazakh economy unsustainable and forced most Kazakh households into sedentary agriculture. Using a large novel dataset constructed from Russian colonial expedition materials, we document a low and worsening sex ratio (in particular, among poor households) between 1898 and 1908. The theoretical hypothesis that garners most support is that of excess female mortality in poorer households (especially among adults), driven by gender discrimination under the increasing pressure for scarce food resources.

Suggested Citation

  • Aldashev, Gani & Guirkinger, Catherine, 2012. "Deadly anchor: Gender bias under Russian colonization of Kazakhstan," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 399-422.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:exehis:v:49:y:2012:i:4:p:399-422
    DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2012.07.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0014498312000459
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.eeh.2012.07.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Maristella Botticini & Aloysius Siow, 2003. "Why Dowries?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(4), pages 1385-1398, September.
    2. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2013. "On the Origins of Gender Roles: Women and the Plough," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 128(2), pages 469-530.
    3. Edvinsson, Sören & Lindkvist, Marie, 2011. "Wealth and health in 19th Century Sweden. A study of social differences in adult mortality in the Sundsvall region," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 376-388, July.
    4. Mokyr, Joel & Ó Gráda, Cormac, 2002. "What do people die of during famines: the Great Irish Famine in comparative perspective," European Review of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 6(3), pages 339-363, December.
    5. David I. Levine & Minnie Ames, 2003. "Gender Bias and The Indonesian Financial Crisis: Were Girls Hit Hardest?," Development and Comp Systems 0303001, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1976. "The Efficiency Wage Hypothesis, Surplus Labour, and the Distribution of Income in L.D.C.s," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 28(2), pages 185-207, July.
    7. Klasen, Stephan, 1998. "Marriage, Bargaining, and Intrahousehold Resource Allocation: Excess Female Mortality among Adults during Early German Development, 1740–1860," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(2), pages 432-467, June.
    8. Horrell, Sara & Meredith, David & Oxley, Deborah, 2009. "Measuring misery: Body mass, ageing and gender inequality in Victorian London," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 93-119, January.
    9. Bhalotra, Sonia, 2010. "Fatal fluctuations? Cyclicality in infant mortality in India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 7-19, September.
    10. Paul Gertler & David I. Levine & Minnie Ames, 2004. "Schooling and Parental Death," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(1), pages 211-225, February.
    11. Baten, Jorg & Murray, John E., 2000. "Heights of Men and Women in 19th-Century Bavaria: Economic, Nutritional, and Disease Influences," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 351-369, October.
    12. Siwan Anderson & Debraj Ray, 2010. "Missing Women: Age and Disease," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(4), pages 1262-1300.
    13. Nancy Qian, 2008. "Missing Women and the Price of Tea in China: The Effect of Sex-Specific Earnings on Sex Imbalance," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(3), pages 1251-1285.
    14. Humphries, Jane, 1991. "'Bread and a Pennyworth of Treacle': Excess Female Mortality in England in the 1840s," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 15(4), pages 451-473, December.
    15. V. Bhaskar & Bishnupriya Gupta, 2007. "India's missing girls: biology, customs, and economic development," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 23(2), pages 221-238, Summer.
    16. Elaina Rose, 1999. "Consumption Smoothing and Excess Female Mortality in Rural India," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(1), pages 41-49, February.
    17. Wright, Gavin & Kunreuther, Howard, 1975. "Cotton, Corn and Risk in the Nineteenth Century," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 35(3), pages 526-551, September.
    18. George Judge & Laura Schechter, 2009. "Detecting Problems in Survey Data Using Benford’s Law," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(1).
    19. Stephan Klasen & Claudia Wink, 2002. "A Turning Point in Gender Bias in Mortality? An Update on the Number of Missing Women," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 28(2), pages 285-312, June.
    20. Papke, Leslie E & Wooldridge, Jeffrey M, 1996. "Econometric Methods for Fractional Response Variables with an Application to 401(K) Plan Participation Rates," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(6), pages 619-632, Nov.-Dec..
    21. Jere R. Behrman & Anil B. Deolalikar, 1990. "The Intrahousehold Demand for Nutrients in Rural South India: Individual Estimates, Fixed Effects, and Permanent Income," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 25(4), pages 665-696.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ekaterina Zhuravskaya & Sergei Guriev & Andrei Markevich, 2024. "New Russian Economic History," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 62(1), pages 47-114, March.
    2. Gani Aldashev & Catherine Guirkinger, 2016. "Colonization and Changing Social Structure: Kazakhstan 1896-1910," Working Papers ECARES ECARES 2016-10, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    3. Aldashev, Gani & Guirkinger, Catherine, 2017. "Colonization and changing social structure: Evidence from Kazakhstan," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 413-430.
    4. Alexander Stimpfle & David Stadelmann, 2016. "Does Central Europe Import the Missing Women Phenomenon?," CREMA Working Paper Series 2016-04, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    5. Catherine Guirkinger & Gani Aldashev & Alisher Aldashev & Mate Fodor, 2022. "Economic Persistence Despite Adverse Policies: Evidence from Kyrgyzstan," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 132(641), pages 258-272.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gani Aldashev & Catherine Guirkinger, 2011. "Deadly Anchor: Gender Bias under Russian Colonization of Kazakhstan, 1898-1908," Working Papers 1111, University of Namur, Department of Economics.
    2. Sonia Bhalotra & Abhishek Chakravarty & Dilip Mookherjee & Francisco J. Pino, 2019. "Property Rights and Gender Bias: Evidence from Land Reform in West Bengal," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(2), pages 205-237, April.
    3. Alexander Stimpfle & David Stadelmann, 2016. "Does Central Europe Import the Missing Women Phenomenon?," CREMA Working Paper Series 2016-04, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    4. Francisco J. Beltrán Tapia & Domingo Gallego, 2015. "Where are the missing girls? Gender discrimination in mid-19th century Spain," Working Papers 23, Department of Economic and Social History at the University of Cambridge.
    5. Bhalotra, Sonia & Chakravarty, Abhishek & Gulesci, Selim, 2020. "The price of gold: Dowry and death in India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    6. Bao, Xiaojia & Galiani, Sebastian & Li, Kai & Long, Cheryl Xiaoning, 2023. "Where have all the children gone? An empirical study of child abandonment and abduction in China," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 95-119.
    7. Fenske, James & Gupta, Bishnupriya & Neumann, Cora, 2022. "Missing Women In Colonial India," CEPR Discussion Papers 17189, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    8. V. Bhaskar, 2011. "Sex Selection and Gender Balance," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(1), pages 214-244, February.
    9. Roland Pongou, 2020. "Is Excess (Fe)Male Mortality Caused by the Prenatal Environment, Child Biology, or Parental Discrimination? New Evidence from Male-Female Twins," Working Papers 2008E Classification-I15,, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    10. Ahsan, Md Nazmul & Thakur, Sounak, 2024. "The great Indian demonetization and gender gap in health outcomes: Evidence from two Indian states," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    11. Joyce Chen, 2012. "Dads, disease, and death: determinants of daughter discrimination," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 25(1), pages 119-149, January.
    12. Sivadasan, Jagadeesh & Xu, Wenjian, 2021. "Missing women in India: Gender-specific effects of early-life rainfall shocks," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    13. Flatø, Martin & Kotsadam, Andreas, 2014. "Droughts and Gender Bias in Infant Mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa," Memorandum 02/2014, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    14. Astghik Mavisakalyan & Anna Minasyan, 2023. "The Role of Conflict in Sex Discrimination: The Case of Missing Girls," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 71(2), pages 443-484.
    15. Eliana Carranza, 2014. "Soil Endowments, Female Labor Force Participation, and the Demographic Deficit of Women in India," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 197-225, October.
    16. Ebert, Cara & Klasen, Stephan & Vollmer, Sebastian, 2021. "Counting missing women: A reconciliation of the "flow measure" and the "stock measure"," Ruhr Economic Papers 924, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    17. Mariano Rabassa & Emmanuel Skoufias & Hanan Jacoby, 2014. "Weather and Child Health in Rural Nigeria," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 23(4), pages 464-492.
    18. Tanika Chakraborty & Sukkoo Kim, 2008. "Caste, Kinship and Sex Ratios in India," NBER Working Papers 13828, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. BenYishay, Ariel & Grosjean, Pauline & Vecci, Joe, 2017. "The fish is the friend of matriliny: Reef density and matrilineal inheritance," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 234-249.
    20. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2018. "Traditional agricultural practices and the sex ratio today," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(1), pages 1-14, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Gender bias; Sex ratio; Excess female mortality; Nomadism; Kazakhstan;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:exehis:v:49:y:2012:i:4:p:399-422. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622830 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.