Disempowered by Whom? Gender vs. Generation in Family Decision making

The now-frequent use of decision-making questions in household surveys has greatly enhanced our understanding of intra-household power relations. While much of the research interest in these questions has focused on the relative influence of the husband or the wife in household decision-making, in developing societies where extended families are common, senior men and women in the household often have important voices. The analysis disentangles the extent to which a woman is being disempowered by her husband versus others (usually her in-laws) in her household. Data from a new 41,554 household survey, the India Human Development Survey 2005, is used to examine how a woman's lack of power is a function of both gender and generation.