Gendered disjunctures: Globalization and human rights

Abstract

In this dissertation, I attempt to improve upon previous studies of globalization and human rights by employing several strategies. First, I employ an interdisciplinary theoretical analysis that draws on disparate literatures from political science, economics, international law, and feminist studies. Second, I use a methodology known as multiple imputation to deal with missing data problems that have plagued previous studies. Third, I test for the differential effects of globalization, economic development, and democracy on the achievement of female and male socio-economic rights in order to understand the degree to which these variables affect the dependent variables of female and male infant mortality, life expectancy, literacy, primary school enrollment, and economic activity rates. Overall, the main findings in this dissertation shed light on inequities of men and women as empirical categories in the context of globalization, economic development and democratization. There are two main findings of this study: (1) There is a statistically significant difference between the achievement of socio-economic rights for women and men in the context of globalization; and, (2) The differential effects of globalization, economic development, and democratization on female and male socio-economic rights are varied but in general all three of these independent variables tend to have more positive effects on the achievement of women's socio-economic rights relative to men's.