Slave trades, kinship structures and women's political participation in Africa

Abstract

We study whether present-day women's political participation in sub-Saharan Africa is associated to the temporary gender ratio imbalances caused by the transatlantic and Indian Ocean slave trades, taking into account pre-existing gender norms influenced by kinship structures. To study the interrelatedness between historical exposure to the slave trades, patrilineality and their association to contemporary women's political participation, we use individuallevel data for 35,595 women from 28 sub-Saharan African countries from three rounds of Afrobarometer surveys, georeferenced to historical ethnic region kinship and slave trade data. Our findings suggest that a woman's ethnic region historical exposure to the transatlantic slave trade is associated with an increase in her likelihood to vote today, however, only in non-patrilineal ethnic regions. This effect is mitigated in patrilineal ethnic regions, where women have less decision-making power. This paper contributes to the literature on the contemporary sub-national effects of the slave trades and the historical causes of gender gaps in political participation.