Women participation in nigerian economy: does governance matter?

Abstract

This study examines the effect of governance measures (control of corruption, accountability, and effectiveness of government) on women's participation in Nigerian economy using annual time-series data for 29 years spanning from 1990 - 2019. The Autoregressive and Distributive Lag (ARDL) Bounds test discloses the existence of a long-run co-integration relationship between accountability, control of corruption, effectiveness of government and women participation in the labor force. The empirical results obtained revealed that both in the short-run and in the long-run, accountability and the percentage of female employment have a positive and statistically significant effect on women's participation in Nigeria. Although, the effectiveness of governance shows negative and statistically insignificant effect both in the short-run and in the long-run while the control of corruption exerted a negative and statistically significant impact both in the short-run and long-run. Therefore, the study recommends that the government at all levels should ensure that accountability prevails in every sector, to allow fair play in representation, employment, and diffusion of decisions to strengthen and energize women's participation.