Memberships in voluntary associations can provide access to valuable social resources. Generally focusing on high- and middle-income countries, research has demonstrated that to varying degrees in different societies, women have fewer memberships in voluntary associations than men. This study examines membership in voluntary associations globally and thereby the national characteristics that drive the gender disparity. The national characteristics we examine include development and inequality. We argue that two theories researchers have used to explain individual-level memberships—the resource perspective and homophily theory—also apply to contextual influences on joining associations. Using data from multiple waves of the World Values Survey, we employ multilevel models to analyze the relationship between national context and the individual vis-à-vis gender differences in memberships in voluntary associations. We find that macro-level resources such as the level of development, as well as macro-level heterogeneity in the form of economic inequality and indicators of gender inequality, significantly predict membership. However, macro-level heterogeneity explains gender gaps while macro-level resources do not. The findings of this study are applicable to countries spanning the full development spectrum and offer a new explanation of how social structures of inequality reproduce and create inequality at the individual level.
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Winter 2017
Research Article|
December 01 2017
The Gender of Joiners: A Global Perspective on Gender, Development, Inequality, and Membership in Voluntary Associations
Yvette Young,
Yvette Young
Department of Sociology, University of Utah Email: yvette.young@soc.utah.edu
Yvette Young, Department of Sociology, University of Utah, 380 S. 1530 E. Rm 301, Salt Lake City, UT 84112. Email: yvette.young@soc.utah.edu. The authors would like to thank Marcel Paret and several anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of the paper.
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Claudia Geist
Claudia Geist
Department of Sociology, University of Utah
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Sociology of Development (2017) 3 (4): 346–376.
Citation
Yvette Young, Claudia Geist; The Gender of Joiners: A Global Perspective on Gender, Development, Inequality, and Membership in Voluntary Associations. Sociology of Development 1 December 2017; 3 (4): 346–376. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/sod.2017.3.4.346
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