Children and adolescents educational gender gaps across the lifecourse in sub-Saharan Africa: On the role of mothers' lack of empowerment as a barrier for girls' educational performance

Abstract

We estimate the impact of lack of mothers’ empowerment on an array of educational outcomes for their children in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), focusing on the gender gap. Further, we look into how this operates by the degree of marginalisation of communities and on weakening educational transfers. We find that gender inequality is still a significant barrier in SSA compounded by weak mothers’ empowerment for improving educational outcomes for girls in comparison to boys. Thus, different barriers behind weak women agency need to be addressed to improve gender inequality across SDG4 gender-targets in the region.