Abstract

Objectives: Our objective was to explore whether traditional measurements of female empowerment used in population health and development studies could detect a role played by women in the 2011 Arab Spring revolutions. Methods: Twenty-one statelevel indicators of health, development and female empowerment were extracted fROm public databases maintained by the World Bank, UNDP and CIA World Factbook and compared between the six so-called Arab Spring nations, as well as eleven Middle Eastern nations deemed to be at risk for revolution. Results: Population sex ratio parity and the percentage of women completing primary education was significantly greater (p<0.05) in nations having successfully revolted, compared to all other examined Arab nations. Conclusions: The extent to which education and sex ratio parity are truly predictive of social engagement and change need to be more deeply investigated. While traditional health and development indicators ostensibly

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