Abstract
The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel – the Nobel Prize in Economics – has been awarded for 49 years (1969–2018). In that time, 81 Laureates have been honoured. Only one was a woman: Elinor Ostrom (1933–2012), whose research contradicted the prevailing wisdom that if no-one owns a resource, it will be overused by those who have access. Through case studies in a range of countries, Ostrom showed that natural resources can be successfully managed by the local commons without government regulation or privatisation. Ostrom’s half-prize – she shared it with a male economist doing separate work – was presented in 2009 (Nobel Foundation 2019).
Victoria Bateman mentions this unique Nobel Prize in a partial sentence in the ‘Introduction’ to The Sex Factor (pp. 3–4), yet more could have been made of Ostrom’s research to reinforce Bateman’s assertions of outmoded strategy and gender bias in the field of economics. Bateman states that the discipline has rigidly maintained methodologies that esteem independence and avoid the influence of human interactions. ‘The very things that make human life differ from the robotic assumptions that economists like to make – fertility, family and society – have all been neglected’ (p. 4). Bateman then compiles evidence of the folly of these exclusions by her academic colleagues.
It is noteworthy that Ostrom was a political scientist and therefore disposed to employing social science’s face-to-face interviews and observations to gather empirical data. She visited communities worldwide where agricultural land, fishing waters and forestry, activities that engaged women to some degree, could be gauged. She also solicited cross-disciplinary participation. By means of non-economic methods and personal experience that valued cooperation and resource consciousness, Ostrom debunked a long-held economic theory that self-interest always takes precedence (Marginal Revolution University 2019).
Bateman states, ‘the very methodology of economics needs reform’ (p. 4). One might assume this includes Ostrom-inspired fieldwork, yet Bateman doesn’t move from her desk. Her hypotheses are based on history – of prosperity, gender equality, the state, and the individual – and challenges to existing tenets of economics like the market. There is no question that her insertion of women into the economic equation is reform, but her chapter on the sex trade and defence of willing participation in that industry relies on articles and books, not her own coal-face research.
Despite this criticism, Bateman has written a volume that should be compulsory reading for existing and aspiring economists. She begins The Sex Factor by reviewing economic history that has consistently seen women as beneficiaries of growth, rather than contributors to it. She outlines lessons that are important in consideration of the West’s advancement: (1) the market is not the sole economic driver, (2) formal (democracy, the law) and informal institutions, particularly culture, matter, (3) freedom is necessary inside the marketplace – for entrepreneurs and traders – as well as outside – elimination of religious sanctions, acceptance of scientific exploration and attention to women’s biology, (4) high, not low, wages benefit growth and (5) awareness of why growth stops (pp. 18–34). Bateman then proposes that economists’ and historians’ neglect of women’s contributions to the themes of these lessons – markets, institutions, wages – has failed to give a complete picture of why the West has been prosperous.
In the following pages, Bateman discusses women’s freedom and control over property, marriage, sexual relations and fertility. For example, in societies where women are free to choose whom to marry and when, pregnancy occurs when a couple can afford to financially support their offspring. Birth control facilitates this delay and the wife’s employment; when children arrive, access to affordable childcare ensures ongoing earning. The result of such social mores is that family income increases, enabling access to the market, participation in the capitalist paradigm and prosperity for the economy. Yet these factors have been consistently absent from economic equations.
Bateman cites evidence (p. 73) that economists view trade and technology as accounting for the West’s economic advantage, although she points out that globalisation and consequent outsourcing has been detrimental for Western unskilled and semiskilled workers. However, trade and technology fall short as explanations for ‘developing world’ inequality. As long as cultures maintain practices such as bride price, arranged marriage, polygamy, eschewal of birth control, and patriarchal domination of women, children and property, poverty will persist because half the population lacks the freedom of self-actualisation.
The Sex Factor is ardently presented and readable. Bateman states that her two passions are economics and feminism (p. 7); her working-class background and connection to the cotton mills of Manchester through her ancestors who worked in them, including the distaff side, fuel the empathy for her bias. She gained notoriety by appearing naked at a Royal Economic Society conference (p. 1), to bring attention to the absence of women and considerations of sex, gender, and female autonomy from the discipline and its pronouncements. She felt that such a statement would be more memorable for her concerns than a polite lecture that might have been poorly attended.
Bateman concludes her book with a manifesto of achievable tenets: amendment of the focus of economics from approach to content (i.e. substitution of fixation on existing beliefs, such as rationality and self-interest, with cognisance of human activity); augmentation of interdisciplinarity; more time spent in the field talking to immigrants, welfare recipients and non-white-collar workers; and abandonment of a pervasive predisposition towards a masculine, independent, egocentric protagonist (pp. 179–182). Given that Bateman believes that ‘the economy stands in a precarious position, facing de-globalization, secular stagnation and the political and social unrest caused by inequality, austerity and de-industrialization’ (p. 3), adoption of her manifesto would be germane and wise.
In October 2019, the Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that the Economics prize would be shared by Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer for their work on addressing poverty. The Academy commended the trio for employing methodologies ‘that were based on field trials rather than prejudice or the failed methods of the past’ (Inman 2019). Duflo, the youngest recipient of the prize as well as being female, stated, ‘Showing that it is possible for a woman to succeed and be recognised for success I hope is going to inspire many, many other women to continue working and many other men to give them the respect they deserve’ (Duflo quoted in Inman 2019). Bateman’s manifesto and cause célèbre are timely in contributing to a shift in the economic zeitgeist.