Corresponding author: Sofia M. Rebrey (
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This research aims to identify major fields and structures of economics of gender research based on bibliometric analysis between 1960 and 2020. The analysis of the journals in economics of gender captures major development stages of gender economics. The study of economics of gender is growing rapidly as seen in the increasing number of journals, articles and citations from the 1970s onwards. It grew faster than the pace of economic publications during the 1980–1990s. The economics of gender research disciplines largely replicates economics and can be viewed as part of economics of inequality. But its feminist philosophy and methodology distinguish the economics of gender as a separate branch of economic sciences which furnishes new findings. According to the Scimago and Web of Science databases, more than 90% of articles in economics of gender are published in English (fewer than in the field of economics in general). The structure of the analyzed countries reflects not only the sophistication of national research in economics of gender, but also the degree of their integration into international scientific discourse, including the presence of a language barrier. Gender economists are primarily focused on the problems of developing countries. Advanced economies account for less than a third of all publications.
Gender studies started to manifest in academia mainly in the United States, Great Britain and France in the 1960–1970s, when research interest was spurred on the one hand by the feminization of paid labor, and on the other, by the Western feminist movement which facilitated the establishment of global institutions within the UN. These institutions included funds and divisions for the advancement of women,
It would be erroneous to assume that no scholar researched the role of women in the economy prior to the collapse of the feminist movement. The most famous example of research is an essay written by John Stuart Mill together with his wife Harriet Taylor Mill, but only finished and published after her death in 1869. Moreover, the bibliography of female economic thought up until 1940 contain more than a ten thousand references to materials appearing from the 1770s to 1940 in all languages on economic issues. The majority are written by American and British authors, with some by European authors, and a few by authors in Africa, Asia, and Latin America (
The 1970–1980s saw the birth of many gender studies journals and some of them contain sections on the economy. The oldest one is
We should also mention the glossology of gender studies. There is a certain discourse within academia dealing with the disparities between women, gender and feminist studies. Women’s studies prevailed back in 1960–1980, when gender studies were emerging, and traced empirical gender inequalities and different roles that sexes usually play in the androcentric (male) world (
In our work, we analyzed a vast amount of literature, relying on the capabilities of bibliographic systems. This predetermined a synonymous approach to the terms under discussion as no bibliographic system contains the full wealth of these terms. In one case, we are dealing only with the “Women studies” section (in WoS), in the other — with the section “Gender studies” (in SCImago). Consequently, we selected articles whose subject was “gender.” The keywords we relied on in the search were “gender” and “economics.”
The term “economics of gender,” which is fixed in the JEL classification (J16), largely reflects our approach, as it moves from a conceptual definition of the field of economic knowledge to an objective one, emphasizing the study of “gender” in economic issues — from the impact of gender inequality on the economy at the macro level to the impact of the distribution of time budgets on individual economic decisions at the micro level. An example of such an “objective” approach can be found in the academic literature provided for university courses on economics, the position of women in economics, and the economics of gender (
This research aims to quantify dynamics, fields and structures of publications on economics of gender from the first articles in the 1960s to 2020, to reveal interdisciplinary interconnections and to identify the pioneering countries, their key journals, and rankings. To achieve this we conducted a bibliometric analysis and compared articles on economics of gender with economic ones. We use two key international scientific databases Scopus via SCImago and Web of Science, which allow us to reveal the present structure of economics of gender through publications, journals, their rankings, countries of origin and countries in research focus, major institutions like publishers and research centers.
Bibliometrics is a field of study in the area of library and informational sciences that emerged in the second half of the 20th century. It is a quantitative study that includes any quantitative measures or analysis applied to bibliographic units (
There are three approaches to bibliometric analysis. The first focuses on the authors and their publication activity (
To reveal the topical structure of gender economics we conduct a bibliometric analysis of international databases Scopus via SCImago and Web of Science. The databases provide efficient tools for bibliometric data analysis, but using the international databases only allows for including in the analysis those journals that are presented in the databases.
Scopus data is available via open online source SCImago Journal & Country Rank. Scimago has developed SJR2 indicator (Scimago Journal Ranking 2 indicator) that considers the prestige of the citing scientific journal and its closeness to the cited journals “using the cosine of angle between the vectors of the 2 journals cocitations profiles” (
The Scimago database provides the categorization of journals. Journals on the economics of gender are located within the gender studies category. It contains 146 journals (by 2019). Apart from economics, there are also journals covering psychology, arts and humanities, sociology and political sciences, education, law, health, history, archeology, linguistics, philology, theology, pedagogics, etc. Moreover, several journals concern men and masculinities and boyhood studies.
Clearly, research on economics of gender is published not only in specialized gender journals, but also in economic journals. In order to count the total number of articles on economics of gender and to compare them with all economic articles, the web of science database is used. Web of Science is a Clarivate Analytics’ website that provides subscription-based access to citation data and analytical tools, including visualization. The citation index for science, used by Web of Science, was developed by Eugene Garfield. It allows “to eliminate the uncritical citation of fraudulent, incomplete or obsolete data by making it possible for the conscientious scholar to be aware of criticisms of earlier papers” (
Search terms such as “women’s studies,” together with “economics,” find 5,049 publications with a total number of 36,603 citations, of which 31,021 were without self-citation, for the period 1975–2021 with a Hirsch index of 73 and an average document citation of 7.25. However, the search term “gender” together with “economics” finds 4 times more articles than “women’s studies” — 21,996 publications.
In addition, to count which countries are researched by economists with regard to gender topics, we used issues of
The Scimago database includes six international journals that are fully or predominantly devoted to economics of gender (Table
International journals on economics of gender.
Title | Scopus category (quartile*) | SJR Quartile | h-index | Country | Publisher |
Gender and Development | • Development |
Q2 | 36 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
Feminist Economics | • Arts and humanities (miscellaneous) |
Q1 | 52 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
Gender in Management | • Business, management and accounting (miscellaneous) |
Q2 | 48 | United Kingdom | Emerald Group Publishing |
International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship | • Business and international management |
Q2 | 25 | United Kingdom | Emerald Group Publishing |
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion | • Cultural studies (Q1) |
Q2 | 23 | United Kingdom | Emerald Group Publishing |
Advances in Business Related Scientific Research Journal | • Business, management and accounting (miscellaneous) |
Q4 | 1 | Slovenia | GEA College — Faculty of Entrepreneurship |
There are 14 interdisciplinary journals that have a section on economics of gender (Table
Interdisciplinary gender studies journals with a Section on economics of gender.
Title | Scopus category (quartile*) | SJR quartile | h-index | Country | Publisher |
Feminist Studies | • Arts and humanities (miscellaneous) (Q2) |
Q3 | 35 | United States | Feminist Studies |
Monthly Review | • Gender studies (Q2) |
Q2 | 30 | United States | Monthly Review Press |
Gender and Education | • Education |
Q1 | 60 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
Journal of Women and Aging | • Gender studies (Q2) |
Q2 | 33 | United States | Routledge |
Journal of Gender Studies | • Arts and humanities (miscellaneous) |
Q1 | 31 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
Feminist Review | • Arts and humanities (miscellaneous) |
Q2 | 43 | United Kingdom | Palgrave Macmillan |
Gender Issues | • Gender studies | Q2 | 24 | United States | Springer New York |
Gender, Technology and Development | • Gender studies (Q1) |
Q1 | 19 | India | Routledge |
Feminist Theory | • Gender studies | Q2 | 41 | United Kingdom | SAGE Publications |
Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering | • Engineering (miscellaneous) |
Q2 | 20 | United States | Begell House |
Studies in Social Justice | • Gender studies |
Q2 | 12 | Canada | Centre for Studies in Social Justice, University of Windsor |
International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics | • Philosophy |
Q3 | 9 | United States | University of Toronto Press |
Journal of Women and Gender in Higher Education | • Gender studies (Q1) |
Q1 | 7 | United States | Taylor and Francis |
Further, the database contains 23 journals that cover national issues (Table
National journals on gender studies that contain a Section on economics of gender.
Title | Scopus category (quartile) | SJR Quartile | h-index | Country | Publisher |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Australian Feminist Studies | • Gender studies | Q2 | 26 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
NORA — Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research | • Gender studies | Q2 | 25 | United Kingdom | Routledge |
Estudos Feministas | • Gender studies | Q3 | 13 | Brazil | Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro — UFRJ |
European Journal of Women’s Studies | • Arts and humanities (miscellaneous) |
Q1 | 41 | United Kingdom | SAGE Publications |
Asian Journal of Women’s Studies | • Gender studies | Q3 | 11 | United Kingdom | Taylor and Francis |
Journal of African American Studies | • Cultural studies (Q2) |
Q3 | 15 | United States | Springer New York |
Travail, Genre et Societes | • Business and international management |
Q3 | 14 | France | Editions La Decouverte |
Hawwa | • Cultural studies (Q3) |
Q4 | 10 | Netherlands | Brill Academic Publishers |
Nouvelles Questions Feministes | • Gender studies | Q4 | 8 | Switzerland | Editions Antipodes |
Women and Gender: The Middle East and the Islamic World | • Religious studies (Q3) |
Q4 | 6 | Netherlands | Entomological Society of Canada |
Cadernos Pagu | • Gender studies | Q2 | 9 | Brazil | Universidade Estadual de Campinas UNICAMP |
Asian Women | • Gender studies |
Q3 | 6 | South Korea | Sookmyung Women’s University |
Feministische Studien | • Gender studies |
Q4 | 6 | Germany | Walter de Gruyter GmbH |
Women and Gender in China Studies | • Cultural studies (Q3) |
Q4 | 3 | Netherlands | Entomological Society of Canada |
Chinese Sociological Review | • Anthropology |
Q1 | 17 | United States | M.E. Sharpe |
Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies | • Cultural studies (Q1) |
Q2 | 7 | United States | Indiana University Press |
Gender, Equal Opportunities, Research | • Gender studies | Q4 | 4 | Czech Republic | Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic |
NORMA | • Gender studies | Q2 | 9 | United Kingdom | Taylor and Francis |
Woman in Russian Society | • Gender studies |
Q3 | 2 | Russian Federation | Ivanovo State University Publishing |
Gender a Vyzkum / Gender and Research | • Gender studies | Q4 | 1 | Czech Republic | Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Institute of Sociology |
Gender Studies | • Gender studies | Q4 | 1 | Poland | De Gruyter Open |
Advances in Business Related Scientific Research Journal | • Business, management and accounting (miscellaneous) |
Q4 | 1 | Slovenia | GEA College — Faculty of Entrepreneurship |
Intersections (Australia) | • Cultural studies (Q3) |
Q4 | 0 | Australia | Australian National University, Dept. of Gender, Media and Cultural Studies |
Whereas women’s studies imply the research of female issues only, gender studies include studies of men too. Gender studies evolved from women’s studies to gender studies in 1970–1980s and inspired international organizations to switch from approaches such as “Women in Development” and “Women and Development” to “Gender and Development” (
Several economics of gender journals (or gender studies journals with an economics of gender section) are included in the Scopus database but not found in Scimago data. Those journals are:
We compare the economics of gender with economics in general publications in the context of 4 factors: the dynamics of volume of publications in 1960–2020, the disciplinary structure of publications, the languages published, and the countries of publication.
Fig.
Five years moving average growth rates of publications in Economics of gender and Economics, 1960–2020 (%).
In order to visualize the structure and interlinkages of academic disciplines, we examine different areas of studies that cover articles from the economics of gender, and exclusively economics. As articles in Web of Science belong to different areas of studies, and sometimes to different disciplines, examining their interlinkages shows how the economics of gender and economics interact with other disciplines (Fig.
Discipline intersections of Economics of gender and Economics (%).
To compare the disciplines of economics of gender and economics we combined web of science categories into larger units.
Their interdisciplinary structure is quite similar; however, the economics of gender has more intersections with social sciences, history and philosophy and medicine, pharma, psychiatry and psychology, whereas economics intersects more with technical and computer sciences, engineering and mathematics. A closer look at socio-economic research categories also reveals a similar structure of fields covered. Intersections with medicine and healthcare are the most common, as medical studies take into account economic factors.
Fig.
Publishing countries/regions in Economics of gender and Economics (%).
Most developed economies and English-speaking countries have a wider share of articles on gender economics than on economics, except for the United Kingdom (despite the global publishers cited earlier). The U.S. publishes more on gender equality than the EU.
A country’s specific publication activity in international databases depends not only on R&D development, but also on its integration into international academic discourse.
Native English is a serious advantage here — 91% of articles on economics are written in English. The share of English in economics of gender is slightly lower than in economics (90%). To visualize other languages’ frequencies, the English language is subtracted from the database, and the share of other languages for economics of gender and for economics is calculated (Fig.
Languages of publications in Economics of gender and Economics, except English (%).
The most popular journals and book series in economics of gender are visualized via online Web of Science tools in Fig.
Publications on gender economics: journals and book series.
To understand the authors and topics in gender economics we analyze the massive of papers published in
Gender economists are primarily focused on the problems of developing countries (58%), led by China (12% of articles) and India (7%). Africa accounts for 13% of articles, including the countries of Ghana, Uganda, Mali, Tanzania, Nicaragua, Madagascar, Nigeria, South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Chad. African studies are predominantly carried out by European and American researchers.
Latin America accounts for 7.5% of research, including the countries of Chile, Uruguay, Peru, Mexico, Ecuador, and Haiti. Asia (in addition to China and India) is represented by studies of such developing countries as Turkey (2.2%), Bangladesh (1.5%), Indonesia, Cambodia, Nepal, Vietnam, Iran and Pakistan.
The post-Soviet space is represented by Tajikistan. In addition, the post-Soviet (institutional) legacy is examined using the example of East Germany.
Advanced economies account for 27.8% of research. Europe — 19% (EU — 2%, Spain — 3%, Great Britain — 2%, Germany — 2%, Italy, Greece, Sweden, Poland, Portugal), the U.S. — 7%, Australia — 3%.
Research into women’s issues and gender inequalities has been conducted in the past, but it was shaped into a research category and institutionalized only in the 1970–1980s, and incorporated into the thriving field of gender studies.
Economics of gender covers topics ranging from gender studies, women’s studies, and feminist studies that focus on economics of inequality by gender. However, feminist economists tend to separate themselves from other gender economic researchers because they focus on female perspectives (gynocentric approach;
The study of the economics of gender is growing rapidly in terms of the number of journals, articles, and citations. It has outpaced economics’ publications since 1980 and continues to do so, even though the growth rates have decreased. Thus, the economics of gender has become one of the core and rapidly growing branches of economics with the relevant journals now being in the Q1 of the SCImago ranking of economic journals.
However, instead of presenting a coherent domain of economic study, it consists of many schools and fields that cover major pressing issues of economics. Essentially, economics of gender subscribes to a gender-based analytic methodology coupled with feminist prerequisites. As part of gender studies, it remains interdisciplinary and structured similarly to economics.
The research was stimulated by institutional development — the creation of departments, laboratories, institutes for gender economics, as well as journals with relevant sections or fully devoted to the new branch of economic knowledge. The economics of gender flourished as an offshoot of gender studies when a feminist movement and academia facilitated the institutionalization of gender studies through journals. The leading countries in gender publications are also leading in the number of specialized book series and journals, as well as in the number of institutions dealing with gender economics.
It allows us to see the connections between national and gender agendas and their impact on the global gender economic discourse. Advanced gender research centers consider socio-economic policies through the lens of gender expertise and produce gender budgeting and gender mainstreaming in their countries, but still face major challenges and resistance (
The structure of gender economics journals fully reflects the trends in the development of science. The emergence of a number of national journals along with international ones is associated with the development of national perspective in feminist theory and empirical work. And the number of interdisciplinary journals proves the high level of interdisciplinarity of this branch of economic sciences.
In the interdisciplinary field, there is also a similar structure of articles on economics of gender and economics. But the weights of research fields are different. For example, the economics of gender have more interdisciplinary articles within social sciences, history and philosophy, medicine, pharma, psychiatry and psychology, whereas economics intersects more with technical and computer sciences, engineering and mathematics.
Journal specialization will intensify and more countries will establish gender economic journals in line with advancements in gender economic research. The sophistication of gender research and its impact on international academia, represented by quartile ranking, is primarily associated with the level of gender equality in the specific country. Countries with a low level of gender equality have journals with lower ranking (Q3–Q4). Thus, leaders in economics of gender are the U.S. and other English-speaking countries (such as the UK, Canada and Australia, etc.). However, this result is impacted by the limitations of the databases, which include more journals in English.
The U.S. publishes more on gender equality than the EU. Also, the United States experiences a sharper yet less effective fight for gender equality than Europe: according to the Global Gender Gap report, the U.S. is ranked 30, whereas Europe fills the top (
Asian feminism rather penetrates from the outside. In China, feminist ideas began to come in the 1930s–1940s through the richest and most educated men who kept in touch with the “enlightened West,” however it did not last long (
China, which is gaining significant weight in publications, is more visible in economic publications than in those on gender economics. The absence of the Chinese language among the leaders in economics of gender is explained by the fact that Chinese scholars try to publish more in the English language in international journals.
In Confucian Asia, despite the socio-cultural rejection of gender equality, research on gender economics is developing because scholars and politicians are beginning to see gender policy as a solution to demographic issues — ultra-low fertility and the refusal of young generations to marry and start a family (
The intensification of gender studies in Asia is currently associated with the spread of gender economic theories and the exacerbation of economic and demographic problems. For example, the ex-Prime Minister of Japan S. Abe singled out low female participation in paid labor as one of the main reasons for the sluggish economy and in 2013 he prioritized an economic policy which was dubbed “Womenomics” and was designed to increase women’s participation in paid employment through the large-scale construction of kindergartens and the subsequent abolition of fees (
Islamic feminism stands out separately, where the main force is the academy, but not in economic policy.
Russia’s contribution to economic publications is quite low, and even lower in publications on economics of gender. The reason lies in the weak institutional support for gender studies in Russia and, more broadly, has to do with the renaissance of patriarchal sentiments in social policy in recent decades. Russia and other post-Soviet states inherit a controversial legacy. On the one hand, the USSR pioneered the feminization of labor markets by providing state childcare facilities. Many women working in research, who had obtained academic degrees, were allowed to study women’s issues, although censorship of activities prevailed. After the collapse of the 1990s, gender studies and gender economic research revived but they did not find sufficient financial support (
We shall hope that the rich experience of the USSR regarding women’s emancipation will be in demand and developed in the next wave of interest in gender politics as a resource for solving Russia’s demographic problems.
The limitations of our analysis are based on our sources of information. Firstly, using the international databases allows us to include in our analysis only the journals present in the databases. Secondly, the databases’ categorization can be viewed as an institutional obstacle to proper bibliometric analysis, since it can misinterpret the core ideas of the field.
Nevertheless, we have discovered the main trends in the economics of gender. Economics of gender studies grew rapidly in the number of journals, articles and citations in the 1970s. It grew faster than economics publications during the 1980–1990s. Economics of gender research disciplines largely replicate the ones in economics and can be viewed as part of the economics of inequality. But feminist philosophy and methodology distinguish economics of gender as a separate branch of economic sciences, and usher us into a new realm of knowledge. According to the Scimago and Web of Science database, more than 90% of articles in economics of gender are published in English (slightly fewer than in economics in general). The structure of the analyzed countries reflects not only the sophistication of national research in economics of gender, but also the degree of their integration into international scientific discourse, including the presence of a language barrier. For example, the Scandinavian countries and France, which are considered to be pioneers in the fight against gender inequality, are poorly represented among the Web of Science journals. Russia and other post-Soviet states, and the developed countries of Asia belong to the category of countries where the weak development of gender economics is reinforced by the low orientation towards the international academy. Gender economists are primarily focused on the problems of developing countries. Advanced economies account for less than a third of all publications.
Advancement of Women (INSTRAW) and United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) were established in 1976 as successor organizations to the Division for the Advancement of Women (established in 1946).
Web of Science tools do not provide citation metrics for large databases.