Policy Research Working Paper10693Tackling Gender Discriminatory Inheritance Law PrivatelyLessons from a Survey Experiment in TunisiaChristina Sarah HauserMiddle East and North Africa RegionOffice of the Chief EconomistFebruary 2024 Public Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedProduced by the Research Support TeamAbstractThe Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.Policy Research Working Paper 10693When reform of gender discriminatory law fails, indi-vidual action can offer a second-best solution. As most Muslim-majority countries, Tunisia applies Islamic inher-itance law, systematically favoring sons over daughters. By making gifts to their daughter, parents can privately attenuate gender discrimination in inheritance. This study investigates to what extent gifting can represent an alterna-tive to legal reform and for whom. Within a randomized experiment, this study tests whether providing information on public support for inheritance law reform and/or the possibility to make a gift to one’s daughter has a causal impact on individual attitudes towards women’s right to inheritance. The overall evidence on the effectiveness of the proposed informational treatments to encourage gift-ing is mixed. However, approval of gifting daughters is high—especially among the wealthy. Men are more likely to gift than women. By contrast, demand for legal reform is significantly higher among women and individuals with low educational attainment. The findings thus suggest that gifting indeed represents an alternative to legal reform; but mostly for a relatively well-off subset of the population, leaving the agency to the traditionally male head of the family.This paper is a product of the Office of the Chief Economist, Middle East and North Africa Region. It is part of a larger effort by the World Bank to provide open access to its research and make a contribution to development policy discussions around the world. Policy Research Working Papers are also posted on the Web at http://www.worldbank.org/prwp. The author may be contacted at christina.hauser@eui.eu or christina.sarah.hauser@gmail.com. Tackling Gender Discriminatory Inheritance Law Privately: Lessons from a Survey Experiment in...
