Women's productive role and marital violence in Bangladesh

Abstract

This study assesses the role of women's participation in productive activities in reducing the risk of marital violence. Data were collected from villages where numerous non-government organizations (NGOs) had micro-credit based income generating programs for the poor. Both the surveys and in-depth interviews were used to collect information from a randomly selected sample of 500 currently married women aged <50 years living in 70 villages in 10 regions of Bangladesh. Findings reveal that the prevalence of marital violence such as mental torture and physical assault had negative association with women's participation in economic activities. Situation that invoked violence against had most often been their failure of performing expected role in the household. Women's productive roles not only improved women's position in their household but also significantly reduced both mental torture and physical assault against them. The paper argues that participation in productive activities has the potential to bring a significant reduction in the risk of marital violence among women in the poor community.