Economic Drivers of Domestic Violence among Women: A Case Study of Ghana

Abstract

Violence against women seems to be more of an economic than a sociological problem. In Ghana, no study has investigated the economic causes of domestic violence against women. The chapter seeks to investigate the economic factors that are likely to drive domestic violence among married couples. The study uses a survey of 260 married women from selected communities around the University of Cape Coast. Due to the nature of the measurement of domestic violence, the study adopts the binary logit model to estimate the key economic variables that affect the likelihood of being subjected to domestic violence. Average income, property ownership, economic activities, and their interactions seem to drive domestic violence after controlling for some household covariates. It is found that income and a combination of being economically engaged and owning an asset significantly affected domestic violence at their desired level of significance. Stemming from this, the authors call on the appropriate authorities to make credit facilities available to women to enable them to be economically engaged. Empowering women through the provision of microcredit facilities has the potential to reduce the economic dimensions of domestic violence.