Income Shocks, Bride Price and Child Marriage in Turkey


Book Description

This paper investigates the impact of income shocks and bride price on early marriage in Turkey. The practice of bride-price, still vivid in many regions of the country, may provide incentives for parents to marry their daughter earlier, when faced with a negative income shock. In addition, marriages precipitated by negative income shocks may present specific features (endogamy, age and education difference between spouses). Weather shocks provide an exogenous source of variation of household income through agricultural production. Data on weather shocks are merged with individual and household level data from the Turkish Demographic and Health Surveys 1998 to 2013. To study the role of payments to the bride's parents, we interact our measure of shocks with a province-level indicator of a high prevalence of bride-price. We find that girls living in provinces with a high practice of bride-price and exposed to a negative income shocks when aged 12-14 have a 28% higher probability to be married before the age of 15 than girls not exposed to shocks. This effect is specific to provinces with a high prevalence of bride price. Compared to women who experienced the same shock but lived in a province where bride price is infrequent, such women are also more likely to give birth to their first child before 18 and for those who married religiously first, the civil ceremony is delayed by 2 months on average. Our results suggest that girl marriage still participates to household strategies aimed at mitigating negative income shocks in contemporary Turkey.




Child Marriage in Türkiye


Book Description

"This book provides a critical examination of the problem of underage marriage in Türkiye through a sociological perspective, considering gender politics, cultural norms, and historical and political contexts. The author conducts a comprehensive analysis of the problem by focusing on the lived experiences and narratives of women who married before the age of 18. Face-to-face, in-depth, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty-two women who married at a child age to identify the causes and consequences of the marriage of underage girls, and to explore how these women perceive both their own identities and the broader issue of child marriage. Employing discourse analysis, the author scrutinizes these interviews through the theoretical lenses of gender, identity, and ideology, all while remaining attuned to feminist perspectives. These combined methodologies allow the author to reveal the hidden dimensions of the problem, examining the feelings, stories, behaviours, and beliefs of real women who have married as children. Finally, constructive solutions are proposed for the elimination of the child marriage problem, not only in Türkiye, but in countries across the world. The book will interest those working and studying in an array of fields, including sociology, gender studies, and Turkish culture and society, as well as anyone with a general interest in the problem of underage marriage"--




Socio-Cultural Influences on Teenage Pregnancy and Contemporary Prevention Measures


Book Description

Teenage pregnancy is a public health concern that is growing more prevalent in both developed and developing countries. Understanding the problems of teenage motherhood and suggesting relevant preventive strategies and interventions can help break the cycle of poverty, poor education, and risky behaviors that can lead to health and child welfare issues. Socio-Cultural Influences on Teenage Pregnancy and Contemporary Prevention Measures is an essential reference source that discusses the causes and factors responsible for early motherhood, as well as the mental and psychological outlooks of teen mothers. Featuring research on topics such as minority populations, family dynamics, and sex education, this book is ideally designed for healthcare students, medical professionals, practitioners, nurses, and counselors seeking coverage on the issues, reasons, and outcomes of teenage pregnancy, as well as preventive strategies to combat teenage motherhood.




Ending Child Marriage


Book Description

Ending child marriage is not only a moral imperative—it is a strategic imperative that will further critical U.S. foreign policy interests in development, prosperity, stability, and the rule of law.




Child Marriage in Türkiye


Book Description

This book provides a critical examination of the problem of underage marriage in Türkiye through a sociological perspective considering gender perceptions, cultural norms, and historical and political contexts. The author conducts a comprehensive analysis of the problem by focusing on the lived experiences and narratives of women who married before the age of 18. Face-to-face, in-depth, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 women who married at a child age to identify the causes and consequences of the marriage of underage girls and to explore how these women perceive both their own identities and the broader issue of child marriage. Employing critical discourse analysis, the author scrutinizes these interviews through the theoretical lenses of gender, identity, and ideology, all while remaining attuned to feminist perspectives. These combined methodologies allow the author to reveal the hidden dimensions of the problem, examining the feelings, stories, behaviours, and beliefs of real women who have married as children. Finally, constructive solutions are proposed for the elimination of the child marriage problem, not only in Türkiye, but in countries across the world. The book will interest those working and studying in an array of fields, including sociology, gender studies, and Turkish culture and society, as well as anyone with a general interest in the problem of underage marriage.







Women, Migration and Asylum in Turkey


Book Description

This book examines the migration of women as gendered subjects to and from Turkey, using feminist research practices to explore a range of diverse experiences of migrant women as refugees, asylum seekers, undocumented or documented migrants. The collection includes contributions from researchers, practitioners, and migrants themselves to present a nuanced analysis that challenges binary divisions between ‘forced’ and ‘voluntary’ migrants and highlights the political and social agency of refugee and migrant women in Turkey. Drawing on a rich body of original empirical and theoretical research the volume explores recent policy change in Turkey, the political and social influences that have shaped migration policy (both internally and globally), and how women migrants have been positioned within its changing refugee and migration regimes. Analysis of the Turkish experience of redesigning migration policy in a country with weak civil protection against gender discrimination provides important lessons, in particular for countries in the Global South that are under pressure from the Global North to control and manage migrant flows. This interdisciplinary volume offers gender-sensitive recommendations for policymakers and practitioners and will advance global debates on migration management and governance across the fields of sociology, social policy, anthropology, labour economics and political science.




American Child Bride


Book Description

Most in the United States likely associate the concept of the child bride with the mores and practices of the distant past. But Nicholas L. Syrett challenges this assumption in his sweeping and sometimes shocking history of youthful marriage in America. Focusing on young women and girls--the most common underage spouses--Syrett tracks the marital history of American minors from the colonial period to the present, chronicling the debates and moral panics related to these unions. Although the frequency of child marriages has declined since the early twentieth century, Syrett reveals that the practice was historically far more widespread in the United States than is commonly thought. It also continues to this day: current estimates indicate that 9 percent of living American women were married before turning eighteen. By examining the legal and social forces that have worked to curtail early marriage in America--including the efforts of women's rights activists, advocates for children's rights, and social workers--Syrett sheds new light on the American public's perceptions of young people marrying and the ways that individuals and communities challenged the complex legalities and cultural norms brought to the fore when underage citizens, by choice or coercion, became husband and wife.




Erdoğan’s ‘New’ Turkey


Book Description

Demonstrating how Turkey’s politics have developed, this book focuses on the causes and consequences of the failed coup d'état of 15 July 2016. The momentous event and its aftermath challenges us to ask if the coup was the cause of Turkey’s present crisis, or simply an accelerant of trends already in motion, and thus a catalyst for the realization of Erdoğan’s latent authoritarian impulses. Bringing together approaches from politics, sociology, history and anthropology, the chapters shed much-needed light on these crucial questions. They offer scholars and nonspecialists alike a comprehensive overview of the implications of the coup attempt and its aftermath on the issues of religion, democracy, the Kurds, the state, resistance and more besides. Its effects have been felt in almost every aspect of Turkish society from religion to politics, yet it came at a time when Turkey was already experiencing significant social and political turmoil under the increasingly authoritarian leadership of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Readers interested in contemporary politics, Turkish and Middle Eastern studies will find the volume useful, as they ponder other cases in this era of democratic retrenchment and global turmoil.




Education of Syrian Refugee Children


Book Description

With four million Syrian refugees as of September 2015, there is urgent need to develop both short-term and long-term approaches to providing education for the children of this population. This report reviews Syrian refugee education for children in the three neighboring countries with the largest population of refugees—Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan—and analyzes four areas: access, management, society, and quality.