The forthcoming article “Breaking barriers: How an international treaty for women reduces the size of the informal economy” by Chris Gahagan is summarized by the author below.
Whether international treaties alter domestic policy has long been an open question in international politics. Some scholars argue that treaties constrain state behavior and meaningfully change domestic outcomes, while others contend that treaties merely screen out non-compliers, implying that ratifying countries would have behaved similarly even in the absence of international commitments. These competing views are especially visible in debates over the effectiveness of international human rights treaties, where scholars remain divided over whether ratification produces substantive improvements or amounts largely to symbolic commitment.
Within this broader debate, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) offers a revealing case. Existing research credits the treaty with advances in women’s political and social rights, yet largely concludes that it has failed to improve women’s economic standing. I argue that this assessment understates CEDAW’s economic effects for three reasons.
First, much of the prior research relies on broad indicators of women’s economic rights that blend law and practice into a single score, making it difficult to identify what is actually changing within countries. Focusing instead on specific legal barriers that directly relate to women’s ability to work provides a clearer test of whether CEDAW matters for women’s economic outcomes. Second, economic improvements may occur through channels that standard expert-based reports do not capture, meaning important consequences of the treaty can go unnoticed. Third, recent methodological advances allow for stronger causal analysis by better accounting for differences between countries and the timing of treaty ratification.
The core finding is straightforward. Countries that ratify CEDAW make measurable progress in reducing legal barriers that prevent women from working on equal terms with men. These reforms include eliminating gendered restrictions on women’s access to employment, requirements for male permission to work, and other legal constraints on formal employment. After ratification, the likelihood that women face such barriers declines significantly, and this effect strengthens over time. In short, CEDAW does what it is meant to do—improves women’s economic rights.
I also show that CEDAW generates an important and largely overlooked downstream effect. By removing legal obstacles to formal employment, the treaty facilitates movement out of the informal economy and into formal work. Informal employment is typically associated with lower wages, unsafe working conditions, and limited protection during economic shocks. Shortly after ratification, countries experience a significant reduction in the size of their informal economies, amounting to roughly half a percentage point of gross domestic product. This shift reflects expanded employment opportunities rather than government crackdowns on informal activity and is unique to CEDAW rather than a general feature of human rights treaty ratification.
These findings matter beyond academic debates. For governments, reductions in informality can increase tax revenues and strengthen the provision of public goods. For individuals, especially women, formal employment brings safer working conditions, higher pay, and lower risks of poverty and inequality. More broadly, this research underscores that international treaties can matter in indirect but meaningful ways, shaping economic outcomes through channels that are often overlooked.
About the Author: Chris Gahagan is a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at Florida State University and an incoming 2026-2027 Postdoctoral Fellow at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at Princeton University. Their research “Breaking barriers: How an international treaty for women reduces the size of the informal economy”” is now available in Early View and will appear in a forthcoming issue of the American Journal of Political Science.