Culture Portability from Origin to Destination Country. The Gender Division of Domestic Work among Migrants in Italy.

Elisa Brini , University of Oslo
Anna Zamberlan, University of Trento
Paolo Barbieri, University of Trento

Gender inequality in the division of household labour persists over time, especially in Mediterranean countries, where women are responsible for the largest share of domestic chores. Whether this is the result of structural constraints or of cultural preferences originating from traditional gender norms remains an open question. We investigate the role of culture in explaining gender asymmetries in housework and childcare tasks. Through multilevel models based on microlevel data (the Istat SCIF survey), we examine the extent to which the division of household labour in migrant couples living in Italy relates to gender equity in their origin country, proxied by the Global Gender Gap Index. We also examine whether age at, or time since, migration affects cultural assimilation. We find visible gender differences in both the division of household labour and partners’ involvement in different tasks. Most interestingly, migrants from more gender-equal countries display more equality in the division of unpaid labour, and vice versa. This result holds for migrants who were socialised in their country of origin, i.e., arrived in Italy when 18 or older, while no systematic variation is found among individuals born or socialised in Italy. This might suggest the presence of effective cultural assimilation mechanisms. Culture contributes to gender inequality in the intra-couple division of unpaid labour, yet non negligible differences exist between different housework and childcare tasks. Our study adds both to the literature on the cultural component of gender inequalities and to studies about migrants and cultural assimilation.

See extended abstract

 Presented in Session 61. Work and the family