Regional Gender (in)Equality in the EU. Beyond Achivement and Development

The research question that this study seeks to address is as follows: how does gender equality at the regional level relate to economic indicators such as GDP per capita and other indicators of a more social, cultural and political nature in the European Union?

The objective of this paper is to conduct a comparative analysis of the gender equality situation in three EU countries: Spain, Italy and France. Furthermore, we examine the methodology employed in the Gender Equality Index (GEI) of the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE). In this study, we build upon the analysis conducted by López-Roldán and Fachelli (2023) and the methodological critique presented by Permanyer (2010, 2015) to develop a novel approach to examining gender inequality.

In order to achieve this objective, we have applied a structural and articulated methodology (López-Roldán & Fachelli, 2015) combining Principal Component Analysis techniques that identify the attributive characteristics of the social space and then a cluster analysis that identifies and classifies the regions into groups associated with higher or lower gender inequality. Subsequently, we will examine the extent to which this multidimensional and relational reality of gender inequalities is associated with economic and societal factors. To this end, we will conduct a linear regression analysis between the GEI and a range of economic and social indicators. Finally, we will discuss our results and comment on our main conclusions in light of them.