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This work analyzes female immigrants’ integration in the dimensions of education, labor market participation and fertility in 15 European countries, considering individual characteristics, including cultural background, host countries’ attitudes towards immigrants, the role of women in the family and country-specific integration policy. All these aspects taken together are crucial to understand the main patterns of integration focusing on gender differences.

We focus on second- and first-generation male and female immigrants between the age of 25 and 41, with a length of stay of at least ten years. Enrollment ratios for tertiary education in parents’ countries, the total fertility rate and the female labor force in the mother’s country represent ethnic background. Diversity in the destination regions is captured by local attitudes towards immigrants, the perceived role of women and national policies to integrate migrants [Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX)]. The data are drawn from the European Social Survey (ESS) for 2010–2018. Our results are based on ordinary least squares (OLS) and logit estimates; multilevel analysis was conducted.

We find significant evidence of gender role transmission from mother to daughter; age at immigration seems to be crucial to examine the importance of the culture of origin among immigrants. However, females are responsive to attitudes toward immigrants and gender equality in receiving societies, while integration policies, by defining the set of opportunities, may contribute to both genders’ tertiary education and women’s probability of being in the labor force.

This work underlines that integration policies favoring equal rights as nationals may contribute to both women’s tertiary education and their probability of being in the labor force.

We explore female integration in Europe in the dimensions of education, labor market, fertility and the role of both immigrants’ cultural heritage and specific aspects of destination countries. Previous research, particularly in the USA, has generally focused on some of these features at the expense of a more comprehensive approach. This study builds upon the existing literature and contributes to it by taking a multifaceted approach to female integration in Western Europe, which presents not only an institutional context different from the USA but also some heterogeneity with respect to integration policies and socioeconomic factors.

The article aims to identify the determinants of the urbanization process given the magnitude of this phenomenon and also its economic, social and environmental implications and pressure on public authorities to find viable solutions in the context of sustainable development.

The research is based on regression analysis with urbanization growth being the dependent variable and enrollment in higher education, GDP, value added by industry and female labor force as independent variables.

The main factors that favor urbanization are the increase in population, industry value-added and the female labor force. Urbanization is an objective that must be pursued differently by public authorities in developed and developing countries, given the different realities they face-population growth in developing countries, and population aging and international migration in developed countries.

The present research has limitations generated by the selection of independent variables, which is why in future directions, the research will consider the use of other indicators such as the number of graduates, exports as percent of GDP or migrations as a percentage of the total population. Given the complexity of the phenomenon of urbanization, future research will focus on groups of countries as they resulted from the clustering made by this article.

The impact of higher education on urbanization is low, which is why the intensification of partnerships between municipal authorities and universities could be a solution that ensures not only the transfer of knowledge from academia to the public sector but also from entrepreneurs increasingly aware of the importance of promoting SDGs for urban development in the context of the challenges posed by global warming. The involvement of women in the labor market is essential for the intensification of the urbanization process. The increasing presence of women in the labor market generates an increase in the income of families, an increase in the level of education and an intensification of national and international migration. The research findings can be used by policy and decision-makers to develop appropriate urbanization and education policies and strategies.

The existence of inhomogeneous clusters is noticeable, which demonstrates the complexity of the urbanization phenomenon that is present in all countries around the world, but under the influence of different factors such as the export of natural resources (mainly oil) or the intensification of industrial activity. Taking into account the variables used, this study stands out in the multitude of articles published in the international mainstream.

This paper aims to investigate the relationship of female participation in labor force with the cybersecurity maturity of nations and the enabling role of e-government development in moderating the same.

The authors have conducted fixed-effects regression using archival data for 149 countries taken from secondary sources. Furthermore, the authors have grouped the sample countries into four levels of cybersecurity maturity (unprepared, reactive, anticipatory and innovative) using clustering techniques, and studied the influence of their interest variables for individual groups.

Results show that female participation in labor force positively influences national cybersecurity maturity, and e-government development positively moderates the said relationship, thereby enabling the empowerment of women.

Encouraging broader participation of women in the labor force and prioritizing investments in e-government development are essential steps that organizations and governments may take to enhance a country’s cybersecurity maturity level.

This study empirically demonstrates the impact of the nuanced interplay between female participation in labor force and the e-government development of a nation on its cybersecurity maturity.

COVID-19 has had various effects on women’s labour supply worldwide. This study investigates how women’s labour market outcomes in the MENA region have been affected by the stringency of governments’ COVID-19 responses and school closures. We examine whether women, particularly those with children at young age, reduced their labour supply to take care of their families during the pandemic.

To investigate whether having a family results in an extra penalty to women’s labour market outcomes, we compare single women to married women and mothers. Using the ERF COVID-19 MENA Monitor Household Surveys, we analyse the key conditions underlying women’s labour market outcomes: (1) wage earnings and labour market status including remaining formally employed, informally, unpaid or self-employed, unemployed or out of the labour force and (2) becoming permanently terminated, being suspended, seeing a reduction in the hours worked or wages, or seeing a delay in one’s wage payments because of COVID-19. Ordered probit and multinomial logit are employed in the case of categorical outcomes, and linear models for wage earnings.

Women, regardless of whether they have children or not, appear to join the labour market out of necessity to help their families in the times of crisis. Child-caring women who are economically inactive are also more likely to enter the labour market. There is little difference between the negative experiences of women with children and child-free women in regard to their monthly pay reduction or delay, or contract termination, but women with children were more likely to experience reduction in hours worked throughout the pandemic.

These findings may not have causal interpretation facilitating accurate inference. This is because of potential omitted variables such as endogenous motivation of women in different circumstances, latent changes in the division of domestic work between care-giving and other household members, or selective sample attrition.

Our analysis explores the multiple channels in which the pandemic has affected the labour outcomes of MENA-region women. Our findings highlight the challenges that hamper the labour market participation of women, and suggest that public policy should strive to balance the share of unpaid care work between men and women and increase men’s involvement, through measures that support child-bearing age women’s engagement in the private sector during crises, invest in childcare services and support decent job creation for all.

This research aims to explore whether or not the widely adopted diversity management strategy of Japanese firms aids female self-initiated expatriates' careers. Japan is famous for its male-dominated society (e.g. Hofstede, 2003), which seems to conflict with the recent fading of this strategy in Japanese firms. To what extent does the strategy work for Japanese organisations and how do female self-initiated expatriates perceive it?

An interview-based qualitative methodology is used to collect testimony from female self-initiated expatriates who are currently working fulltime in Japanese firms. The interviews were conducted with 22 female expats who come from 13 different countries.

Although the strategy aims for equality, gender still matters in Japanese society and within firms. The interviews found that male-centred rules set out every single step for local employees' behaviours. “Male things” are defined everywhere at work, which makes female expats sceptical of Japan and Japanese firms. The dynamics of the male-based rule seem to eliminate female expats from the centre of organisational society.

Discussion over female expatriates has been increasing due to the frequent movement of international labour to Japan. Also gender fairness has been pushed by the international community, including Japanese. These factors, however, have yet to be explored in the context of the Japanese workplace for female international expatriates. What do we know about female expats working in Japan? What does the male dominance mean for female expats? This study provides an initial insight on female and expatriate diversity management in Japan.

Female entrepreneurship discussions will broaden and diversify as a result of global shifts. Studies of female entrepreneurship must take into account differences between male and female entrepreneurs due to the historical, cultural and social specificity of developing countries to narrow gender gaps, identify barriers, fine-tune support systems, release dormant potential and provide information for policymaking. This paper aims to measure and estimate the most crucial socioeconomic characteristics that Southeast Asian countries leverage to advance women’s business initiatives.

Using a panel data model whereby the Female Entrepreneurship Indicator Score serves as the dependent variable and the ten most important socioeconomic indicators serve as the independent variables. Ten southeast Asian countries are analyzed using the panel fixed effects approach of Method of Moments Quantile Regression (MM-QR) from 1980 to 2021.

It has been found by empirical panel quantile regression using the MM-QR method that the following indicators positively affect female entrepreneurship in southeast Asian countries: the assets indicator, the pay indicator, the workplace indicator, the mobility indicator and the a woman can sign a contract in the same way as a man indicator. But the parenthood indicator, the unemployment indicator, the school enrollment indicator, the men and women have equal ownership rights to immovable property indicator and the marriage indicator all have negative effects.

This paper uses a new method called MM-QR to look at how the most important socioeconomic factors affect female entrepreneurship in Southeast Asian countries. The results obtained will also add to and broaden the small amount of research that has been done on female entrepreneurs in developing countries.

Education had proven to be one of the main determinants of economic growth, and it is a reason of the variations in economic growth levels between developed and developing countries. One of the main dimensions in studding the relationship between economic growth and education is the gender dimension or the importance of gender equality or female education in achieving economic growth. This chapter aims to test the hypothesis of the existence of a positive relationship between female education and economic growth in Egypt since 1990.

To address this question, Auto Regression Distributed Lag (ARDL) Bound test approach is conducted to analyze the co-integration between female education and economic growth using Egyptian Data for the period 1990–2022. The Empirical analysis for Egypt suggests the existence of positive significant relationship both in the short run and long run and that the impact of female education on economic growth is larger than the impact of education in general on growth. This could be explained by the existence of gender gap in Egypt, labor market, and thus, more educated girls able to enter the labor market will affect the economic growth more than the education of both sexes, in other words, there is still a room for improvement in the female labor market opportunities than for both sexes. The chapter also confirms the existence of a direct link between education in general and economic growth and thus confirms the hypothesis of the positive impact of education economic growth.

Purpose: This chapter addresses the skills shortages in Kosovo’s labour market, emphasising the service sector. The labour market economy is very dynamic, and Kosovo, with the youngest population in Europe, also has the highest unemployment level among youths. Therefore, we aim to analyse the mismatches of the skills demand in the labour market.

Methodology: The scientific methods used in this chapter are quantitative methods applying analytical and critical approaches based on economic theory. In this chapter, we analysed secondary data from Labour Force Surveys (LFS) and official reports such as the World Bank and UNDP. We have also conducted primary research with the employees of SMEs in the service sector, with specifically related questionnaires for descriptive issues.

Findings: The logit model used in this research has shown goodness of fit and yielded significant results. Based on the empirical findings, we have found a need for some main soft skills such as communication skills, language skills, ICT skills, and additional training to help gain employability skills. These findings suggest that there is a need for more skills in the service sector, significantly impacting the employees’ job performance and the job seeker’s level of employability.

Significance: Noticeably, countries that are still in the transition process face inequalities in the labour market and have a very high level of unemployment. The findings can be used in analysing demand-side management of the labour market and mismatching of skills in transition economies by policy makers.

Purpose: This chapter investigates the current skill gap in small-scale industries, the need for skill development and digital training in micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSME), and reviews policies for skill development and solutions.

Need for the Study: While the legislature and organisations have initiated various considerations for the successful implementation of the Skill Development System in the country’s MSMEs, there are significant challenges that must be addressed quickly to fill the skill gap in workers in this digital era.

Research Methodology: Secondary data has been used for the chapter review. Analysis has been done based on review data from women handloom and handicraft workers in the micro or craft industry who received a Star rating from the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) partners in Lucknow. For data collection, a questionnaire based on random sampling was used. The data were analysed using a rudimentary weighted average and a percentage technique.

Findings: The studies provide answers to some fundamental problems: are small industry employees indeed mobilised to be skilled outside the official schooling system? Is the training delivery mechanism adequate to prepare pupils for employment? Would industries be willing to reduce minimum qualification criteria to foster skill development?

Practical Implication: Non-technical aptitudes digital and soft skills for workers in this sector should be emphasised in MSMEs, and significant reforms in MSME sectors and capacity-building education and training programmes should be implemented in the Indian industry to generate small and medium enterprises production and employment.

Persons with disabilities (PwD) are generally less likely to be employed than the general population. The paper aims to investigate whether access to assistive technologies (AT) impacts labour force participation in the disabled population.

The study utilises the nationally representative survey on disability in India conducted in 2018 through multi-stage sampling by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MOSPI), Government of India. The instrumental variable (IV) approach has been employed to infer causality between AT and labour market participation.

The study found that the labour force participation rate (LFPR) in India amongst the disabled population was 29% in the age group of 15–65 years in 2017–2018, as compared to 52% in the general population. Around two-thirds of the PwD respondents who were advised to acquire aid appliances acquired them, implying limited access to AT. The probability of LFPR in disabled population increases by 26.6% with access to AT particularly in urban areas.

Persistent issues such as lack of adequate amenities, poor literacy and a lack of vocational skills need to be addressed to improve labour market outcomes for the disabled population in rural areas.

Despite its role in promoting distributive justice and inclusive development, research on equity gaps in access to AT and its impact on labour market outcomes is scant. This is the first paper that provides empirical evidence on the impact of access to AT on LFPR in the context of low- and middle-income countries.