Following extensive consultations with gender experts, academics, civil society representatives, and colleagues within the World Bank Group, the Women, Business and the Law team designs questionnaires that are administered to a large sample of lawyers, judges, academics, and members of civil society organizations in 190 economies. These experts—who complete the questionnaires on a pro bono basis—are identified by their expertise in the various areas of law covered by the report.

The team further engages with experts through conference calls, written correspondence, and in-person meetings on country visits. All questionnaire responses are then analyzed, with each answer verified against the corresponding primary legal source. Lastly, the data undergoes a thorough internal review process in which comments on the data are received from across the World Bank Group.

Information on the construction of the panel, the methodology, and the scoring for each question can be found in the report's Data Notes, available on the Methodology page.

The Women, Business and the Law index is based on statistically significant associations with outcomes related to women’s economic empowerment, in particular with women’s labor force participation as well as with other outcomes of interest. The first seven indicators demonstrate statistically significant associations with one or more of the following outcomes even after controlling for the log of GNI per capita and region fixed effects: the female to male labor force participation rate ratio from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators database, the female to male wage ratio from the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report, the percentage of firms with a female top manager from the World Bank’s Enterprise Surveys and the percentage of females (age 15+) who report owning financial accounts from the World Bank’s Global FINDEX database. For the final indicator, Pension, a statistically significant association was found with the percentage of females (age 15+) who report saving or setting aside any money for old age in the past year from the World Bank’s Global FINDEX database.

In addition to the association of indicators with outcomes, Women, Business and the Law employs a thorough review of the economic literature that supports each indicator. This review demonstrates how legislation influences women’s equality of opportunity during different phases of their working lives and affects their economic inclusion.

Finally, to ensure their relevance to women’s human and economic rights, each indicator is supported by the international legal framework set out in the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). Questions on sexual harassment under the Workplace indicator, divorce and domestic violence questions under the Marriage indicator, and childcare credits under the Pension indicator are also supplemented by the UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women (DEVAW) and by the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women General Recommendations (CEDAW GR). Finally, questions on maternity leave for the Parenthood indicator use the International Labor Organization (ILO) Maternity Protection Convention N. 183 of 2000 as a benchmark.

Women, Business and the Law 2023 provides scores for each economy covered. Thirty-five data points are scored across eight indicators of four or five binary questions, with each indicator representing a different phase of a woman’s career. Indicator-level scores are obtained by calculating the unweighted average of the questions within that indicator and scaling the result to 100. Overall scores are then calculated by taking the average of each indicator, with 100 representing the highest possible score.

Policymakers, international organizations, civil society organizations, gender equality advocates, investors, and researchers can use Women, Business and the Law findings in many ways. For instance, the data can be used to identify good practices and compare countries on how conducive their regulatory environment is for women business owners and workers. Women, Business and the Law findings can also be used to assess the economic impact of laws and regulations on women’s prospects as employees and entrepreneurs, bolstering traditional human rights arguments with economic research. Further, the findings can be used to influence legislative change, make informed decisions regarding policy reform and private investment, and support research on institutions and regulation.

Over the past years, Women, Business and the Law has taken as its starting point that the law can help women reach their full potential. It is the framework by which governments can identify barriers to women’s success and, by removing them, boost their labor force participation. However, for women to thrive in the world of work, the laws that guarantee their equality of opportunity must be meaningfully implemented and enforced.

Women, Business and the Law recognizes that the implementation and enforcement of laws are critical barriers to gender equality. Gaps between laws on the books and actual practice restrict the full realization of women’s rights and opportunities. To present a fuller picture of the legal environment for women, Women, Business and the Law 2022 presented the results of a pilot exercise conducted in 25 economies, examining both the supportive frameworks that create an enabling environment for working women and the expert opinions of progress made toward gender equality of individuals on the ground.

Though preliminary, the pilot exercise confirms that laws alone are not enough to improve gender equality, with gaps between the legal index and the measures of implementation observed across all countries. Continuing to improve these measures in subsequent years, Women, Business and the Law hopes to deliver a fully developed methodology for measuring the operation of laws that will allow more women to enforce their rights, boosting economic inclusion and labor force participation worldwide. Read more.

Women, Business and the Law focuses on the formal legal and regulatory environment determining whether women can open their own businesses or work. Although many women in developing economies start businesses or work in the informal economy, a goal of this project is to define some of the features of the legal framework that make it more difficult for women to transition from the informal to the formal economy. Further, to maintain comparability across economies, Women, Business and the Law includes an assumption that the woman in question is employed in the formal sector. However, many of the indicators have direct relevance for women who work in the informal sector, for example laws affecting women’s ability to own or inherit property, or protections against domestic violence. Indirectly, legal protections affecting the formal sector provide a foundation for economic inclusion and offer incentives for women to be employed in or start businesses in the formal sector. 

Women, Business and the Law data is based on codified laws only and in some cases, in common law countries, legal precedent. Uncodified religious or customary practices are not reflected in the data. Unwritten, social or cultural norms—which may have a large impact on women’s lives—are also not considered. The existence of a statutory law is generally necessary for Women, Business and the Law to assess whether women are granted equal rights as men. For example, under the Assets indicator, Women, Business and the Law does not assign a positive score when property rights are solely governed by uncodified customary law (which often discriminates against women). This limitation ensures that the indicators remain actionable, because the law is what policymakers can change.

To ensure fairness and transparency in the data collection process, the Women, Business and the Law team has created a Government Engagement Portal through which government officials and World Bank Group colleagues may request meetings and provide the team with information regarding potential reforms or data corrections by completing an online Data Updates Submission (DUS) Form.

Data Updates can be submitted through the Government Engagement Portal during each data collection cycle from one month after the start of data collection until two weeks after the data cutoff date. The Women, Business and the Law team reviews and sends written responses to all information submitted through the Government Engagement Portal no later than two months after data collection closes. In the response, the Women, Business and the Law team explains the assessment of the particular economy data to the issue raised based on the relevant methodology and provides a conclusion.

Since 2022, the team publishes the information received through the Government Engagement Portal. Read the data updates submitted by governments by clicking here.