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Part 1

Provide the full citation for the article

Ross, Michael L. "Oil, Islam, and women." American political science review (2008): 107-123.

Write in your own words, the research question for this article.

How does an increase in oil production in a country affect gender equality?

What is the dependent variable?

The dependent variables of the article are Female Labor Force Participation and female political

influence. The former entails the percentage composition of the formal working sector occupied

by women. It uses data from surveys and census done by the International Labor Organization in

2005 (Ross, 112). Female political influence is evident through the ministerial positions and

parliamentary seats they hold in a country.

What is the theoretical significance of this research question? In other words, how does this

study contribute to scholarly debates?

The study implicates oil-production as the major cause of inequality in Middle East countries

rather than the main idea of Islam being the main cause. The author postulates that increased

focus on oil-production leads to a shift of labor from the traded sector to the non-traded sectors
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(Ross, 109). Traded sectors comprise the textile, agricultural and export-based industries where

most women work, whereas non-traded sectors include construction and manufacturing. Once a

country heavily relies on oil as the significant driver of the economy, many women leave the

labor force due to increased reservation wages than the low compensation working in traded

sectors.

What is the primary hypothesis being put forward or tested by the author?

The primary hypothesis is that advancement in oil production lowers female participation in the

working population, reducing their political influence (Ross, 110-111).

Describe two rival explanations that are considered by the author, as well as the evidence

that is used to evaluate the rivals.

The rival argument is that Islam is why women in the Middle East have continued to maintain

traditional roles as housemakers and have fewer government seats. Others claim that the poor

treatment of women in the region is the root cause of the bad blood between the West and

Islamic nations (Ross, 107).

What cases are being compared?

The author compares the case for oil-producing countries that have occupational segregation and

those that do not have. The former limit women's employability to the traded sector only, but the

latter gives them the volition to shift to the non-traded sector when conditions best fit their

preference (Ross, 110).

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What research methods are used, and what types of evidence are collected?

The research method employed in the paper is a qualitative case study where the author utilizes

the first-differences model and cross-sectional data. The evidence collected is case-controlled

results that include one hundred and sixty-nine states between 1960-2002 (Ross, 111).

What is the author's argument?

The author postulates that increased oil-production in a country is the cause of gender inequality

in the government and workforce. Occupational segregation limits women to low wages and

"feminine" agricultural, textual, and export-oriented jobs (Ross, 116-120). Once oil takes over

the economy, the real exchange rate increases making imports cheaper, which displaces domestic

products from traded sectors. This situation causes restraint in the cost of production. Firms have

to lower their wage rates further so that to maintain profit and continue in operation. Eventually,

women abandon their pursuit for extra income since their husbands earn more and, together with

government transfer funds, increases the reservation wage. Ultimately, women cannot meet and

share ideas concerning their rights and the need for representation.

What is your evaluation of the author's argument? Are you convinced? Why or why not?

The author provides an explicit and comprehensive explanation of gender inequality in the

workforce and the political sector. This argument is convincing enough to change one's

perspective on the role of economic development in promoting inequality.

Part II

A quasi-experimental design is essential when an individual wants to abide by certain

organizations' ethical standards and remain practical. Quasi-experimental design functions like a
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true experiment that exhibited the correlation of cause and effect between predictor and predicted

variables (Bärnighausen, 21-29). The difference comes around in the assignment of subjects

where true experiments are randomized and quasi are not. What this implies is that quasi-

experiments study already classified groups without affecting the classification to benefit the

study. When discussing ethicality, quasi-experiments play a significant role by ensuring that all

variables receive their due treatment without using one group as a control sample and the other

as an experiment. In this case, true experiments are not feasible because they choose the group

that will receive the treatment and the one that will not.

Additionally, quasi-experiments are vital when researching in organizations that uphold

high equality levels for all its subjects. Often, quasi-experiments are ubiquitous in the infectious

disease literature. In such cases, the organization under observation may prevent research from

administering treatment to one group and not another for the sake of observing different

reactions. In such cases, the organization will choose their method of classification to ensure

equality for everyone. The second instance of using quasi-experiments is for practical reasons,

which involves funding. True experiments require many resources going to the field for data

collection, research into secondary data, a compilation of information, recording devices, and

permits, to name but a few. However, quasi-experiments are much cheaper because all it does is

study already classified groups which are reactive to the particular culture imposes on them.

Additionally, it takes advantage of data already provided by the government, so it does not go to

the extra mile of acquiring such.

An example that would cater for both reasons for using quasi-experimental design would

be the Oregon Health Study, which took place in 2008. The study was undertaken by researchers

sponsored by the state of Oregon to determine ways to expand Medicaid enrollment and
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provision of insurance program to America's low income and very low-income earners (Thomas,

1-1). The program could not cover everyone eligible to receive the benefits. Therefore, they had

to establish a way to cover people without eliminating others based on experimental control

ethically. Hence, they introduced a random lottery that would earn the individuals the slots

equally. Researchers used the enrolled individuals as a random treatment group and were eligible

but did not succeed in the lottery as the control group. This example shows that the state upheld

integrity, and the researchers saved funds and time by studying the already classified groups.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Quasi-experimental design merits external and internal validity but demerits in the use of

past data and lower validity relative to true experiments (Thomas, 1-1). External validity

acquired by quasi-experimental designs occurs relative to true experiments—the latter focus on a

laboratory setting where they study variables concerning their preconceived ideas of certain

reactions. However, the former provides real-world conditions that are far much tangible than lab

experiments. Therefore, raising their validity level. Secondly, the design's internal validity is

higher than non-experimental research types because they provide better control for confounding

variables. Confounding variables are third-parties to the experiment related to the independent

and dependent variables (Thomas, 1-1). They consist of things like the temperature in an ice-

cream and sunburn experiment. When people get sunburns, they take more ice-cream, but that

does not mean the latter causes the former. Therefore, the researcher introduces another variable:

temperature, meaning that higher temperatures cause people to take more ice-cream, thus

spending more time under the sun and obtaining sunburns. Therefore, quasi-experiments allow

better control of these variables. On the flip side, this design provides reduced internal validity

than true experiments because it lacks randomization. In certain experiments, confounding

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variables may be more than one. Therefore, without randomization, the design fails to account

for all of them. Finally, the quasi design uses retrospective data from its identified sources. The

problem with using secondary data is that it may be incomplete, inaccurate, and in the wrong

units than one intended them. The researcher using this design cannot prove the credibility of the

data, analysis method, and identification methods. Therefore, as much as the process may be

cheaper and easier to access, many things are at risk of recording the wrong information.

Work Cited

Bärnighausen, Till, et al. "Quasi-experimental study designs series—paper 4: uses and value."

Journal of clinical epidemiology 89 (2017): 21-29.

Thomas, Lauren. "An introduction to quasi-experimental designs." Scribbr. 2020.

Thomas, L. "Understanding confounding variables." Scribbr. 2020.

Ross, Michael L. "Oil, Islam, and women." American political science review (2008): 107-123.