Empowering Absence? Assessing the Impact of Transnational Male Out-Migration on Left behind Wives

Experiences of left-behind family members transnational migrant workers have been in the shadow academic discourse on migration. To contribute to slowly growing body literature, this study explores impact male out-migration wives. The proposes and applies a novel framework estimate Women Empowerment Index (WEI) for comparing empowerment level across households with without men labor. Cross-sectional surveys unstructured interviews were used collect data from 373 respondents three selected areas Nepal. Results indicate that wives experience higher degree decision-making authority, physical mobility, involvement socio-political spheres compared women husbands at home. However, left behind found increased unpaid workload decreased access information, together emotional psychological costs absence their husbands.