Assessing the Impact of Social Culture and National Regulations on Women’s Engagement in Logistics Decision-Making in Uganda

Résumé

Background Women remain underrepresented in leadership within Uganda’s logistics sector, despite national commitments to gender equality. This study examines how national regulations and laws and social culture shape women’s engagement in decision-making, and whether regulations mediate culture’s influence. Methods A quantitative cross-sectional survey was administered to 298 logistics professionals sampled from private logistics companies, industry associations, and regulatory bodies. Using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM), we assessed reliability/validity of constructs and tested direct and mediated relationships among social culture, national regulations and laws, and women’s engagement in decision-making (WEDM). Model fit and predictive relevance were evaluated (e.g., SRMR, R2, Q2). Results National regulations and laws had a positive, statistically significant effect on WEDM (β = 0.036, p = 0.002), underscoring the role of formal legal frameworks in advancing women’s leadership. Social culture showed no significant direct effect on WEDM (β = 0.002, p = 0.942). However, culture negatively influenced regulations (β = −0.265, p < 0.001), and a significant indirect (mediated) pathway from social culture to WEDM via regulations was detected (β = −0.008, p = 0.039), indicating full mediation. Correlations mirrored these patterns (national regulations–WEDM r = 0.377, p < 0.001; social culture–WEDM r = −0.224, p < 0.001; social culture–regulations r = −0.182, p = 0.002). The model demonstrated good fit (SRMR = 0.075) and strong explanatory power (R2 = 0.971 for WEDM; Q2 = 0.969). Conclusions Robust and enforced national legal frameworks are pivotal for increasing women’s engagement in logistics decision-making, and they can buffer or redirect the effects of restrictive cultural norms. While the direct impact of social culture on engagement was non-significant, its indirect effect through regulations highlights the importance of coupling legal reforms with consistent enforcement and organisational practices to convert rights into outcomes. Policy and practice should therefore integrate (i) targeted gender-equality regulations and monitoring, (ii) organisational interventions (e.g., transparent promotion, anti-bias systems, leadership development), and (iii) societal initiatives that progressively shift norms, to achieve durable, inclusive leadership pipelines in logistics and similar male-dominated sectors.

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