We have recently established together with Ingeborg Hess Elgersma that different ownership arrangements in the extractive industry affect gender equality in contrasting ways (Krauser et al. 2019). While international investment in the mining industry lowers female labor market integration, it also reduces the risk of intimate partner violence. These results add to the proposition of our earlier studies that the resource curse literature needs to consider the micro-management of the extractive industry (e.g. Wegenast and Schneider 2017;Wegenast et al. 2018).In an interesting contribution, Neupert-Wentz (2020) criticizes our recent article in this journal for largely disregarding the role of traditional gender roles and for thus insufficiently contextualizing the effects that the extractive industry has on the labor market integration of females and intimate partner violence in Sub-Sahara Africa. The main gist of her argument is that the effect of an intervention might depend on local norms: "The types of local gender norms can have varying effects on gender equality. For instance, there could be considerable differences between inheritance norms, marriage customs, and traditional harmful practices, such as female genital cutting" (Neupert-Wentz 2020). In addition, she claims that different types of interventions might have different effects on gender equality.As we have never argued that investment in the extractive industry affects gender equality or other social outcomes in a comparable way to wars, natural catastrophes