scholarly journals The Role of Multi-Actor Engagement for Women’s Empowerment and Entrepreneurship in Kerala, India

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Murale Venugopalan ◽  
Bettina Lynda Bastian ◽  
P. K. Viswanathan
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
International Development ◽  
Local Governments ◽  
Social Inclusion ◽  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Regulatory Change ◽  
Marginalized Communities ◽  
Rural And Urban

Entrepreneurship has been increasingly promoted as a means to achieve women’s empowerment in the pursuit of gender equal societies by international development organizations, NGO’s as well as national and local governments across the world. Against this, the paper explores the role and influence of multi-actor engagement on successful empowerment of women based on a case study of Kudumbashree program in a regional context of Kerala, in South India. Our objective is to examine the women empowerment outcomes of the Kudumbashree initiatives, implemented within a multi-actor engagement framework supportive of women’s empowerment through capacity building and social inclusion programs. The case study demonstrates ‘how multiple-level engagements help enhance women’s development and support broad sustainable social change, in view of their sensitivity to the embeddedness of women’s agency under specific socio-political and cultural contexts’. We find that Kudumbashree programs, through its multi-actor engagement, strives for an equilibrium between social change through policy and regulatory change (top down) and social change via mobilizing the people (bottom-up). From a policy angle, the key learnings from the successful outcomes of Kudumbashree may be considered for designing rural and urban community development programs with a focus on the multidimensional empowerment as well as social and economic inclusion of women and other marginalized communities.

scholarly journals The Intersection of Islamic Microfinance and Women’s Empowerment: A Case Study of Baitul Maal Wat Tamwil in Indonesia

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ninik Sri Rahayu
Keyword(s):  
Gender Inequality ◽  
Poverty Alleviation ◽  
Local Governments ◽  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Critical Groups ◽  
Microfinance Institutions ◽  
Organizational Vision ◽  
Islamic Microfinance

It is largely assumed that Islamic microfinance institutions (IMFIs) deal with family empowerment instead of women’s empowerment. However, women are the main beneficiaries of Baitul Maal Wat Tamwil (BMT), Indonesia’s first IMFIs. This paper aims to explore the origins, the initiators, and the visions of BMTs and the extent to which they intersect with women’s empowerment. Employing a qualitative approach, this study selected four BMTs in Yogyakarta as a case study. It found that four critical groups that have a significant role in the development of Indonesian BMTs: ICMI (Association of Indonesian Muslim Intellectual), Islamic mass organizations, NGOs, and local governments. The issues of loan sharks and poverty alleviation were the primary factors driving the inception of BMTs. Despite women being crucial clients, none of the studied BMTs explicitly invoked women’s empowerment in their organizational vision. To conclude, the BMTs’ preference for women is not based on an understanding of gender inequality, but rather motivated by pragmatic business considerations, particularly the self-sustainability paradigm that underpins their practices.

scholarly journals Understanding the influence of development interventions on women beneficiaries' perceptions of empowerment: A case study in South Sulawesi, Indonesia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Adinda Tenriangke Muchtar
Keyword(s):  
International Development ◽  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Economic Dimension ◽  
Development Interventions ◽  
South Sulawesi ◽  
Personal Experiences ◽  
Women’S Perceptions ◽  
External Intervention

<p>This thesis argues that international development interventions influence the way women perceive empowerment. It does so by looking at aid relationships and the relevance of development interventions. It involves a case study of Oxfam’s Restoring Coastal Livelihoods Project (2010-2015) in South Sulawesi, Indonesia.  Efforts to empower women have been channeled through various approaches. However, little has been said about the practice of aid relations within projects and how aid relations work through the ‘aid chain’ and influence women’s perceptions of empowerment. Also, there has not been much said about how, in the intersectionality of aid relationships, women make ‘empowerment’ their own, appropriate it, transform it, adapt it to their stories and needs through their active engagement in projects.  The qualitative research which involved a five-month period of ethnographic research found that women beneficiaries perceived empowerment mostly based on their experiences in the project. However, the degree of empowerment is relative to the types of women’s engagement, the nature of activities, and their general understanding of gender relations. The project has brought economic-driven gender awareness by facilitating women’s practical and strategic needs through economic groups. It has also brought empowerment consequences which went beyond the economic dimension.  The research highlights the importance of personal, relational, and multidimensional aspects of empowerment in women’s perceptions of empowerment. Efforts to empower women seem to still rely on external intervention to facilitate the process and to deal with existing dynamics of power relations. The findings reassert that women’s empowerment requires enabling internal and external environments to promote women’s awareness of, and capacity for, empowerment.  Finally, the thesis underlines that empowerment depends highly on women’s personal experiences, awareness, agency, resources, choice, willingness, and commitment. This research contributes to our understanding of women, aid, and development as it highlights the multidimensional and multi-layered aspects of aid relations and women’s empowerment.</p>

scholarly journals Understanding the influence of development interventions on women beneficiaries' perceptions of empowerment: A case study in South Sulawesi, Indonesia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Adinda Tenriangke Muchtar
Keyword(s):  
International Development ◽  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Economic Dimension ◽  
Development Interventions ◽  
South Sulawesi ◽  
Personal Experiences ◽  
Women’S Perceptions ◽  
External Intervention

<p>This thesis argues that international development interventions influence the way women perceive empowerment. It does so by looking at aid relationships and the relevance of development interventions. It involves a case study of Oxfam’s Restoring Coastal Livelihoods Project (2010-2015) in South Sulawesi, Indonesia.  Efforts to empower women have been channeled through various approaches. However, little has been said about the practice of aid relations within projects and how aid relations work through the ‘aid chain’ and influence women’s perceptions of empowerment. Also, there has not been much said about how, in the intersectionality of aid relationships, women make ‘empowerment’ their own, appropriate it, transform it, adapt it to their stories and needs through their active engagement in projects.  The qualitative research which involved a five-month period of ethnographic research found that women beneficiaries perceived empowerment mostly based on their experiences in the project. However, the degree of empowerment is relative to the types of women’s engagement, the nature of activities, and their general understanding of gender relations. The project has brought economic-driven gender awareness by facilitating women’s practical and strategic needs through economic groups. It has also brought empowerment consequences which went beyond the economic dimension.  The research highlights the importance of personal, relational, and multidimensional aspects of empowerment in women’s perceptions of empowerment. Efforts to empower women seem to still rely on external intervention to facilitate the process and to deal with existing dynamics of power relations. The findings reassert that women’s empowerment requires enabling internal and external environments to promote women’s awareness of, and capacity for, empowerment.  Finally, the thesis underlines that empowerment depends highly on women’s personal experiences, awareness, agency, resources, choice, willingness, and commitment. This research contributes to our understanding of women, aid, and development as it highlights the multidimensional and multi-layered aspects of aid relations and women’s empowerment.</p>

Empowering Women Entrepreneurs Through Microfinance - A Case of Rural Bangladesh

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Saida Parvin
Keyword(s):  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Assessment Tools ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Case Study Method ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Theoretical Contribution ◽  
Donor Agencies ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Impact

Women’s empowerment has been at the centre of research focus for many decades. Extant literature examined the process, outcome and various challenges. Some claimed substantial success, while others contradicted with evidence of failure. But the success remains a matter of debate due to lack of empirical evidence of actual empowerment of women around the world. The current study aimed to address this gap by taking a case study method. The study critically evaluates 20 cases carefully sampled to include representatives from the entire country of Bangladesh. The study demonstrates popular beliefs about microfinance often misguide even the borrowers and they start living in a fabricated feeling of empowerment, facing real challenges to achieve true empowerment in their lives. The impact of this finding is twofold; firstly there is a theoretical contribution, where the definition of women’s empowerment is proposed to be revisited considering findings from these cases. And lastly, the policy makers at governmental and non-governmental organisations, and multinational donor agencies need to revise their assessment tools for funding.

scholarly journals Women’s empowerment for abortion and family planning decision making among marginalized women in Nepal: a mixed method study

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Heera KC ◽  
Mangala Shrestha ◽  
Nirmala Pokharel ◽  
Surya Raj Niraula ◽  
Prajjwal Pyakurel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Family Planning ◽  
Mixed Method ◽  
Women's Empowerment ◽  
Women’S Empowerment ◽  
Key Informants ◽  
Marginalized Communities ◽  
Modern Contraceptives ◽  
Marginalized Women ◽  
Planning Decision

Abstract Background Women’s empowerment is multidimensional. Women’s education, employment, income, reproductive healthcare decision making, household level decision making and social status are vital for women’s empowerment. Nepal is committed to achieving women empowerment and gender equality, which directly affects the reproductive health issues. This can be achieved by addressing the issues of the poor and marginalized communities. In this context, we aimed to find the association of women’s empowerment with abortion and family planning decision making among marginalized women in Nepal. Methods A cross sectional study was conducted at selected municipalities of Morang district of Nepal from February 2017 to March 2018. A mixed method approach was used, where 316 married marginalized women of reproductive age (15–49 years) and 15 key informant interviews from representative healthcare providers and local leaders were taken. From key informants, data were analysed using the thematic framework method. Findings obtained from two separate analyses were drawn together and meta inferences were made. Results Women’s empowerment was above average, at 50.6%. Current use of modern contraceptives were more among below average empowerment groups (p 0.041, OR 0.593 C.I. 0.36–0.98). We could not find any statistically significant differences among levels of women’s empowerment, including those women with abortion knowledge (p 0.549); family planning knowledge (p 0.495) and women’s decision for future use of modern contraceptives (p 0.977). Most key informants reported that unsafe abortion was practiced. Conclusions Women’s empowerment has no direct role for family planning and abortion decision making at marginalized communities of Morang district of Nepal. However, different governmental and non-governmental organizations influence woman for seeking health care services and family planning in rural community of Nepal irrespective of empowerment status.

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