Women as Subjects of Development

Women’s overall socio-political and economic status can be improved only by changing the gender relations of domination and subordination between men and women that is by empowerment of women. Empowerment is an all-comprehensive process, which is difficult to define in concrete terms. One way to define it could be "the process of gaining control over the self, over ideology and the resources which determine power". "This must be a multi-dimensional process encompassing all aspects of social existence, legal rights, guarantee of equity, and equality in access to resources, education, and knowledge as also generation of a consciousness about and a willingness to fight against the oppressive relations. It must "address all structures of power." The end product of empowerment is development of an individual, who is self-confident, understands the processes of social interaction, economic resource allocation, and has power to decide and also sufficient options to be able to choose where one wants to work and how one wants to live. Empowerment also means having voice and influence over economic and political decisions affecting their lives in the larger arena. While economic and social empowerments are necessary conditions for attaining the position of political power, political power enhances the opportunities for economic and social empowerment. This process must contribute to women’s real empowerment in all its dimensions. It is not sufficient just to increase women’s income by a marginal amount and help them gain a greater role in the household decision making process, while the role of the household itself in the economic and political processes effecting the lives of the people may be declining. In this context, the empowerment process may be viewed in terms of the following three dimensions:

Increasing women’s political power through women’s organizations, solidarity, and collective action. Both qualitative and quantitative indicators may be used to evaluate this process. Political ability to bring about changes in women’s legal status, to direct resources to women, and to get access to positions of power is of crucial importance.

Increasing women’s access to economic opportunities and resources relative to men, such as employment, credit, and wealth including land and technology and apparently non-economic resources such as education, knowledge, and health which are basic to human development.

Raising social consciousness of women and men about the symptoms and causes of the oppressive religious, economic, cultural, familial, and legal practices; changing the perceived social images of women as individuals; strengthening their capacity to take action for changing the gender roles.

Thus gender assessment of the institutions and programs must evaluate all structures, policies, programs/projects etc whether they are gender-sensitive and conducive to empowerment of women. Gender sensitiveness may be viewed in terms of strength and effectiveness of the specific machinery involved in advocating women’s concerns in the development process, gender awareness of the general implementing machinery, and finally, proportion of women in decision making roles in the government.

This means it is not adequate to just involve women in development programs/projects; measures to empower them and changing the gender relations must be incorporated and implemented in all programs/ projects.

Women cannot be viewed as objects of development; they must be viewed as subjects of development. For example, it is often argued that women must be involved in programs to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the programs. Although UNDP long since has taken a people-focused approach to development, putting people at the center, the largest development agency, the World Bank, still views the need for involving stakeholders in general and women in particular in development programs primarily for increasing the efficiency of its development interventions. But equality and equity is a woman’s human right and they must benefit from human progress on an equal footing with men.

Gender approach to development (GAD) also means that all other kinds of oppression, besides gender relations, for example, caste, class, ethnicity, language-related inequalities must also be addressed simultaneously. When there is any kind of inequity in the society, women are oppressed doubly as women and as members of the disadvantaged group. For example dalit or poor women are more intensely exploited by the men of upper caste and also by their own men. Many more dalit women are raped with social immunity than women from upper castes or richer economic strata. The gender disparity in access to education and health facilities among the dalits exists at a more intensive level than among the non-dalits.

Women’s needs and problems are too colossal to be addressed by individual programs. They have to be addressed in all spheres, hence the concept of mainstreaming. Since women’s problems were viewed as some-thing different from the overall society under WID and WAD, specific programs for women were advocated. Under the mainstreaming approach, the emphasis is on all policies, programs/projects, sector-specific or otherwise. They must be gender/ class/caste/ethnicity-sensitive and must try to redress the disadvantages faced by women of each group in each of the sphere. It does not mean that the basic needs-related programs are to be neglected. But it means that they are not adequate. Basic needs-related programs can be very effective if implemented in addition to programs which meet women’s strategic needs, as defined below. In addition, capacity building and compensating programs are also a must so that women can benefit from gender-neutral programs on an equal footing with men. Further, women’s specific needs related to their reproductive and mothering functions and combating various forms of violence against them must also be addressed.  (Excerpts: Book on "Efforts at Promotion of Women in Nepal" by the author)

Posted on : 2009-03-11 11:28:36

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