Resources

The different processes associated with globalisation have led to rising rates of paid work by women often in contexts where male employment is stagnant or declining. This paper explores how women and men are dealing with this feminization of labour markets in the face of the widespread prevalence of male breadwinner ideologies and the apparent threat to male authority represented by women’s earnings. Responses have varied across the world but there appears to be a remarkable resistance to changes in the domestic division of unpaid work within the household and a continuing failure on the part of policymakers to provide support for women’s care responsibilities, despite the growing importance of their breadwinning roles. Many of the services previously provided on an unpaid basis are being transferred to the paid economy but most working women continue to bear a disproportionate burden of domestic responsibility. …

For poor women paid work is not simply a pathway out of poverty, but has more deeper transformative potential, including both internal transformation (changes in women's personal and political consciousness and agency as citizens) and external transformation (changes in women's social position). Hence, measurement of women's empowerment requires identifying appropriate qualitative indicators to capture these dynamic processes of change that are not all observable. We were faced with two crucial measurement challenges: first, to estimate the magnitude and nature of women's paid work that is often unrecognised, and second, to assess a transformative process like women's empowerment. The paper describes the methods used for enumerating women's economic activity and measuring women's empowerment in the context of Bangladesh, using quantitative indicators estimated from a large household survey. …

This report in Bangla focuses on research which explored how Bangladeshi women engage with television and the meanings, choices and subjectivities they derive from it. The researchers examined the changing representations of women and female sexuality and explored how women in different sites and classes engaged with television and attached meaning to the images represented on screen. …

In the late 1980s and early 90s, the Bangladeshi feminists mobilised for a uniform family code. Despite the extensive groundwork by the feminists on the required legal changes, the movement failed to attain its goal. The demand for a uniform family code not only challenged male privileges based on Shari'a law but also those based on religious laws of the minority communities. This chapter explores the movement building strategies and negotiations for a uniform family code, particularly feminist efforts to contest the pitting of the ‘right to equality’ against the ‘right to religion’. …

The nature of men's involvement in the struggle for gender justice has long fiercely divided gender-equality advocates. After nearly three decades of disagreement this seam of tension doggedly persists, little engaged with and largely unresolved. …

The Pathways Middle East Team had to scope a broad territory and probe deeply so as to ground the work of the RPC in the concerns of the region and its concerned citizens. The work of the inception phase attempted to answer three questions so as to insure the future relevance and success of the RPC on Pathways of Women’s Empowerment: 1) Why is women’s empowerment un-claimed and seemingly unpopular with grass-roots women and those who are most dis-empowered despite decades of feminist activism and of state support in most Arab countries? 2) Why is women’s empowerment perceived to be an alien import despite decades of apologia that have elaborated on the just and progressive potential of Islam, of Arab social organization and institutions? And 3) Why have the projects and programs implemented not had a transformative effect on women’s daily lives? This paper reports on the scoping workshop held from 10- 12 September 2007 in Cairo Egypt. The workshop invited a variety of activists, scholars, academics and researchers to three days of presentation and discussion to imagine an informed, evidence-based agenda for future RPC work that is liberated from stereotypes and prejudice. The report reports on each session by placing the subject matter of the session in context of the concerns and development in this hub and articulating the proceedings of the session with the planned activities of the RPC. …

A witness account from Mina on the politically motivated sexual assaults targeting female protestors of the Arab revolt in Cairo. These have been taking place since the revolution in 2011 which deposed President Mubarak. …

This report focuses on the results from research on case study organisations and donors, conducted in Bangladesh. Five women-headed WROs were chosen as case studies. Research included interviews with donor staff, document review, and validation workshops. This report synthesizes their findings and reflections based on the case studies, around three key questions: How have donors affected women’s organisations’ work and ways of working? What are WROs doing to raise resources outside of donor funding and what are the types of work they do which is not donor funded? What are the emerging pathways? The report includes an analysis of Bangladesh’s context and developments from 1995 to present, the national development-aid scenario, the influence of the Paris Declaration and attempts towards donor harmonisation; a presentation of the five case-study organisations; an analysis of the experiences of the organisations before they received donor funding; sections on “Life with and without Funding”; a presentation of the situation from the perspective of the donors; and conclusions from the research and presents issues of sustainability. …

A case study report of the organization BNWLA, under the umbrella of inter-country research on ‘Mobilising for Women’s Rights and the Role of Resources’ undertaken by The Research Programme Consortium (RPC) on Pathways of Women’s Empowerment. The case-study organisations were chosen to capture the diversity of different types of women’s organisations in Bangladesh which include small associations, professional networks, and NGOs. The case studies were compiled following the collection of background materials, individual interviews, and a day long reflection exercise which was carried out using participatory techniques. The case study gives a background of the organization, its institutional process, its national and international context, its timeline, its agenda and relationships, its resources, its ways of organising, mobilising and the changes that have taken place, its relations with the government, crises/conflicts with donors, and an analysis. …

A case study report of the organization BOMSA, under the umbrella of inter-country research on ‘Mobilizing for Women’s Rights and the Role of Resources’ undertaken by The Research Programme Consortium (RPC) on Pathways of Women’s Empowerment. The case-study organisations were chosen to capture the diversity of different types of women’s organisations in Bangladesh which include small associations, professional networks, and NGOs. The case studies were compiled following the collection of background materials, individual interviews, and a day long reflection exercise which was carried out using participatory techniques. The case study gives a background of the organization, its institutional process, its national and international context, its timeline, its agenda and relationships, its resources, BOMSA’s own reflections, and analysis of the relationship between the organization and donors. …

A case study report of the organization Kormojibi Nari, under the umbrella of inter-country research on ‘Mobilizing for Women’s Rights and the Role of Resources’ undertaken by The Research Programme Consortium (RPC) on Pathways of Women’s Empowerment. The case-study organisations were chosen to capture the diversity of different types of women’s organisations in Bangladesh which include small associations, professional networks, and NGOs. The case studies were compiled following the collection of background materials, individual interviews, and a day long reflection exercise which was carried out using participatory techniques. The case study gives a background of the organization, its institutional process, its national and international context, its timeline, its agenda and relationships, its resources, reflections on overall trends, its ways of organizing, mobilizing and the changes that have taken place, its relations with the government, crises/conflicts with donors, and an analysis. …

A case study report of the organization Doorbar Network, under the umbrella of inter-country research on ‘Mobilizing for Women’s Rights and the Role of Resources’ undertaken by The Research Programme Consortium (RPC) on Pathways of Women’s Empowerment. The case-study organisations were chosen to capture the diversity of different types of women’s organisations in Bangladesh which include small associations, professional networks, and NGOs. The case studies were compiled following the collection of background materials, individual interviews, and a day long reflection exercise which was carried out using participatory techniques. The case study gives a background of the organization, its institutional process, its national and international context, its timeline, its agenda and relationships, its resources, Doorbar Network’s own reflections, and analysis of the relationship between the organization and donors. …

Women's rights organisations are highly significant for securing tangible results for women's empowerment. The nature of the state, state-society relations, the structure of gender relations and the particular history of the feminist movement and activism in any country all shape the character of women's mobilisation for their rights. Although Bangladesh and Ghana differ in all these respects, they also share some common characteristics which may not be present in all other aid recipient countries. Both have gone through a democratic transition after a long period of military/one party rule. …

This is the preliminary research report from the Maria Da Penha Law Observatory which monitors the implementation and application of the Maria Da Penha on violence against women in Brazil. …

Andil Gosine asks whether sex and sexuality have been left unconsidered in international development or not. Sex and sexuality he argues have always been at the heart of development. Three figures have haunted the project of international development: Monster, Womb, MSM (‘Men who have sex with Men’). Anxieties about the sexual proclivities of these figures have driven and shaped the project of international development, both as a teleological metanarrative and in its material application. …