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This report in Bangla focuses on the project which investigates the enabling conditions for women's participation in local governance and its influence on women's empowerment. The objectives for the study were to explore the challenges faced by women councillors, how they negotiate these challenges, their own interpretation of their engagement patterns and processes, and whether new gender norms and roles are being created for women in the public domain. …

This chapter makes an attempt to probe into the politics of women’s voice in Bangladesh. The chapter argues that there are structural factors within the state and society that act as barriers for women in Bangladesh to vocalise their opinions in the public sphere. Yet parallel forces are at work at national and international levels that enable women to create their spaces and voices despite these structural limitations. …

Local Government reforms in Bangladesh in 1997 introduced direct elections to reserved seats for women. This replaced an earlier system of nomination. The change allowed women a direct link with their constituency, helping to increase their legitimacy as representatives. However restrictions on mobility, lack of knowledge about local government functions, male resistance, and the gendered nature of local level politics limit women’s effective participation in local politics. …

This report, presented to the 'Pathways: What are we Learning?' Conference held in Cairo from 20-24 January 2009 is based on a study of women in Local Government in Bangladesh, and seeks to examine the levels, margins and boundaries of the re-definitions and contestations of the existing values, traditions and spaces of women both in the private and public sphere. The obstacles faced by women in doing so and their responses, as well as struggles, to overcome those also constituted a major focus of the study. The challenges of breaking into a restrictive system and the strategies and paths adopted by the councillors in carving out spaces are presented in this paper. Finally the report trenched out the emergence of new voices, spaces and the march of women towards the creation of structures, more amenable to social justice, equity and human needs. …

The collection of essays in the book aims to capture the variety of policies, discourses, debates and interventions that have influenced the lives of women in South Asia and to identify those that have led to greater empowerment of women. …

This research investigated the conceptions of security, peace and empowerment among the Hill women of the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. The research explored the Hill women's actual and perceived role in security and peace building, the role of Hill women's organisations and their movements, major obstacles faced by Hill women and their strategies for overcoming these. …