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This paper, presented to 'Pathways: What are we Learning?' Analysis Conference held in Cairo, 20-24 January 2009, seeks to interrogate the extent to which change has occurred in the lives of three generations of Ghanaian women. This is to assess the extent of changes and continuities in the lives of women as a social group. Change here is being used as an indirect indicator of empowerment when it involves improvements. The significance of the various indicators in the lives of the different generations of women will also be explored. …

In 2007, the West Africa Hub of the Pathways in collaboration with ABANTU for Development organized a three-day gathering with district assembly women to talk about their experiences in the 2006 local elections in Ghana. The aim of the dialogue was to create the opportunity for the local female politicians to reflect on their experiences in participating in the local elections. They were encouraged to link these experiences to their life histories as a way of exploring the meaning and sense they have developed about participating in the election process and how it may have empowered them. …

What has changed for Ghanaian women since Ghana gained independence in 1957? What has driven these changes, and how have they been experienced by women of different generations? And to what extent do Ghanaian women feel empowered by changing contexts of work, education, institutions and associational life? Pathways researchers in Ghana set about finding out from women in three regions of the country – Northern, Ashanti and Greater Accra – what constellation of factors enable a woman to empower herself. …

Drawing on household survey data collected in Egypt, Ghana and Bangladesh as part of the Pathways of Women’s Empowerment Research Partners’ Consortium, this report provides insights into the ‘resource’ pathways that enhance women’s agency and thereby contribute to the inclusiveness of the economic growth process. Moreover, it looks at the the extent to which the structure of economic opportunities, generated by a country’s growth strategies, translated into positive impacts on women’s lives in these three country contexts.  …

In this paper, we address the methodological challenges as well as innovations made possible by a mixed methods analysis of empowerment in a multi-lingual environment. The linguistic challenge of translating empowerment fully reminds us that the concept is both time and place specific. Combining a survey with intergenerational interviews allows us to uncover both whether or not Ghanaian women are empowered and equally importantly the context that makes this possible. Such an approach also allows us to assess the extent to which researchers and the researched share similar understandings of what empowerment means. …

This paper presented at 'Pathways: What are we Learning?' conference held in Cairo from 20-24 January 2009, reflects on the linguistic and methodological challenges of researching aspects of women's empowerment in Ghana. It shows how by using both surveys and indepth interviews across three generations of women, researchers were able to highlight how various factors such as education changed in significance over time. The research process also drew attention to importance of selecting the right words to use during the planning stages in order to avoid biasing responses, for instance the words for 'empowerment' and 'empowering' had different significance in terms of strength and type. …

A panel from the the AWID Forum held in Cape Town from 14-17 November 2008. Dzodzi Tsikata discussed how women’s NGOs in Ghana have responded to some of the challenges they face because of NGOization. She recounted the history of NGOization in Ghana and the lessons that women’s NGOs learned from it, and concluded that “while NGOization still remains a huge issue for the women’s movement in Ghana, I think that women’s organisations in Ghana have come to recognize by their work that NGOs are not synonymous with civil society nor with the women’s movement. ” Saba Khatak placed the women’s movement in Pakistan in the larger context of Pakistani politics. …

Dzodzi Tsikata focuses on the progress of women’s organizing in Ghana over the last ten years. It argues that although hampered by challenges of state society relations and organizational weaknesses arising from NGOization, women’s organisations have experienced growth and enjoyed some successes. These can be attributed to the establishment of three women’s rights networks to consolidate their work. …

The goal of this research project was to understand the experiences and contexts of women‘s rights and feminist movements in Ghana, how different kinds of resources have shaped their mobilizing strategies, and how changing aid modalities are affecting women rights work. The report covers background, context, donor relations, organization profiles, contexts and impacts of the WROs before donor assistance, and analysis. The key findings of the study are that securing adequate resources for women‘s rights work in Ghana remains a great challenge. WROs are compelled to enter into partnerships with organisations whose gender agendas are unclear and who may not share in their feminist politics. …

The study explored women's everyday lives in order to better understand their experiences of empowerment and disempowerment as they relate to the three themes of the RPC - empowering work, building constituencies for women's empowerment and changing narratives of sexuality. Through a pilot survey of 400 women in urban, peri-urban and rural areas in the Greater Accra Region, the study examined how women's experiences of empowerment and disempowerment are associated with particular moments in their lives from childhood to adulthood. …

This project concerned the significance and impact of official external financing for women’s organising at global, regional and national levels. It used participatory methods of critical reflection involving both donor staff and representatives of women’s rights organisations and networks in Bangladesh and Ghana as well as at regional and global levels. …