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This bulletin addresses a theme that mainstream development has persisently neglected: sexuality. Drawing on a workshop held at the Institute of Development Studies in 2005, it seeks to show why sexuality matters. It features papers from the workshop which provide diverse accounts of sexual rights conceptions, mobilisation, and new approaches to implementation. …

Representations of men as perpetrator and patriarch have profoundly shaped the terms of gender and development’s engagement with masculinities discourse and practice. Many of those working in the field have remained hesitant, tentative, often hostile to the notion that men might be potential allies in the struggle for gender justice. This work explores what role there should be for men in women's empowerment. …

This book explores the ways in which positive, pleasure-focused approaches to sexuality can empower women. Gender and development has tended to engage with sexuality only in relation to violence and ill-health. Although this has been hugely important in challenging violence against women, over-emphasising these negative aspects has dovetailed with conservative ideologies that associate women’s sexualities with danger and fear. On the other hand, the media, the pharmaceutical industry, and pornography more broadly celebrate the pleasures of sex in ways that can be just as oppressive, often implying that only certain types of people - young, heterosexual, able-bodied, HIV-negative - are eligible for sexual pleasure. …

This research project explored how paid work can change women’s lives in terms of dealing with the public sphere and institutions, accessing services, commodities, resources, information, reducing isolation, increasing negotiation/bargaining skills, ability to protect themselves, etc. The context under which work can be empowering and the kinds of work that change lives was compared through comparisons of similar research undertaken by the West Africa and Middle East Pathways regional hubs in Ghana and Egypt. …

A new working paper by Andrea Cornwall for UNU-WIDER revisits foundational feminist work on the concept of empowerment from the 1980s and 1990s. The paper draws on  findings from the Pathways programme to explore experiences of positive change in women’s lives, in diverse contexts, and to draw together some lessons for policy and practice. …