Ethnic Groups in Conflict

The Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) is a new survey-based index designed to measure the empowerment, agency, and inclusion of women in the agricultural sector. The WEAI was initially developed as a tool to reflect women’s empowerment that may result from the United States government’s Feed the Future Initiative, which commissioned the development of the WEAI. The WEAI can also be used more generally to assess the state of empowerment and gender parity in agriculture, to identify key areas in which empowerment needs to be strengthened, and to track progress over time. The WEAI is an aggregate index, reported at the country or regional level, based on individual-level data collected by interviewing men and women within the same households. The WEAI comprises two subindexes. The first assesses the degree to which women are empowered in five domains of empowerment (5DE) in agriculture. It reflects the percentage of women who are empowered and, among those who are not, the percentage of domains in which women enjoy adequate achievements. These domains are (1) decisions about agricultural production, (2) access to and decisionmaking power about productive resources, (3) control of use of income, (4) leadership in the community, and (5) time allocation. The second subindex (the Gender Parity Index [GPI]) measures gender parity. The GPI reflects the percentage of women who are empowered or whose achievements are at least as high as the men in their households. For those households that have not achieved gender parity, the GPI shows the empowerment gap that needs to be closed for women to reach the same level of empowerment as men. This technical paper documents the development of the WEAI and presents pilot data from Bangladesh, Guatemala, and Uganda, so that researchers and practitioners seeking to use the index in their own work would understand how the survey questionnaires were developed and piloted, how the qualitative case studies were undertaken, how the index was constructed, how various indicators were validated, and how it can be used in other settings.

/pdf/the-women-s-empowerment-in-agriculture-index-2a8n81bl0r.pdf

The Women's Empowerment in Agriculture Index

https://www.ophi.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/ophi-wp-58.pdf

The Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index

This article proposes a short list of internationally – comparable indicators of individual agency and empowerment (and the corresponding survey questions). Data from these indicators would enable researchers to explore research and policy issues such as the interconnections between empowerment and economic or human development. The article surveys definitions of agency and empowerment, adopts the definition from Amartya Sen, supplemented by Rowlands’ typology. The proposed ‘short list’ of indicators includes; control over personal decisions; domain-specific autonomy; household decision-making; and the ability to change aspects in one’s life at the individual and communal levels. The strengths and weaknesses of each indicator are discussed, as is the need to supplement this shortlist with other variables. To ensure the feasibility of the proposal, we rely on previously-fielded questions wherever possible.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2118589_code930622.pdf?abstractid=2118589&mirid=4

Agency and Empowerment: A Proposal for Internationally Comparable Indicators

All things are subject to interpretation; whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth. (Friedrich Nietzche) Words make worlds. The language of development...

Buzzwords and fuzzwords: deconstructing development discourse

This book represents an effort to present an easily accessible framework to readers, especially those for whom empowerment remains a puzzling development concern, conceptually and in application. The book is divided into two parts. Part 1 explains how the empowerment framework can be used for understanding, measuring, monitoring, and operationalizing empowerment policy and practice. Part 2 presents summaries of each of the five country studies, using them to discuss how the empowerment framework can be applied in very different country and sector contexts and what lessons can be learned from these test cases. While this book can offer only a limited empirical basis for the positive association between empowerment and development outcomes, it does add to the body of work supporting the existence of such a relationship. Perhaps more importantly, it also provides a framework for future research to test the association and to prioritize practical interventions seeking to empower individuals and groups.

/pdf/empowerment-in-practice-from-analysis-to-implementation-u95idi5hr1.pdf

Empowerment in practice : from analysis to implementation

Empowerment in Practice : From Analysis to Implementation

Following discussion during a two day working meeting, this publication brings together the edited papers, along with a selection of supplementary materials. A first series of papers addresses competing definitions and conceptual issues around power and rights, illustrating these with experiences observing and applying the concepts in practice in different countries. Following this, papers address topics aimed at helping development practitioners to apply these concepts to their work. Part II contains the supplemental materials, including a summary of the major theoretical conceptualizations of power, and an overview of the literature on power and rights. Prepared by leading thinkers on the topics of power and rights these materials offer both development professionals and students of development studies succinct summaries of the relationship between theory and practice.

Power, rights, and poverty: concepts and connections

Collaboration between government and non-government organizations has been a recurrent feature of many development interventions in India. This paper is based on case studies of 11 such programs.

The substance of interaction: design and policy implications of ngo-government projects in india

Local organizations have become key mechanisms in effective, fair, and sustainable resource management in India. Two debates dominate discourse on the roles of local organizations in decentralized development: first, on how to ensure they function effectively, fairly, and sustainably; and second, on the relative roles of different organizations - including elected local governments, administrative line departments, and nongovernmental organizations. This book adds empirical evidence to these debates, and suggests that in practice, they can not be separated. Based on research on local organizations in India, involved in three sectors: rural women's development and empowerment; rural drinking water supply and sanitation; and, watershed development, in the states of Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttaranchal, the authors' findings indicate that the design of, and support for local organizations are often little more than rudimentary, resulting in less than adequate performance, and raising serious sustainability concerns. The study further indicates that sector-specific configurations of a plural organizational landscape, in which government and private organizations are an integral part, are required for effective and sustainable development.

/pdf/local-organizations-in-decentralized-development-their-5el4mbm407.pdf

Ruth Alsop

Papers

Empowerment in practice : from analysis to implementation

Empowerment in Practice : From Analysis to Implementation

Power, rights, and poverty: concepts and connections

The substance of interaction: design and policy implications of ngo-government projects in india

Local Organizations in Decentralized Development: Their Functions and Performance in India