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The discursive construction of gender identities and roles for women in cash transfer programmes: Implications for gender power relations

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  • Puorideme, Dennis
  • Rolandsen Agustín, Lise
Abstract
Cash transfer (CT) programmes in Global South countries do not only provide cash grants to extremely poor households to smoothen consumption and improve human capital development, but they also promote collective action, strengthen relation-building and social transformation. Ghana’s Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) is one of many such programmes with considerable success in providing cash to extremely poor households, mostly with women as caregivers, but there are also some concerns worth highlighting. The questions are: first, how does Ghana’s LEAP CT programme perpetuate or transform gender power relations? Second, how do women caregivers exercise agency within the intersecting relations of the programme in the cultural context? Gender, power, and discourse are the theoretical underpinnings of the article with an ethnographic-discourse strategy inspired by a dialectical-relational approach to critical discourse analysis. The discursive analysis of the practices of the LEAP CT programme officials and the women caregivers demonstrate that the LEAP CT programme, at the institutional level, discursively reproduces and naturalises gender identities, roles and subject positions for women despite prioritizing women as the recipients of the cash. However, it also reveals nuances of women agency evident at the intersecting and participatory practices of women caregivers in the programme and in the socio-political contexts of the local communities. Whilst the first finding affects women negatively, the second presents a potential for transforming gender power relations in institutions and local communities in Global South countries as it challenges the taken-for-granted notions of gender relations for a better world. The study contributes to an improved situated understanding of unequal and pervasive gender power relations in Global South countries’ social protection interventions.

Suggested Citation

  • Puorideme, Dennis & Rolandsen Agustín, Lise, 2023. "The discursive construction of gender identities and roles for women in cash transfer programmes: Implications for gender power relations," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 29(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wodepe:v:29:y:2023:i:c:s2452292923000036
    DOI: 10.1016/j.wdp.2023.100487
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Kabeer, Naila & Waddington, Hugh, 2015. "Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 63905, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. de Milliano, Marlous & Barrington, Clare & Angeles, Gustavo & Gbedemah, Christiana, 2021. "Crowding-out or crowding-in? Effects of LEAP 1000 unconditional cash transfer program on household and community support among women in rural Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    3. Maxine Molyneux, 2006. "Mothers at the Service of the New Poverty Agenda: The PROGRESA/Oportunidades Programme in Mexico," Social Policy in a Development Context, in: Shahra Razavi & Shireen Hassim (ed.), Gender and Social Policy in a Global Context, chapter 2, pages 43-67, Palgrave Macmillan.
    4. Maxine Molyneux & With Nicola Jones & Fiona Samuels, 2016. "Can Cash Transfer Programmes Have ‘Transformative’ Effects?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 52(8), pages 1087-1098, August.
    5. Anouka Eerdewijk & Tine Davids & Jane L. Parpart, 2014. "Exploring The Transformative Potential Of Gender Mainstreaming In International Development Institutions," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(3), pages 382-395, April.
    6. Fabio Veras Soares & Elydia Silva, 2010. "Conditional Cash Transfer Programmes and Gender Vulnerabilities: Case Studies of Brazil, Chile and Colombia," Working Papers 69, International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth.
    7. Naila Kabeer & Hugh Waddington, 2015. "Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis," Journal of Development Effectiveness, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 290-303, September.
    8. Andy Norton & Tim Conway & Mick Foster, 2002. "Social Protection: Defining the Field of Action and Policy," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 20(5), pages 541-567, November.
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    1. Bari, MD. Abdul & Khan, Ghulam Dastgir & Katayanagi, Mari & Yoshida, Yuichiro, 2024. "Gender dynamics of the impact of cash transfer on female educational expenditure of informal settlements in Bangladesh," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 34(C).

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