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Hope in Hard Times: Women’s Empowerment and Human Development

Author

Listed:
  • Manisha Desai

    (University of Connecticut)

Abstract
This paper addresses the conceptual and methodological issues related to women’s empowerment, the trends in women’s empowerment over the last 20 years in key areas such as education, health, economic and political participation, and finally the best practices of state and non-state actors in empowering women. Following a brief critique of human development, it begins with a discussion of the growing conceptual consensus around empowerment, i.e., empowerment being control over resources, women’s agency, a process and outcomes, to the methodological issues involved in its measurement, specifically focusing on the Gender Empowerment Measure and arguing that minimally the measure needs to move away from its urban, elite, and formal employment bias. The trends in women’s empowerment over the past 20 years show that while there have been gains in primary and secondary education, in political representation at the national level, and in waged labor, and a decline in fertility and maternal mortality, violence against women and HIV/AIDS continue to be endemic and these trends vary across regions and within countries urban and rural poor, ethnic minorities, and older and disabled women fare worse on all indicators with the current economic crisis reversing many gains. Furthermore, a decrease in measures of gender gap do not translate into gender equality and positive trends are often accompanied by negative trends resulting from unintended consequences of development. Finally, it highlights some government best practices such as quotas, cash transfer programs, gender budgeting, and community based micro enterprises, some movement practices, i.e., local women run community based programs to combat violence and HIV/AIDS and transnational exchanges, unions campaigns such as Decent Work for Women and corporate practices such as gender equality seals and corporate social responsibility.

Suggested Citation

  • Manisha Desai, 2010. "Hope in Hard Times: Women’s Empowerment and Human Development," Human Development Research Papers (2009 to present) HDRP-2010-14, Human Development Report Office (HDRO), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
    • Handle: RePEc:hdr:papers:hdrp-2010-14
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    File URL: http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2010/papers/HDRP_2010_14.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nancy Folbre, 2006. "Measuring Care: Gender, Empowerment, and the Care Economy," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(2), pages 183-199.
    2. Stephan Klasen, 2006. "UNDP's Gender-related Measures: Some Conceptual Problems and Possible Solutions," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(2), pages 243-274.
    3. Gustavo Esteva, 2010. "From the Bottom-up: New institutional arrangements in Latin America," Development, Palgrave Macmillan;Society for International Deveopment, vol. 53(1), pages 64-69, March.
    4. Caren A. Grown & Chandrika Bahadur & Jessie Handbury & Diane Elson, 2006. "The Financial Requirements of Achieving Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_467, Levy Economics Institute.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. David Mayer-Foulkes, 2013. "A Cross-country Causal Panorama of Human Development and Sustainability," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(2), pages 235-251, May.
    2. Jess Bonnan-White & Andrea Hightower & Ameena Issa, 2013. "Of couscous and occupation: a case study of women’s motivations to join and participate in Palestinian fair trade cooperatives," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 30(3), pages 337-350, September.
    3. Amie Gaye & Jeni Klugman & Milorad Kovacevic & Sarah Twigg & Eduardo Zambrano, 2013. "Measuring gender disparities in human development," Chapters, in: Deborah M. Figart & Tonia L. Warnecke (ed.), Handbook of Research on Gender and Economic Life, chapter 24, pages 393-409, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Yetunde A. Aluko, 2015. "Patriarchy and Property Rights among Yoruba Women in Nigeria," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 56-81, July.
    5. Ly Phan, 2016. "Measuring Women’s Empowerment at Household Level Using DHS Data of Four Southeast Asian Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 126(1), pages 359-378, March.
    6. Eugenie Samier & Eman ElKaleh, 2021. "Towards a Model of Muslim Women’s Management Empowerment: Philosophical and Historical Evidence and Critical Approaches," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-24, April.
    7. Danquah, Michael & Iddrisu, Abdul Malik & Boakye, Ernest Owusu & Owusu, Solomon, 2021. "Do gender wage differences within households influence women's empowerment and welfare? Evidence from Ghana," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 916-932.
    8. Martinho, Vítor João Pereira Domingues, 2012. "Effects on women empowerment of awareness raising," EconStor Preprints 67517, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    9. Kassinis, George I. & Stavrou, Eleni T., 2013. "Non-standard work arrangements and national context," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 31(5), pages 464-477.
    10. Jessica Dye & Stephani� Rossouw & Gail Pacheco, 2012. "Well-being of women in New Zealand: The changing landscape," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(3), pages 273-302, December.
    11. David Mayer-Foulkes, 2011. "A Causal Panorama of Cross-Country Human Development," DEGIT Conference Papers c016_049, DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade.
    12. Sundström, Aksel & Paxton, Pamela & Wang, Yi-Ting & Lindberg, Staffan I., 2017. "Women’s Political Empowerment: A New Global Index, 1900–2012," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 321-335.
    13. Aliya Bushra** & Nasra Wajiha***, 2013. "Assessing ther determinants of women empwerment in Pakistan : A case of two colleges of Lahore," Pakistan Journal of Applied Economics, Applied Economics Research Centre, vol. 23(2), pages 115-139.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    gender; women’s empowerment; human development;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • Y8 - Miscellaneous Categories - - Related Disciplines

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