Women's empowerment in India: a comparison of microfinance and transport sector initiatives

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The 'empowerment of women' is often identified as an important aim of international developmentpolicies, and many donor agencies now include women's empowerment in their strategies. Many of theseprojects in developing countries aim to promote women's empowerment by using microcredit. Theassumption that microfinance embodies aspects of social capital that enhances women's empowermentstatus is implicit in most advocacy literature on microcredit. While much academic research supportsmicrocredit as a development strategy, a growing number of researchers are critical and suspiciousabout microcredit's ability to correct longstanding social ills, fill the void of formal wage work, andempower women within existing patriarchal structures (Scully, 2004, cited by Norwood, 2014). Kabeer(2001) suggests that access to economic resources alone is not necessarily sufficient to addressinequality and to empower women. To locate women at the centre of the empowerment process, someauthors suggest that the concept of women's empowerment should change from a welfare-orientedapproach to an equity approach, seeking to end gender discrimination (Nayak and Mahanta, 2009).However, most initiatives are still trying to respond to the needs of poor women by making relativelysmall investments in income-generating projects (Badola et al., 2014). Often such projects fail becausethey are motivated by welfare and not development concerns, offering women temporary and part-timeemployment in traditionally female skills such as knitting and sewing that have limited markets (ibid.).The question arises as to whether women would be more empowered if they had the option to leavetraditionally female-dominated work roles and enter other economic sectors. This research will shedsome light on this debate by comparing two projects. It aims to open new conversations around ways toempower women, focusing on the effect that women working in environments where they havetraditionally been excluded will have not only for themselves, but also for their communities.The study will analyse two programmes using differing economic models that aim to promote women'sempowerment. One case study will look at a microcredit programme for women in rural areas of AndhraPradesh, India, managed by the NGO Fundación Vicente Ferrer (FVF). The other will look at the FemaleElectric Rickshaw Driver programme run by the Karuna-Shechen organisation, a programme thatprovides disadvantaged women with the skills and the means they need to work as e-rickshaw taxidrivers in Bodhgaya, India. By comparing these programmes, the research will examine two economicmodels intended to empower women, and the resulting effect of each intervention on the womeninvolved.To answer the research question, anthropological data collection techniques will be used, includingparticipant observation and semi-structured interviews. The research will take place in India whereinterviews will be carried out with staff and participants of the programmes, as well as family andcommunity members. Dimensions of empowerment will be assessed including elements such aswomen's knowledge, as well as their physical, emotional, economic and social autonomy.Focusing on current debates around how development agencies can engage in changing patriarchalstructures rather than accommodating women within the inequitable existing order, the research will askhow this can be achieved, and what facilitates change in women's lives. It will analyse the impact thatworking in a traditionally male environment can have, not only in terms of income generation, but also asa way to change how women see themselves, in turn enabling them to step away from the expectationsthat limit them.