{"title":"Women's empowerment and power relations: Evidence from Grameen Bank China","authors":"Wenpei You, Kathi Badertscher","doi":"10.1016/j.wsif.2024.102882","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Women's empowerment fundamentally shifts power relations, a systematic process of removing deeply embedded unequal power structures. Drawing upon qualitative data from Grameen Bank China (GBC) and an inductive case study, this paper asserts an empowering methodology based on preconditions for membership and three mechanisms through which traditional gendered hierarchical power relations shift: relational justice, self-governance, and repetitive praxis. Women's empowerment, to achieve equal and shared relationships, is neither imposed on women nor naturally occurring among poor rural Chinese women. The findings suggest a development intervention and the crucial front-line worker who facilitates empowerment by “nudging” GBC women borrowers to empower themselves.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":47940,"journal":{"name":"Womens Studies International Forum","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5000,"publicationDate":"2024-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Womens Studies International Forum","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277539524000207","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"WOMENS STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Women's empowerment fundamentally shifts power relations, a systematic process of removing deeply embedded unequal power structures. Drawing upon qualitative data from Grameen Bank China (GBC) and an inductive case study, this paper asserts an empowering methodology based on preconditions for membership and three mechanisms through which traditional gendered hierarchical power relations shift: relational justice, self-governance, and repetitive praxis. Women's empowerment, to achieve equal and shared relationships, is neither imposed on women nor naturally occurring among poor rural Chinese women. The findings suggest a development intervention and the crucial front-line worker who facilitates empowerment by “nudging” GBC women borrowers to empower themselves.
期刊介绍:
Women"s Studies International Forum (formerly Women"s Studies International Quarterly, established in 1978) is a bimonthly journal to aid the distribution and exchange of feminist research in the multidisciplinary, international area of women"s studies and in feminist research in other disciplines. The policy of the journal is to establish a feminist forum for discussion and debate. The journal seeks to critique and reconceptualize existing knowledge, to examine and re-evaluate the manner in which knowledge is produced and distributed, and to assess the implications this has for women"s lives.