Empowerment: No Longer A Buzzword

Photo: Prasad
In the Indian context, it is problematic to concentrate on ‘women only’ constituency without embracing the ‘familial other’—men. Rural Champaran, Bihar perhaps is one of the best examples of this mind-set.

Abstract: Women’s empowerment, the often used concept in the contemporary discourse on development, needs revisiting. The empowering processes have to embrace men as well to address gender-biased structures, frameworks and rigid mind-sets for effective transformation.

The author was formerly at the Centre for the Study of Regional Development, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. saraswati_raju@hotmail.com