WUNRN
Breaking the Multiple Constraints on Poor Women's Livelihoods
By
Naila Kabeer, Professor of Development Studies, SOAS; Karishma Huda, Research Manager,
and Sandeep Kaur, Communications and Monitoring Officer, BRAC Development
Institute; and Nicolina Lamhauge, Policy Analyst, OECD Environment Directorate
Development
Viewpoint Number 73, May 2012
This Development Viewpoint
highlights the provocative findings and lessons in CDPR’s new Discussion Paper
#28/12, 'Productive
Safety Nets for Women in Extreme Poverty: Lessons from Pilot Projects in India
and Pakistan'.
The Discussion Paper assesses the
success of two pilot projects—one in West Bengal, India and the other in Sindh,
Pakistan—in ‘graduating’ poor women out of extreme poverty. The projects were
based on the successful experience of BRAC, the well-known NGO in Bangladesh,
in overcoming the multiple constraints blocking women’s empowerment.
These projects recognized that
extreme poverty is not based solely on a lack of material resources, such as
income and assets. It is also invariably due to a lack of human resources (such
as education and skills) and social resources (such as supportive kinship
relations and community solidarity).
In South Asia, social inequalities
based on caste, religion and ethnicity worsen economic deprivation. Thus,
people from lower castes, tribal groups and minority religions are more likely
to be extremely poor.
Gender discrimination cuts across
these various dimensions of social inequality, consigning women from minority
groups to an even more vulnerable position. Thus, they find it exceedingly difficult
to escape conditions of extreme deprivation. And many projects designed to help
them correspondingly fail.
The BRAC Approach
In response, BRAC has pioneered a
project approach (‘Targeting the Ultra-Poor’ or TUP) that recognizes that the
extreme poverty of women results from a number of intersecting constraints.
Thus, it designs interventions to address them simultaneously.
These constraints include: a lack of
viable livelihood options; an inability to move to where other options are
available; a dearth of skills and knowledge; difficulties, under the stress of
daily survival, in accumulating investment funds; a lack of self-confidence;
and a reluctance to take risks.
In tackling such multiple
constraints, BRAC devised an approach that included seven major elements.
First, it used ‘mixed method’ surveying that combined various
intersecting ways to successfully identify the extreme poor. Second, it focused
on enterprise development since poor women are unlikely to ever
generate enough income on their own to invest in a micro-enterprise. This
aspect usually took the form of some kind of asset transfer to get an
enterprise off the ground.
Third, BRAC insisted on intensive
interaction and training so that poor women could boost their
self-confidence and effectively manage their enterprises. Fourth, women were
provided with an interim cash stipend until their enterprise could begin
generating a sustainable income.
Fifth, women had to enroll in a weekly
savings programme in order to accumulate a small fund to deal with
inevitable shocks and stresses. Sixth, the programme offered health support
based on the recognition that the costs of ill health are often a major drain
on poor women’s meager resources. And, lastly, BRAC sought to mobilize elite
support for its projects, usually by setting up a Village Assistance
Committee composed, for example, of government officials, businesspeople and
teachers.
Outcomes for the
Two Pilots
BRAC’s success led to the piloting
of a number of other similarly designed projects. Among these are the two that
the CDPR Discussion Paper examines. These initiatives were supported by CGAP
and Ford Foundation.
The project in West Bengal was
managed by Trickle Up, an international NGO, in partnership with the Human
Development Centre, a local NGO. The productive assets that it provided poor
women were goats and sheep. In Sindh, Pakistan, the Orangi Charitable Trust
(OCT) concentrated on providing goats, hens and cash for purchasing material
for basket-making (the traditional activity for women in this area).
Because the Sindh project did not
adopt BRAC’s mixed-method targeting, it had difficulties in identifying the
extreme poor in the project villages. Also, it did not carry out the
accompanying research needed to identify the viability of their livelihood
options. For example, the goats that it provided died because they were not
suited to the local conditions and veterinary services were inadequate.
As a result of such factors,
pre-existing inequalities in the Sindh project villages tended to deepen. The
better endowed households in the wealthier villages progressed the most
rapidly. Pervasive patriarchal constraints also held back many of the women.
Social networks were strong within
these villages, which had been settled generations ago. Frequent cross-cousin
marriages meant that most families were related to each other. And there were
few cases of divorce or desertion.
However, such strong kinship and
family ties went hand-in-hand with a deeply entrenched preference for male
breadwinners. Hence, women had difficulties in exercising the independence
necessary to benefit from the opportunities offered by the OCT project. The
most adverse impact was felt by families without a regular male breadwinner.
More Positive
Results in West Bengal
The results in West Bengal were more
positive. Following more closely the BRAC targeting approach, the programme
succeeded in including a much larger proportion of the extreme poor. However,
like the Sindh pilot, it failed to adequately take account of local conditions.
Hence, some of the livestock that it distributed died.
Nevertheless, households generally
made much greater progress in the West Bengal context, including those from the
least advantaged tribal groups. There are several explanations for this
contrast.
Poorer women, including many Muslim
women, enjoyed much greater mobility in the public domain than women in Sindh.
Indeed, women from tribal and lower caste groups had a long tradition of
working for their living. Thus, not only were they better able to respond to
project opportunities but also they were able to do so even in the absence
of—or in the face of resistance by—male household members.
An additional advantage of the
programme in West Bengal is that many of its staff had previously worked with
an Indian NGO that had lengthy experience in supporting Self-Help Groups for
women in extreme poverty.
Though not included in BRAC’s
original project design, this approach was introduced into the West Bengal
pilot and proved to be a major strength. This group structure allowed women to
save on a more regular and disciplined basis and offered a venue where they
could discuss their problems and seek support.
Finally, the West Bengal pilot
operated in a context in which the state was far more active than in Sindh.
Also, the state’s efforts worked in tandem with—rather than in isolation
from—the efforts of NGOs.
Though neither pilot carried out a
baseline survey in order to rigorously judge its success, the West Bengal
project gathered enough relevant information to amply support its decision to
expand its outreach to other villages, and even to other states in India.
However, based on its evident lack of success, the Sindh project chose to end
its activities.
Concluding Remarks
The more positive outcomes for the
West Bengal pilot are likely due, in part, to its staff’s experience. It was
able to draw on their long track record of working with the extreme poor and
understanding their livelihood difficulties.
Thus, it grasped the importance of
combining survey and participatory methods in identifying the extreme poor and
understood the value of the group structure in providing critically needed
support to poor women.
By contrast, the Orangi Charitable
Trust in Sindh might have been disadvantaged by a predominantly microfinance
background. Thus, it was less accustomed to grasping the importance of the
social and cultural dimensions of poverty.
The OCT project also had to work in
a context in which the state was largely absent. In West Bengal, in contrast,
the state was very active. The downside of such a context was the importance
that had to be attached to strengthening political connections.
But such links proved invaluable in
providing access to state benefits, health care and infrastructure. This
advantage tends to support, for example, BRAC’s original emphasis on
‘mobilizing elite support’.
The Sindh project also operated in a
social context in which kinship structures were far more stable and patriarchal
constraints correspondingly stronger. Because families in the West Bengal
pilot, by contrast, came from the poorest segments of the population, they had
undergone considerable migration and resettlement. Thus, patriarchal
constraints were weaker.
The men in West Bengal did display
greater ‘irresponsibility’ toward their familial obligations (e.g., drinking,
remarrying, beating their wives or deserting them) than men in Sindh. As a
result, women had learned—perhaps paradoxically—to be much less reliant on
men’s incomes for their own survival.
The original BRAC project design
assumes, implicitly, that social conditions are flexible enough to allow women
to exercise a significant degree of independence. When such conditions are
clearly not present, it becomes crucially important to implement pro-active
measures, such as the innovation of the Bengali self-help groups, in order to
ensure that poor women are empowered to take some control of their lives.
Otherwise, projects that intend to
‘graduate’ women out of extreme poverty will find that the multiple constraints
impeding women’s empowerment will inevitably reassert their regressive
influence.
Reference
- Kabeer, Naila et al.
(2012). ‘Productive
Safety Nets for Women in Extreme Poverty: Lessons from Pilot Projects in
India and Pakistan’, Discussion Paper 28/12, Centre for Development
Policy and Research, May, SOAS.