The concept of women's empowerment has attracted increasing attention in recent years from groups of actors, especially at the international level, authors and researchers, feminist scholars and, not least, non-governmental organisations (NGOs). This article aims to address the different meanings that have been attributed to the concept of women's empowerment through the available literature and empirical evidence from NGO projects in this field. The findings revealed four similar notions of women's empowerment: giving women a voice, challenging current systems of power, radically reshaping lifestyles and livelihoods, and mainstreaming gender. The aim of the paper is to analyse how NGOs approach gender issues and how they try to close the inequality gap through their projects, but also to highlight the contradictions of these, as the lack of knowledge of gender mainstreming often hinders NGOs in their ability to create real and sustainable change in women's lives. Furthermore, because these methodologies and notions are not yet capable of achieving women's social inclusion, it is suggested that these non-governmental organizations (NGOs) concentrate their energies on initiating systemic change in order to successfully endorse women's empowerment in the the communities in which they operate.
Il concetto di empowerment femminile ha attirato negli ultimi anni una crescente attenzione da parte di gruppi di attori, soprattutto a livello internazionale, autori e ricercatori, studiosi femministi e, non da ultimo, organizzazioni non governative (ONG). Questo articolo si propone di affrontare i diversi significati che sono stati attribuiti al concetto di empowerment femminile attraverso la letteratura disponibile e le prove empiriche dei progetti delle ONG in questo campo. I risultati hanno rivelato quattro nozioni simili di empowerment femminile: dare voce alle donne, sfidare gli attuali sistemi di potere, riformare radicalmente gli stili di vita e i mezzi di sussistenza e integrare il genere. L'obiettivo del documento è analizzare come le ONG si approcciano alle questioni di genere e come cercano di colmare il divario di disuguaglianza attraverso i loro progetti, ma anche evidenziare le contraddizioni di questi ultimi, poiché la mancanza di conoscenza del mainstreaming di genere spesso ostacola le ONG nella loro capacità di creare un cambiamento reale e sostenibile nella vita delle donne. Inoltre, poiché queste metodologie e nozioni non sono ancora in grado di raggiungere l'inclusione sociale delle donne, si suggerisce a queste organizzazioni non governative (ONG) di concentrare le proprie energie sull'avvio di un cambiamento sistemico, al fine di sostenere con successo l'empowerment delle donne nelle comunità in cui operano.
WOMEN'S EMPOWERMENT AND THE ROLE OF NGOs - Case study in Nepal: Street Child NGO
GIORDANO, LORENZA
2022/2023
Abstract
The concept of women's empowerment has attracted increasing attention in recent years from groups of actors, especially at the international level, authors and researchers, feminist scholars and, not least, non-governmental organisations (NGOs). This article aims to address the different meanings that have been attributed to the concept of women's empowerment through the available literature and empirical evidence from NGO projects in this field. The findings revealed four similar notions of women's empowerment: giving women a voice, challenging current systems of power, radically reshaping lifestyles and livelihoods, and mainstreaming gender. The aim of the paper is to analyse how NGOs approach gender issues and how they try to close the inequality gap through their projects, but also to highlight the contradictions of these, as the lack of knowledge of gender mainstreming often hinders NGOs in their ability to create real and sustainable change in women's lives. Furthermore, because these methodologies and notions are not yet capable of achieving women's social inclusion, it is suggested that these non-governmental organizations (NGOs) concentrate their energies on initiating systemic change in order to successfully endorse women's empowerment in the the communities in which they operate.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12608/46042