Poverty alleviation and participatory citizenship for women in Kerala, India

Kerala's programme, Kudumbashree, aims to enhance women's economic development and enable women to become 'active citizens'

• From: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
• Published: 31 March 2011

• Country: India
• Document Type: Briefing
• Theme: Social Change
• Authors: Bhattacharyya, D., Nandigama, S., Narayana, D., Williams, G., Thampi, B.V.

Abstract

Kerala’s poverty eradication programme, Kudumbashree, aims to enhance women’s economic development and enable women to become ‘active citizens’. The programme has been largely successful in terms of the numbers of women involved, their levels of engagement with the local state, and their increased ability to save money and access subsidised credit. However this study suggests that, as a result of local political cultures and sustained patterns of social exclusion, some of the poorest and most marginalised women find it difficult to access the programme, and many of the women who are involved still lack decision-making power and autonomy.

Citation

Glyn Williams, Binitha V Thampi, D Narayana Sailaja Nandigama, Dwaipayan Bhattacharyya (2011) Poverty alleviation and participatory citizenship for women in Kerala, India. Sheffield International Development Network (SIDNET) - Policy/Research Briefing No. 3

Links

Poverty alleviation and participatory citizenship for women in Kerala, India (PDF, 383KB)

Published 31 March 2011