Abstract
This essay primarily argues that antipoverty programmes have long been a gendered arena and thus considers some of the assumptions about the ‘poor’ and about ‘gender’ and how it is used in an antipoverty programme. It has two main objectives: first, describe and analyse the discourse of poverty in antipoverty policy platforms from a gendered perspective; and second, apply this analysis to a poverty reduction project using a case study of a women loomweavers multi-purpose cooperative in the Philippines. The case study links macroeconomic policy on poverty with a locally-implemented poverty reduction programme in the Philippines. It examines how the dominant discourse of poverty primarily based on conventional conceptions and the ‘feminisation of poverty’ thesis, selectively appropriating women’s issues in certain development areas, has been acted out in different antipoverty policy platforms in the country. To some extent, this seems to produce a partial notion of “success” in the development intervention focused on the women loomweavers’ multipurpose cooperative, because it assumes that the gains women loomweavers get from the project also equitably redound to the benefit of all members of their household. This lack of serious attention to gender differences and intrahousehold dynamics in antipoverty programmes may undermine poverty reduction in itself while reinforcing gender stereotypes at the local context.
Introduction
However, the increased concern with global poverty has led to a rethinking within development discourses of the approaches to poverty as well as to development organizations requiring poverty assessments coupled with an increased awareness on gender as a condition for development aid (Chhachhi, 2009a). This “need to incorporate gender differences has not only increasingly been taken on board in poverty analysis but in policy and practice too” (Chant, 2008:171).
In recent years, “there has been a growing recognition of the importance of macroeconomic policy in shaping women’s living standards and their prospects for economic empowerment” (Elson in Budlender et al, 2002:23). Evidenced amply in policy rhetoric, Rodenberg (2004:iv in Chant, 2008:172) further describes that this is a ‘winwin’ formula which links greater gender equity, economic growth and effective poverty alleviation. Yet the manner by which gender has been incorporated in the burden of coping with poverty in households, through the ‘feminisation’ of antipoverty programmes, has sometimes exacerbated living conditions and reinforced gender stereotypes.
This essay attempts to examine whether an antipoverty programme has adequately considered the intersecting realities of poverty and gender. It has two main objectives: first, describe and analyse the discourse of poverty in policy platforms from a gendered perspective; and second, apply this analysis to a poverty reduction project using a case study of a women loomweavers multi-purpose cooperative.
By drawing on feminist positions highlighting the significance of tracing the gendered dynamics of poverty, the essay will demonstrate that poverty is couched in social relations, including gender relations and underscore that the lack of serious attention to gender differences and intra-household dynamics in antipoverty programmes may undermine poverty reduction in itself while reinforcing gender stereotypes.
Feminising Poverty: Myth or Means?
From the one-dimensional notion of poverty, antipoverty programmes purport to have embraced a multidimensional view of poverty alluding to Sen’s capability approach, the Social exclusion approach, and the Rural livelihoods systems approach which broaden the definition of poverty from basic needs to capabilities, assets, and livelihoods. But this relatively inclusive concept of poverty was challenged by early feminist research, although on empiricist terms, by highlighting the invisibility of women and the gaps of poverty data. I would like to highlight in this section how even the incorporation of women in the poverty knowledge systems did not prevent the construction of new myths about women and poverty.
The ‘feminisation of poverty’ that has crept into the policy arena almost like a mantra has “clearly proved persuasive enough to grab the attention of planners and policymakers beyond as well as within gender and development (GAD) circles” (Chant, 2008:171). The ‘feminisation of poverty’ is the persistent, bold yet unsubstantiated claim that 70% of the world’s poor are women. This slogan which “seems to have brought women, if not gender, more squarely into the frame of international fora on poverty reduction, is viewed as problematic in both analytical and policy terms” (Chant, 2008:166). First, there is a dearth of sex-disaggregated longitudinal panel data which could substantiate the claim and it drives away attention to differences among women which is arguably critical in determining whether and how poverty might be feminizing (Chant, 2008:166). Second, the implicit privileging of income assumes an equitable decision-making as to its allocation within the household and ignores the negotiation of its distribution by household members, at the same time; neglects other more complex and/or abstract dimensions of poverty (Chant, 2008:174). Women’s burden is described by Sweetman (2005:3) summarising that poverty is ‘as much about agency compromised by abuse, stress, fatigue and voicelessness, as it is about lack of resources’ (Chant, 2008:175). Third, there appears to be a neglect of men and gender relations as it focuses on women and implies ‘masculinisation’ of power, privilege and asset accumulation (Chant, 2008:176). Reference to this data is refuted both by emerging evidence of shrinking disparities between men and women’s capabilities and opportunities, particularly in the fields of education, employment and politics and evidence also of increased male unemployment and job insecurity and a ‘crisis of masculinity’ (male breadwinner model). Fourth, it further ignores the main conclusion that there has been ‘feminisation of responsibility and obligation’, not ‘feminisation of poverty’ (Chant 2008 in Chhachhi, 2009b), an increase in the reproductive tax, so to speak, as women take on the burden of dealing with poverty.
Government policy has in many occasions used the thesis of ‘feminisation of poverty’, targeting women as beneficiaries in antipoverty programmes and often positioning them as “a means to secure programme objectives; argued elsewhere as conduit of policy, in the sense that resources channelled through them are expected to translate into greater improvements in the well-being of children and the family as a whole” (Molyneux forthcoming in Molyneux, 2006:439).
Hence, the current unproblematised focus on women and on incomes has regrettably obscured rather than illuminated understanding of gendered poverty and has done little to engender effective policy approaches (Chant, 2008:183). I will cite the influence of ‘feminisation of poverty’ in the next section by briefly looking at various policy platforms that envisage antipoverty goals from the international down to the local context.
Aside from cloistering women’s concerns in certain areas of development, the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) is no exception among those that subscribe to the ‘feminisation of poverty’ as it targets women as vulnerable and thus have “special needs”. The Philippines has been one of the countries adhering to the MDGs and its top-down administration of antipoverty programmes mandates local governments to implement local poverty reduction measures that mimic national goals and strategies, often indicated in the various development plans[2] including provincial development plans, and has occupied more often, “the centrepiece of an administration’s program” (Reyes & Valencia, 1998:10). Given this acquiescence, it is rightly so that the current national antipoverty programmes in the country are wanting of ‘a multidimensional view of poverty, better integrating the non-economic dimensions of poverty (vulnerability, powerlessness, voicelessness and male-biased governance systems) with the economic dimensions, and giving space to the views of poor men and women about their own poverty’ (Whitehead, 2003:3).
At the local scene, following the MDGs and the Medium Term Development Plan (MTDP) of the national government, the Province of Bohol crafted its own development plan anchored on pro-poor and environmentally sustainable growth (Cities Alliance, 2009). The Bohol Poverty Reduction Programme (2003-2015) drew a two-pronged strategy for poverty reduction: increase the access to services and participation of disadvantaged families and communities; and achieve pro-poor economic growth through investments in preferred areas as eco-tourism and agricultural development. The broad policy statements reflect the development direction of the province but the nominal citation of gender in poverty reduction strategy statements and the absence of a Provincial Gender and Development Plan is a telling marker of its development priorities.
Also assessing whether this trend is present in development organizations operating in the province bannering pro-poor and pro-women goals is imperative. One of the trailblazing antipoverty programmes in the province is the Philippines-Australia Community Assistance Program (PACAP) following a Strategic Guidance Framework (SGF) guided by Australia-Philippines Strategy 2007-2011. Consistent with the MTPDP and the MDGs, PACAP operates within the broad country strategy with the goal of reducing poverty and improving the standard of living of poor communities through sustainable economic and social development. While PACAP through its Focal Community Assistance Scheme (FOCAS) stresses “community-initiated” needs, the broad country strategy and the MDG goals that it abides by may again be taken as a delimitation of how it views poverty and its parallel perspective on women and gender. The way gender is present in policy statements or poverty reduction programmes, such as whether it is gender-specific or mainstreamed, is as vital as pointing out its absence.
Coming to terms with the policy statements of three actors (national government, provincial government, PACAP), there appears to be an overriding observation that discourses in these antipoverty programmes have not so far as come up to scratch gender and poverty knowledge by remaining in the assumption that it is enough to integrate women into specific areas of development. As such, it is a recasting of the “‘gender jewel in the policy crown’ now adorning the MDGs” (Chhachhi, 2007:12). In the next section, I will demonstrate how this prevailing poverty discourse is acted out in the dynamics of a women loomweavers’ cooperative, a poverty reduction project beneficiary of both government and PACAP, examine its ‘feminisation’, and point out the significance of digging deep into intra-household dynamics to better understand the relationship between gender and poverty.
Success Story: What’s in a Name?
The poverty discourse ‘seldom pays attention to gender and, when it does, it is most often by discussing women’s “vulnerability” – but without examining the causes of this vulnerability…’ (Johnsson Latham 2004:4-5). When women are given focus of attention in antipoverty programmes, it usually springs from the assumption that they ‘need assistance on the grounds that they were sexually vulnerable, their children were at risk, their capacity to work was being squandered through inactivity and/or the family was being undermined through their absence, inattention or incapacity (Molyneux, 2007:17-18). In this light, I would like to bring in the case of loomweavers, wives of farmers and fisherfolks, previously seen as sitting-through the day waiting for their husbands before they were organized as loomweavers. Tagged as a ‘success story’, I would like to draw how the ‘feminisation of poverty’ has been acted out in this context, explore nonetheless how it has been transformative in positive ways or reveal how this may just be after all a ‘fetishised’ success to satisfy donor requirements.
‘From Raffia to Riches?’[3]
In 1989, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) brought together weavers in Tubigon, Bohol to form an association as beneficiaries of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program. The association of weavers moved from zero skills to what is now ranked as the second largest producer of raffia[4] loomwovens in the buri[5] loomweaving industry in the province. Most of the loomwoven products are sold through middlemen to the export market and 80% of the total provincial production in recent years is exported to the USA, Japan and Europe (Gonzalez, forthcoming).
Albeit not without problems like loomweaving being labor-intensive and weavers not able to pay cash advances from the cooperative, the association nevertheless graduated into the Tubigon Loom Weavers Multipurpose Cooperative (TLMPC) in 1993 with currently 51 members. Not long enough, they have expanded in membership and product line and designs of loomwoven products. TLMPC obtained funding assistance from PACAP through VICTO and Fundacion Santiago in 2007 as orders from clients increased with the growing demand for loom woven products in the local and international market. This called for a reciprocal skills enhancement and work efficiency from the cooperative members, not only in weaving but also in other skills such as managing the cooperative, drafting the operations manual, inventory, bookkeeping, and marketing. TLMPC went into aggressive marketing through participation in regional and national trade fairs. The cooperative has taken advantage of the production facility obtained through the PACAP grant by centralizing production in one area where both production manager and weavers see each other. This is perceived to bring in quality assurance and on-time deliveries as weavers are monitored and set with work quotas on a daily basis.
Having a regular source of income has enabled members to acquire properties such as a deep well and share them with the community as well as become regular sponsors in activities such as barrio fiestas and other celebrations (Success Stories, 2006). TLMPC has provided members equal access to skills and technologies, increased its production, expanded its market to local tourism establishments, conducted capability-building activities, implemented environmentally-aware measures such as waste control and planting of buri trees in the project area to replenish what has been cut and used, and preserved the loomweaving skills of the people in the area which have been passed on through generations to make products from locally grown materials. Given these, the TLMPC has contributed not only to developing the raffia weaving industry and enriching the cultural heritage of the province but also to increasing women’s fallback position, in case the loomweaving industry will be affected (as it is vulnerable) by the rise and fall of market demand for raffia products.
But the ‘black box’ has not been opened!
The forms of intervention in the latter part of the TLMPC project show some evidence of recognition of women’s multidimensional needs as it sought to enhance their capabilities by generating income, enhancing their skills, promoting leadership, and increasing their social capital, all of which are narrated in the “Most Significant Change Stories” by women coop members.
The income from loomweaving has been widely accepted to have enhanced self esteem and improved life chances of the women. It may not have been enough to enable them to overcome the cycle of poverty yet they have acknowledged that the same income has helped their families as it compensates for their basic needs. But the “Most Significant Change Stories” however, do not go as far as intra-household dynamics. Equitable distribution of income in the household is presumed and the idea of the household being a site of cooperation is pretty much idealized. Moore (1994 in Chhachhi, 2009c) elaborates that the “household is a locus of competing interests, rights, obligations and resources where household members are often involved in bargaining, negotiation and possibly even conflict”.
Drawing on one of Sen’s determinants of bargaining power in the household, the same acknowledgment by women exemplify themselves as altruistic by relating their personal interest with the interest of the family. Sen however did not fully articulate on this perceived altruism by women and feminists would argue that this is due to the lack of perception and acceptance of the ‘legitimacy of inequality’ as they absorb the idea of being unequal and thus domination is not questioned or resisted. As intra-household decision-making cannot be assumed, to what extent women often sacrifice their own self-interest for the sake of the family or make decisions as to where the income is spent are untold in this narrative. Considering the accepted notion of the male as the breadwinner, there is more to be known how husbands take the status of their wives bringing home ‘food to the table’. Nothing is told about any conflict, or violence, in the household that may have been generated when men resent undermining of their authority. “Opening up the ‘black box’ of the household and looking at intra-household power relations reveals gender as well as generational variation in assets, vulnerability, violence, and the experience of poverty” (Chhachhi, 2007:10).
Women also viewed their standing in the community as enhanced. This could be a positive outcome of the project, only that we cannot account whether more involvement in collective community work has a consequence on women’s competing demands on time for household or care work and their loomweaving. Otherwise, women may again be left with juggling through all three acts, as has been the normative image of an “empowered” woman to prove their “equality” with men, as they struggle over these power-laden social spaces, increasing at the same time their reproductive tax; and all these work performed may be naturalized, what Bordieu calls as ‘doxa’ – the self-evident, taken for granted, not spoken about systems of classification and domination. “As Kabeer has argued: ‘Gender often operates through the unquestioned acceptance of power” (Chant, 2008:181).
But again, the analysis of gender relations within and outside the household has to be context-specific. Attention must be paid to conjugal contracts, the ‘terms on which products and income, produced by the labour of both husband and wife, are divided to meet their personal and collective needs’ (Whitehead 1981 in Chhachhi, 2009d) as well as the local cultural conceptions of entitlement which may not only set limits but also change the way women and men relate to each other. These two notions may indicate women’s exercise of agency as they balance the changes in their life chances brought about by the project vis-à-vis the socio-cultural context that they are very much a part of.
Despite the best of intentions, a poverty reduction project “might be missing ‘real empowerment’ as steps to improve women’s poorer condition have rarely challenged men’s condition or position (Johnson, 2005:77 in Chant, 2008:186). Without this politicizing notion of gender, a poverty reduction project may reinforce gender stereotypes especially if it does not “pay attention to gender as the determining factor for allocation of resources, power and influence” (Johnsson Latham, 2004:1). More research as to the gender impacts of the TLMPC case is needed especially within the households to see whether it has indeed contributed to the well being of women and men in the area, and if so, to what extent.
Conclusion
Antipoverty programmes have far too long been a gendered arena. “Despite the rhetoric, poverty relief is still treated all too often as a matter of an unproblematized social need, abstracted from the social and, hence, gender relations that produce it” (Jackson 1998 in Molyneux 2006). For such to be equally responsive to its promised “beneficiaries”, these have to move from rhetoric to practice. But it cannot be done without a reflexive conception of the “poor” and “gender” amidst the unquestioned assumptions of neoliberal macro-economic policy that cling to the thesis of ‘feminisation of poverty’.
Antipoverty programmes “may successfully identify some unmet needs within poor households and communities but attending to the diverse needs of the women who are central to the functioning of these programmes is not their explicit aim, any more than is gender equality a consistently observed objective” (Molyneux, 2006). The disciplining of women, committing them to health, education and micro-enterprises is a breathing exemplar of how gender has become a token in antipoverty programmes.
Against this ominous backcloth, much still relies on the notion of poverty and gender challenged on feminist terms and its unequivocal ensconcing on the policy tablet to better inform a more responsive state social support system and non-government development intervention.
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1 “… third generation PRSPs continue to pigeonhole the discussion of women/gender into the education and health sections (the gender jewels in the policy crown now adorning the MDGs), with some discussion in the sections on labour markets (mainly micro-enterprises) and hardly any mention in the sections dealing with agriculture, land rights, rural development, environment..., see Chhachhi (2007).
[2] “Poverty reduction targets in the Philippines were incorporated for the first time in the 1987-1992 Development Plan… see table of Poverty Reduction Targets under various Administration (Reyes & Valencia, 1998:10).
3 From Raffia to Riches by Charito Cauton features stories of three active raffia manufacturers in Bohol, see The Human Face of PTRI SET Interventions.
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