Resources

By questioning the conceptualization of gender which is used to guide PRA-based processes, this article examines the extent to which PRA has been used to address issues of gender inequality, as opposed to simply describing the differences between the lives of women and men. It also suggests that despite the importance of empowerment as a guiding concept, its current usage in the context of much PRA work is inconsistent and ill-defined.

The author argues that much of the time in development, "gender" is taken to mean "women", and women are treated as an identifiable single category, thought of in a narrow range of stereotypical ways, and that "gender analysis" does not extend to analysing men's positions, views and reactions as men. For "gender-aware PRA" to be genuinely aware of gender and to be really participatory, it is crucial that facilitators reflect on their own preconceived ideas and prejudices.

This chapter aims to raise some problematics in procedure, product and inherently interventionist role of facilitators. It seeks to examine certain key gender-related issues in sub-Saharan Africa for which participatory research (and decentralized policy articulation and operation) is potentially important.

Since the late 1980s, AKRSP (Aga Khan Rural Support Programme - India) began to address some of women's concerns through programme activities specifically reserved for them, and in the process it met with resistance at different levels, partly due to village men's attitudes towards women. This chapter describes one way in which AKRSP staff tried to deal with this resistance. It outlines how men's understanding of the drudgery and hardship of women's tasks increased by asking them to describe a woman's day.

This chapter discusses selected findings and the approach of a participatory study conducted with adolescents in a peri-urban compound of Lusaka, Zambia. The study focused on adolescent sexual and reproductive health with the aim of initiating a community-generated response to the needs of adolescents.

This chapter descibes the author's work in rural Bali, Indonesia, which focused on questioning commonly held gender myths. The experience shows that the adaptation and application of PRA methods within a framework of Gender and Development (GAD) is not enough to support empowering and equitable change. Instead, development practitioners must re-examine their ways of working with gender differences and power and reassess their understanding of and interaction with a "community" and the institutional framework within which their efforts are located.