Institute of Development Studies

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2016: Volume 47

This is the cover to IDS Bulletin archive issue 1A, 'Connecting Perspectives on Women’s Empowerment'.

Connecting Perspectives on Women’s Empowerment

Volume 47 Number 1A March 2016 Edited by: Deepta Chopra and Catherine Müller

With the formulation of the first ever internationally agreed stand-alone goal on gender equality, debates around women’s empowerment are at a critical juncture. This IDS Bulletin makes a timely contribution to our understanding of how ideas around empowerment have evolved and how we can move forward to expand women’s opportunities and choices and realise women’s empowerment in a meaningful way.

Even though the importance of women’s empowerment is widely accepted, it remains a complex concept that defies precise definitions and easy measurements. Together, the articles in this special Archive Collection demonstrate the depth and breadth of a nuanced analysis of empowerment that has come out of academic scholars writing at the cutting edge of this field.

The editors reflect on the interconnectedness of the economic, social and political components of empowerment. In doing so they highlight the significant gaps in policy and programming aimed at furthering processes and outcomes for women’s empowerment. Casting an eye to the future, they draw our attention to two relevant debates that merit further unpacking – that of inequality, and the question of how the Sustainable Development Goals can contribute to furthering processes of women’s empowerment and gender equality.

Ultimately this IDS Bulletin reminds us that empowerment – implying an expansion of opportunities and the power to make choices – can only be realised through a collective, rather than individualised notion of empowerment that focuses on addressing structural inequality and inequitable power relations, and gives primacy to women’s agency in negotiating and challenging these structures.

1999: Volume 30

East Asia: What Happened to the Development Miracle?

Volume 30 Number 1 January 1999

This Bulletin presents the key background papers from a major conference on the East Asian Crisis held at IDS in July 1998. A group of experts from different backgrounds, including international finance, macroeconomic and social policy, and development strategy, came together to discuss the causes of the crisis. With a foreword by Clare Short MP, this Bulletin offers different perspectives on events and discusses how future crises might be better managed or even prevented.

Nationalising The Anti-Poverty Agenda?

Volume 30 Number 2 May 1999

The New Poverty Agenda, along with many other neo-liberal orthodoxies of the 1980s and early 1990s is withering away as rapid political and ideological shifts take place at the global level and within the domain of international development policy. Whilst this Bulletin celebrates that fact, it also urges caution.

First, because these are changes in attitude, not a great breakthrough in actually doing anything to reduce poverty.

Second, because neo-liberalism will not disappear over night but will remain influential for years to come.

Third, the Bulletin questions whether an internationally-defined anti-poverty agenda is really a good thing and will not serve to undermine rather than enhance anti-poverty efforts. It queries whether in fact we should seek to nationalise rather than internationalise the anti-poverty agenda in poor countries.

Globalisation and the Governance of the Environment

Volume 30 Number 3 July 1999

It is sometimes argued that the term ‘globalisation’ is misleading because it describes a trend which is largely confined to the relations between a small number of highly industrialised states and firms operating within East Asia, North America and Europe. This Bulletin demonstrates, however, that it is a process with repercussions extending far beyond the power centres of the global economy, to the lives of most people. In particular, it refers to the impact of the internationalisation of trade, production and finance upon the world of environmental politics. The Bulletin focuses on change in the institutions and actors working on the environment, brought about by the developments taking place in the global economy. At the same time, it highlights how these actors are shaping the course of that economic change. 

Politics in Development: Essays in Honour of Gordon White

Volume 30 Number 4 October 1999

The articles in this Bulletin arise from a conference held to honour the memory of IDS Fellow, Gordon White. Spanning a wide range of subjects, the Bulletin can be divided into four substantive areas: politics in the state, civil society, welfare and globalisation. There is a focus on East Asia, particularly China, reflecting Gordon White’s own interests and work in the region. The articles are united by their links to one or both meanings of ‘politics in development’.