A suitable woman: The coming-of-age of the ‘third world woman’ at the bottom of the pyramid: A critical engagement

Abstract

While the slogan ‘Make Poverty Business’ has become integral to neoliberal discourses on global poverty management, what often goes unremarked is the role of women, especially poor third world women in profitable poverty ventures. Taking the ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’ (BOP) approach as an entry point, the present article brings into sharpened focus the centrality of poor third world women in the ‘global order of poverty management.’ Drawing on Foucaultian notions of problematization, combined with feminist insights on the stakes involved in instrumentalizing women and their subjectivities, and a Marxist-inspired notion of immaterial labor, the article examines how poor third world women are incorporated into profitable poverty eradication ventures. I argue that the construal of poor third world women as knowable objects of knowledge and entrepreneurial subjects remains at the heart of the BOP programmatic. Where, at one level, poor third world women’s participation lends ethical credence to the BOP projects; at another level, their immaterial labor helps to build ‘economies of affect’ at the bottom of the pyramid. Located at the intersection of neoliberalism and feminism, the article aims to add to the ongoing debates on the uneasy proximity between women’s empowerment and ‘neoliberal reason.’