AN INVESTIGATION OF THE FACTORS ENHANCING WOMEN EMPOWERMENT IN PAKISTANI SOCIETY

Abstract

Woman empowerment is an important issue of the 21st century. Women are an important part of any society who contribute to the development process. Since the creation of Pakistan women's empowerment has been neglected. According to the constitution of Pakistan, education is the basic right of every female living in Pakistan but the actual situation is different (Khan, 2020). In many areas women are deprived of social development processes such as education, health, decision making in family matters and access to technology. They even don’t know what their right are and they don’t get equal opportunities of living respectful human life. Many plans and policies have been developed for women development but no one could be implemented. The National Policy 2002 aimed to ensure female participation in economic growth and decision making. Moreover, a bill ‘Criminal Law Act 2004’ against the honor killing of females was also approved by the Parliament of Pakistan (Bushra & Wajiha 2013). Similarly, many laws have been formulated regarding women's empowerment but the issue of women's development is still there and needs to be focused on the well-being of women and ultimately the development and prosperity of society. The determinants of low woman empowerment are socio-cultural issues, economic issues, poverty, lack of awareness, and gender discrimination. The scope of this study is to investigate factors that increase women's empowerment.