Empowering Women For Sustainable Development Through Active Participation In Social Enterprise’s Sector In Pakistan

Abstract


 Women are around 51% of the total population of Pakistan, and they can do miracles through their active participation in economic activities of the country. Empowering women means accrediting half of the population for sustainable development. The aim of this paper is to examine and analyze the impact of active women participation in the social enterprise sector for their empowerment, and its subsequent consequences in creation of social value in society. For this purpose, primary data has been collected through random and snowball sampling to gain insight into female practitioner’s perspective. The paper highlights women empowerment as a multi-dimensional phenomenon based on four dimensions: psychological, social, economic and political empowerment. It prime focus on active participation in the social enterprise’s sector may lead to increase in enablement of women, the data shows that majority of female entrepreneur responded that they feel psychologically empowered and have financial contribution in household expenses and in community welfare. Secondly, the paper identifies the major challenges including concern of safety and security, lack of access to financial opportunities and social acceptance of the project that restrict women entrepreneurs from progress and creation of social value. Thirdly, it intends to construct framework for recommendations to promote women social enterprises in Pakistan for sustainable development as a whole.