State versus Market Debate and Shaping of the Gender Empowerment Agenda

Abstract

This article argues that during the neoliberal and post-Washington consensus era, a broader development debate around state versus market has led to the dominance of instrumental articulation of the gender empowerment agenda. Although scholarship around empowerment has evolved, in the works of the development agencies and broader development discourse, constrained by the overarching debate around state versus market, gender empowerment has been robbed of its transformative potential. The present study frames the empowerment debate around three parameters: (a) narrow versus broad, (b) individual agency versus intersectionality and (c) instrumental versus intrinsic justification for empowerment. Finally, future avenues of research are identified, especially how NGOs, transnational advocacy networks (TANs) and civil society organisations (CSOs) can effectively challenge the current corporate agenda or paradigm.