Self-Employed Women's Association Research Articles

Pluralizing the urban waste economy: insights from community-based enterprises in Ahmedabad (India) and Kampala (Uganda)

The delivery of urban basic infrastructure services is often guided by the modern infrastructure ideal, which aims for technical innovation, economic efficiency and uniformity through long-term, centralized management approaches. In rapidly growing urban centres of the global South, however, heterogeneous infrastructure configurations have long involved multiple systems in varying degrees of coexistence. This paper explores how community-based enterprises – organizations that aim not to turn a profit but rather to generate human well-being – contribute to, complement or conflict with wider municipal solid waste management strategies. It does so through two case studies, focused on Luchacos, a local enterprise turning waste into briquettes in an informal settlement of Kampala, Uganda; and the Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), a cooperative of waste pickers in Ahmedabad, India. Drawing on empirical data and policy analysis, the research finds that, given the necessary state support, community-based enterprises can contribute to a range of sustainability and development objectives.

Public Health Student Internship: An Opportunity to Explore System, Self, and Society

Emerging public health challenges require attention to self and society, beyond the classroom and exposure to the health system. The sensitisation of the future public health community is crucial to cover the last mile of the marginalized population. However, in general, public health education focuses on the health system and sciences and lacks a central focus on community-based internships. This short essay is an amalgamation of immersive field experiences of two young public health students with a renowned non-governmental organization called Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) in Gujarat, India. It argues that immersive internships can help students rise above the need of advancing job prospects and revisit their very purpose of learning by realizing their accountability as future members of the PH community. This perspective of a developing country like India would be immensely valuable to the global community elsewhere too.

Rethinking human capital: Perspectives from women working in the informal economy

AbstractMotivationThe development of human capital is a priority for most nation states, accelerated by the COVID‐19 global pandemic. In the context of reimagining a “new normal” post‐COVID, we reconsider the concept of human capital, and focus on knowledge, skills, and training of individuals in order to capture aspects of inclusive development.PurposeThis paper shows how the perspective of women, informal sector workers, representing some of the most marginalized workers in society, informs and improves our understanding of human capital and its development and utilization.Methods and approachOur findings are derived from field‐based research conducted over the summer of 2021 in which multiple (virtual) focus group discussions (FGDs) were held with selected members of the Self‐Employed Women's Association (SEWA) in India.FindingsThrough our FGDs, the participants provided new perspectives and insights into our knowledge of human capital, emphasizing the importance of social protection programmes, gender equity, ongoing training opportunities, decentralized supply chains, and income security. Perhaps most significantly, the benefits accrued to women through being organized have been key to unlocking their human capital potential.Policy implicationsOur research highlights themes that are often overlooked in the literature or are beyond the scope of more narrow conceptualizations of human capital. We show that human capital is tightly interwoven with other forms of capital (community assets), and hence efforts to build the former cannot be achieved in isolation from attending to the latter.

Growing leaders from below: Identity-based worker education and identity-leader ability among self-employed women in India.

Informal and unregulated work is the norm rather than the exception in emerging economies. This study was conducted in India where nine out of 10 women are occupied in informal, unregulated work, and are vulnerable to low-wages, exploitation, and interconnected cultural and social-economic injustices. The Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA) and their education wing the Indian Academy of Self-Employed Women encourage their members to self-define as "self-employed workers" and facilitate identity-based worker education and leadership training. Drawing on insights from the Social Identity Approach to Learning and the New Psychology of Leadership this cross-sectional study (N=300) explored if this shared social identity significantly predicted participants perceived identity-leadership ability. We further explored if this relationship was partially explained by SEWA norms, values, and beliefs, developed during learning, and measured as "awareness of gendered inequality", "injustice consciousness", and "collective efficacy". A parallel mediation analysis found a direct relationship between "self-employed women identity" and "identity-leader ability" and indirect relationships through "awareness of gendered inequality" and "collective efficacy". No indirect path was evident through "injustice consciousness". The theoretical and practical implications of an identity-based approach to worker education and leader training among vulnerable workers, are discussed.

OVERCOMING THE LIABILITY OF POORNESS: SOCIAL CAPITAL RESOURCES OF FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS IN INDIA

This paper seeks to use social capital theory to explain how impoverished women may find success and lift themselves out of poverty. The research addresses three unique, significant areas of study. First, by reviewing relevant theory and research on livelihood creation and social networks, a new lens for examining social capital in the context of poverty is provided. Second, a model is tested examining the role of an entrepreneur’s social capital resources on the development of their own livelihood creation and the consequential changes in the entrepreneur’s lifestyle. The research finds that weak social network ties are positively related to livelihood creation, with counter-intuitive results regarding lifestyle changes in response to the changes in livelihood creation. Third, the above model is applied to female entrepreneurs, utilizing a sample of women associated with SEWA (Self-Employed Women’s Association), a network broker and business incubator trade union working in impoverished communities in and around Ahmedabad, Gujarat, in India.

COVID-19 – a crisis of care and what we can learn from the SEWA experience in India

ABSTRACT As women across the globe continue to be overburdened with child-care responsibilities owing to the closure of institutional child-care facilities due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this paper attempts to posit a viable disaster-resilient model through the idea of community-based care infrastructure. Based on research conducted among parents from low-income groups, whose children attended child-care centres run by Sangini Co-operative of Self-employed women's association (SEWA) in Gujarat in western India, this paper wants to highlight the spontaneity with which the Cooperative responded to the pandemic, underlining the efficacy of community-based interventions in times of crisis. This paper argues that solidarity between care workers and the larger community is only likely to increase during times of crisis, which makes community-based solutions an integral part of addressing future care emergencies.

THE SEWA MOVEMENT: EMPOWERING RURAL WOMEN OF BANASKANTHA(GUJARAT):

The Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) is a national level trade union dedicated to the informal women workers of India. The organisation has contributed immensely to various facets of the Women’s movement such as to the labour movement, cooperative movement, women’s movement in general and more specifically to that of self-employed women and health movement in India and abroad. The paper aims to throw light on the socio-economic activities undertaken by SEWA at the grass-root level to make women self-employed, self- reliant, self-diligent and self-dependent in the Banaskantha district of Gujarat. It delineates SEWA’s initiatives in generating alternative sources of employment for women which are being made available to the region where there are hostile climatic conditions, acute scarcity of water, increased migration, limited access to capital and also limited employment opportunities. The organization’s initiative in the rural organizing process with its need-based integrated approach towards empowerment has transformed the lives of rural women of Gujarat particularly in the district of Banaskantha. The SEWA entities are democratic, self-managed and sustainable in terms of their functioning and work on the principle of full employment and self-reliance to produce individual and collective empowerment. It is both a union and a movement -A national, and now increasingly, a global movement of informal women workers, organizing for their rights, for recognition and inclusion in national plans, programmes and legislation.

Breastfeeding knowledge and practices of working mothers in the informal economy in New Delhi: A formative study to explore new intervention pathways towards improved maternal and child health outcomes

This was a formative study to yield evidence on the conceptual and empirical pathways to improve maternal and child health (MCH) outcomes among informally working mothers while securing livelihoods, and for this, explores how informally working women navigate time sensitive childcare practices such as exclusive breastfeeding (EBF) with their work, and how do the conditions and nature of informal employment shape it.This study was conducted in February–May 2017 using non-probability sampling for cross-sectional semi structured interviews (n = 92) and focus group discussions (n = 56) with working mothers with a child under 2 and 5 years respectively, having regular and stable working history in the informal economy. The study team partnered with Self-Employed Women's Association for site selection and recruitment of study participants across 4 sectors of work in New Delhi, India: home-based work, pheri or barter work, street vending and domestic work.While 65% women report EBF for 6-months, checks with infant feeding recall reveal several disruptions from customary practices and working conditions, and successful EBF only in home-based work, the least paying of all. 59% women reported returning to work under 6-months, leading to early weaning. 90% women were aware of the importance of EBF in the standard language of public health messaging, however, checks with non-standard language queries reveal a drop to 55–80% exhibiting lack of effective knowledge that women could use.The findings emphasise that conditions and nature of informal employment shape MCH outcomes in cities of the global south, where such employment dominates. Furthermore, we use the findings to suggest the following responsive approaches for intervention: delaying mother's return to work, increasing proximity between mother and child, deeper and engaged knowledge of breastfeeding and early child development practices, improving problem solving capacity and agency of the mother, and enabling home and workplace conditions.

Safeguarding the Mental Health of Women of India in times of COVID 19: Challenges and ways forward

Self Employed Women's Association (SEWA) is movement of 1.8 million women workers in 18 states of India. This is an early narrative based report on how women have been affected by COVID 19 in India. There is description of loss of livelihood, malnutrition of children, increased responsibility of care giving, decreased access to health care and increased incidents of violence at home. The article also outlines how women have been resilient and have been active participants in supporting recovery. Mental Health awareness has been initiated by members of SEWA in 11 states.

Lifelong activism and women’s entrepreneurship: how a social movement organization improves conditions for self-employed women in India

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate how a local trade union improves living conditions for women entrepreneurs in India and how its activities have evolved over time.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a longitudinal case study of the self-employed women’s association (SEWA) in India. Founded in 1972, this organization fosters and supports women’s entrepreneurship. The approach of this study combines qualitative face-to-face interviews and secondary data analysis.FindingsThe findings highlight the fact that SEWA, which combines the features of a trade union and a social movement, improves women’s conditions in several different ways. The study shows that the organization’s main role has evolved from creating a community to expanding it and finally to becoming an agent of societal change.Originality/valueThe study contributes to the literature by analyzing how locally grown organizations fight social exclusion and improve the conditions of deprived groups in emerging economies.

Campaigning for the rights of women workers in South Africa: Michelle Hatch speaks to Pat Horn

abstractPat Horn is the founding International Coordinator and current Senior Advisor at StreetNet, an International Alliance of Street Vendors. Her career has centered on organising disempowered individuals into unions and alliances where collectively they have a more powerful voice. As a student activist, adult literacy advocate and trade unionist in the 1970s and 1980s she fought for the rights of South Africans discriminated against under the apartheid regime. During her time in the trade unions she actively worked towards female economic empowerment and became increasingly aware of the plight of the vast number of women working in the informal economy. By forging links with SEWA (the Self-Employed Women’s Association) in India, she established the first trade union for self-employed women (SEWU) in South Africa in 1993. Her association with SEWA lead to her becoming the first International Coordinator for StreetNet, an international alliance formed to improve the lives of street vendors, market vendors and hawkers (the majority of whom are women), around the world. She is in conversation with Michelle Hatch, an academic economist and single mother, whose doctoral thesis explored how motherhood and childcare responsibilities affect the socioeconomic and subjective well-being of women in South Africa.

Challenges and Dilemmas of Civil Society movements in India

AbstractCivil Society spaces provide citizens opportunities to frame their collective identities and interests through the formation of voluntary interest groups and organisations set to specific purposes. In the west, historically these interest groups have contributed to the development of political thought that assisted to forge the economic interests of emerging bourgeoisie. This paper situated in the context of India begins with a thematic perspective and reviews the challenges that emerge as a result of the demands that emerge within the civil society space. The paper considered three broad range organizations for this review such as the Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save the river Narmada Campaign); National Alliance for People's Movement (NAPM); and the Self‐Employed Women's Association (SEWA). The authors see civil society as a conciliating place—where individual interests appear to mingle with societal requirements while providing adequate representation to the marginalized groups and expression of concerns around economic and environmental rights.

The effect of community health worker-led education on women's health and treatment-seeking: A cluster randomised trial and nested process evaluation in Gujarat, India.

BackgroundA community–based health insurance scheme operated by the Self–Employed Women’s Association in Gujarat, India reported that the leading reasons for inpatient hospitalisation claims by its members were diarrhoea, fever and hysterectomy – the latter at the average age of 37. This claims pattern raised concern regarding potentially unnecessary hospitalisation amongst low–income women.MethodsA cluster randomised trial and mixed methods process evaluation were designed to evaluate whether and how a community health worker–led education intervention amongst insured and uninsured adult women could reduce insurance claims, as well as hospitalisation and morbidity, related to diarrhoea, fever and hysterectomy. The 18–month intervention consisted of health workers providing preventive care information to women in a group setting in 14 randomly selected clusters, while health workers continued with regular activities in 14 comparison clusters. Claims data were collected from an administrative database, and four household surveys were conducted amongst a cohort of 1934 randomly selected adult women.Results30% of insured women and 18% of uninsured women reported attending sessions. There was no evidence of an intervention effect on the primary outcome, insurance claims (risk ratio (RR) = 1.03; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.81, 1.30) or secondary outcomes amongst insured and uninsured women, hospitalisation (RR = 1.05; 95% CI 0.58, 1.90) and morbidity (RR = 1.09; 95% CI 0.87, 1.38) related to the three conditions. The process evaluation suggested that participants retained knowledge from the sessions, but barriers to behaviour change were not overcome.ConclusionsWe detected no evidence of an effect of this health worker–led intervention to decrease claims, hospitalisation and morbidity related to diarrhoea, fever and hysterectomy. Strategies that capitalise on health workers’ role in the community and knowledge, as well as those that address the social determinants of diarrhoea, fever and the frequency of hysterectomy – such as water and sanitation infrastructure and access to primary gynaecological care – emerged as areas to strengthen future interventions.

Health Training Programme for Adolescent Girls

The paper examines the impact of the initiative taken by a non-government organization—Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA)—in Ahmedabad, a city in western India to impart knowledge about sexual and reproductive health to adolescent girls. Quasi-experimental design was used for data collection from beneficiary and non-beneficiary households in two rural blocks and two cities of Gujarat. Non-beneficiary households from control areas were selected with similar socio-economic characteristics. The study noted that the girls from control areas were not much different with respect to awareness about reproductive and sexual health compared to those who were exposed to training imparted by SEWA. While the girls who participated in health training received information on menstrual hygiene, their household situation was not always conducive to allow them to practice what was taught. Girls were keen to learn about what is safe sex or how to deal if confronted with difficult boy–girl interaction. The need to include discussion on such issues with young girls is evident and timely. Any intervention to improve the conditions of adolescent girls cannot be limited to providing information about hygiene or giving additional nutritional supplement (as is done in the government centres), but it is important to create a space for them to express their concerns. Also, there is a need for interaction with parents to make them sensitive towards health of their young girls and help them pursue their goals.

Informal sector entrepreneurship for women in China and India: building networks, gaining recognition, and obtaining support

This paper focuses on informal sector entrepreneurship in China and India, and the challenges of developing and sustaining entrepreneurship programs in a sector not often recognized or supported by policymakers. I summarize potential benefits and barriers to organizing the informal sector. Next is a discussion of possible pathways to local/national organizing, examples of organizing strategies, barriers, and outcomes in both countries, and models of transnational networking. Here I review best practices from two organizations in India (the Self-Employed Women's Association and the Scrap Collectors Union) and two organizations in China (the Xi'an Domestic Workers Union and the Chinese Working Women Network). Although a small sample, the case studies illustrate the diversity inherent to organizational form, strategies for local and transnational networking, and pathway to benefit provision. To conclude, I discuss lessons learned, and suggest additional strategies for informal entrepreneurs to gain visibility and recognition.

Naam, Kaam, Gaam: Educating Women for Self-Employment, Cooperation and Struggle

The following is a detailed description of a training program offered by the Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA) Academy to introduce new members to the organization and its work. SEWA describes its main goals as “to organize women workers for full employment,” by which it means “employment whereby workers obtain work security, income security, food security, and social security (at least health care, child care and shelter).” The organization works to achieve its goals “through the strategy of struggle and development. The struggle is against the many constraints and limitations imposed on them by society and the economy, while development activities strengthen women's bargaining power and offer them new alternatives.” SEWA describes itself as “both an organisation and a movement,” which is enhanced by “the sangama or confluence of three movements: the labour movement, the cooperative movement and the women's movement.” SEWA also describes itself as a Gandhian movement: “Gandhian thinking is the guiding force for SEWA's poor, self-employed members in organising for social change. We follow the principles of satya (truth), ahimsa (nonviolence), sarvadharma (integrating all faiths, all people) and khadi (propagation of local employment and self-reliance).” In practical terms, SEWA carries out its strategy “through the joint action of union and cooperatives.” As a trade union, it has nearly two million members, half of whom are in the organization's home state of Gujarat, India. It also operates or is affiliated with nearly two dozen sister organizations and cooperatives.

Creating Opportunities for Women in the Renewable Energy Sector: Findings from India

ABSTRACTThis paper identifies opportunities and constraints that low-income women face in accessing livelihoods in the renewable-energy sector in India through qualitative and quantitative research conducted in collaboration with The Energy Resources Institute (TERI) and the Self Employed Women's Association (SEWA) in 2012–13. Whereas previous research has focused on women mostly as end users of solar and biomass technologies, this research attempts also to understand women's potential as entrepreneurs, facilitators, designers, and innovators. Findings reveal that although access to technology and employment in the energy sector is limited by inadequate purchasing power and low social status, there is tremendous potential to create livelihoods for women at all levels of the energy supply chain. Broader findings indicate that women can gain optimal traction from employment in the energy sector only if there are wider socially progressive policies in place, including state intervention to create a robust social welfare infrastructure and accessible, high-quality, public services.

Sustainable structure and strategies to alleviate poverty: a case study of Self-Employed Women's Association, a membership based organisation

Eradicating poverty, or even alleviating extreme poverty, has been a long-sought goal of governments, aid agencies, non-governmental organisations, the United Nations, and even the poor themselves. Doing something about extreme poverty became the number one target for the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals, and the United Nations has been encouraging and supporting public and private initiatives aimed at poverty eradication. In recent years, attention has moved from governmental-supported and even non-governmental-supported efforts to locally-supported efforts as a key for effective and sustainable poverty alleviation. One such local effort in South Asia is the Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), a unique membership based organisation (MBO) that was established in 1971 as a trade union working to alleviate poverty at the local level by helping poor women obtain work, income and food security. The objective of this article is to examine the organisation, structure and strategy of SEWA as a way to learn what works best for locally-based organisations in their efforts to alleviate poverty. The conclusion is that SEWAs organisational structure and strategies are important reasons for its success, and that the more organisations like SEWA empower their beneficiaries and collaborate with other poverty alleviation-oriented organisation, the more likely they are to achieve success in poverty alleviation.

A Discourse Ethics Defense of Nussbaum's Capabilities Theory

This paper will begin with an explication of the central tenets of Nussbaum's capabilities theory. The next section examines Nussabum's two-fold justification of capabilities; namely, the substantive good approach (or intuitionism), which serves as the primary justification, and a version of Kantian proceduralism, which provides ancillary support. The following section focuses on Jaggar's critique of Nussbaum. Here, I will discuss three criteria of adequacy for a global ethic and their importance, why we should accept them and how both of Nussbaum's justification strategies fail to satisfy them. In the fifth section, I propose a version of discourse ethics as an alternative justification for capabilities that can satisfy the adequacy discerned from Jaggar's critique. This account of discourse ethics reveals that intersubjective dialogue under certain conditions is more likely to provide adequate justification of capabilities, and those engaged in dialogue are also likely to develop practical reason and affiliation. So this method of justification does not merely ground the capabilities, but helps people realize them. Finally, the sixth section presents an example from the Self-Employed Women's Association as a real-life case illustrating how this version of discourse ethics can be manifested.

Energy Services for the Urban Poor: NGO Participation in Slum Electrification in India

Some 40% of the world's urban poor—living predominantly in informal settlements—lack access to legal electricity. Urban upgradation programmes, if they exist, prioritize water supply over electrification since water is nonsubstitutable and more essential for sustaining human life. Illegal electricity—albeit unreliable, expensive and dangerous—is also already widely available in informal settlements. I share the experiences of the Self-Employed Women's Association and Saath—two nongovermental organizations (NGOs) based in India—of participating in a multiple-stakeholder propoor electrification programme. By 2008 close to 100 000 homes had been electrified in the city of Ahmedabad and the programme is currently being replicated in smaller cities in Gujarat and in the neighbouring state of Rajasthan. I use academic literature on urban infrastructure provision and politics, project reports and evaluations, pricing surveys, and interviews with electricity utility and NGO staff to analyze the programme for its impacts upon access, tariffs, consumption patterns, quality of service, and security of land tenure. The findings indicate that NGOs can be very effective as intermediaries between utilities, municipalities, and urban poor communities. However, scaling up such programmes will require strong state involvement in developing a policy framework to facilitate NGO participation in the design and implementation of propoor electrification activities, and in the energy reform process in general.