Women's Cooperatives Research Articles

Exploring the Human Rights Implications of Microfinance Initiatives

This Article explores Microfinance and microcredit (“MFI”) programs from several perspectives, with particular emphasis on human rights issues. These programs involve making small loans to people who would otherwise be unable to borrow money to facilitate them starting their own businesses: frequently, the programs focus on women borrowers in developing countries. The emphasis of MFI programs on women in developing countries makes it important to consider these programs in terms of both women's and indigenous rights, while MFI as an approach to poverty merits a discussion of economic rights. Part I of the article will explore the concept and scope of current MFI programs, describing key components of these programs and assessing comments from both fans and critics. The Grameen Bank, which has been studied extensively and has acted as a model for several other programs, will be examined in detail. Part II of this Article considers MFI in the context of human rights considerations, including economic, indigenous, and women's rights. One particular aspect of Grameen's program, namely the use of Sixteen Decisions, is also critiqued, applying organizational behavior theory. Part III will compare MFI with other approaches to poverty, inclu property rights initiatives, women's cooperatives and social enterprise approaches.

Institutional Change and Embeddedness: Caste and Gender in Financial Cooperatives in Rural India

ABSTRACT This article examines the interaction between institutional change and caste and gender embeddedness. It develops a framework for understanding how this interaction takes place. The article presents data on the results of an effort by a non-profit development organization, the Cooperative Development Foundation (CDF), to promote women's cooperatives, grounded in the ideas of mutual self-help and equitable access to services, in rural Andhra Pradesh in India. Using a simple theoretical framework that highlights the multi-level nature of institutional change, and the potential for interactions with embeddedness at one level to affect interactions at other levels, the article presents data showing how particular institutional rules of the cooperatives interacted with caste and gender to shape the overall governance and service delivery practices of these new organizations. In particular, after failed attempts to integrate existing, male-dominated cooperatives with women, the CDF created gender-segregated cooperatives. Data from the women's cooperatives show the creation of mixed-caste organizations, with boards of directors that were fairly representative of their membership, but with presidents that were more likely to be from the higher-castes. Access to financial services shows little caste bias, though lending is through caste-based peer groups. The data suggest that the interaction of embeddedness and institutional change is a process contingent on: a) the strategy taken by the development organization towards embeddedness; b) the nature of the institutional change itself relative to the existing social structure; and c) the effects the interactions between institutional change and embeddedness at different levels have on each other.

The Contradictions of Agrotourism Development in Greece: Evidence from Three Case Studies

Agrotourism is considered to be and is promoted as an important ‘tool’ for rural development in Europe. In Greece, it was ‘officially’ introduced through EU subsidies to Greek farmers or women's cooperatives in the 1980s and since then has grown significantly. This paper examines the nature of Greek agrotourism, whether it can be considered ‘real’ agrotourism, and its effects on farmers and farms. Evidence from three case studies (Lesvos, Magnesia and Lefkada) reveals the contradictory character of agrotourism development in Greece. Specifically, it highlights the divergence between official objectives and basic characteristics of the sector's development trajectory in Greece.

Analyzing and managing risks – on the importance of gender differences in risk attitudes

PurposeThis paper seeks to show optimal strategies for firms to cope with analysis and management of risks.Design/methodology/approachEmpirical and experimental studies on gender differences in risk analysis and risk management are reported and assessed.FindingsWomen appear less sensitive to probabilities and more pessimistic towards gains than men. In risk management, women seem to have a comparative advantage with respect to diversification and communication tasks.Research limitations/implicationsEmpirical testing of the hypothesis that mixed teams of senior managers optimize risk analysis and management is still missing. Deeper insights into the optimal structure of men's and women's cooperation with respect to risk analysis and management are missing.Practical implicationsA well established cooperation of men and women at the senior management level appears recommendable for firms which strive for an optimization of their risk analysis and risk management. Furthermore, such cooperation is desirable with respect to a society's perspective.Originality/valueIdentification of gender differences in risk analysis and management are pointed. Such differences matter since analysis and management of risk are decisive issues for firms.

“Are we Standing on a Rock or Sand?”: Questioning Women-Centered Organizing in the United States, Mexico and Cameroon

This companion paper to "Reflections on Working with Women's Cooperative Economic Groups" explores questions we have raised in our discussions with each other on how to work in women-centered ways. We provide examples from our work with women's cooperative groups in the rural communities of Chaparral and Columbus, New Mexico; San Pedro Chenalhó, Chiapas, Mexico; and Djalingo, Cameroon. (See the previous paper for descriptions of the groups we reference in this paper.) We hope that our experiences will help others involved in similar kinds of work to reflect on their relationships within groups.

Guatemalan Women's Cooperatives and State Neglect

Over the past several years, I have taken college students to Guatemala as part of a course called “Social Justice and Human Rights in Guatemala.” Last January, the group visited a former squatter ...

Entrepreneurial behaviour of Kashmiri women through cooperatives

This study of agricultural and consumer cooperatives in Kashmir shows that men's cooperatives outnumber women's cooperatives at every level-block, district and state. They also have a higher number of active members; moreover, the number of active women members in men's cooperatives is abysmal. Yet, as many as 66% of the women's cooperatives are operating at a profit, against 46% such men's cooperatives. Though women's cooperatives make lower profits than the men's cooperatives, they are more viable. The study shows also that rural women are more aware of the cooperative movement than women in semi-urban or urban areas. In semi-urban areas, Hanji women are keen to carry out their traditional occupation of fishery through cooperatives. It was found also that urban and rural women are interested in establishing bakery, milk/dairy and consumer cooperatives. Such activities need to be encouraged.

Women entrepreneurs in Cyprus: a new dynamic in Cyprus economy

This paper describes the findings of a unique nationwide research on female entrepreneurial activity in Cyprus, which was carried out for the Women's Cooperative Bank of Cyprus Ltd with funding from the Ministry of Justice and Public Order. On the one hand, it is an attempt towards gaining greater understanding of who the women who develop enterprising activity are (in other words determine what their demographic characteristics are), what their company characteristics are, (e.g. sector of activity, size etc.) as well as what their needs and concerns (e.g. the impact of multiplicity of roles, upgrading of skills or knowledge etc.) are. On the other hand, it is equally important to see how strong women business owners' presence is in the local economy.

Micro-finance and Economic Empowerment: Women's Cooperatives in Nigeria

This paper discusses how the capacity of micro-credit interventions in Nigeria were made more effective when combined with other development activities, especially participation through women's associations. The successes of Micro-credit models like the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh are highlighted, in contrast to earlier development models such as the Green Revolution Programme. The People s Bank Scheme and the Community Banking systems in Nigeria are also seen to be crucial in the implementation of the Better Life for Rural Women (BLFRW) Programme. An assessment of this program is made and some directions for the future are identified.

Rescuing Sex from Prudery and Prurience: American Women's Use of Sex Education as an Antidote to Obscenity, 1925-1932

The United States in the 1920s and 1930s witnessed dramatic shifts in legal and popular attitudes toward sexuality and obscenity. Female antiobscenity reformers were at the crux of these transformations--simultaneously holding back some changes and urging others forward. This article examines the antiobscenity work of Catheryne Cooke Gilman and the organization over which she presided, the Minneapolis, Minnesota, Women's Cooperative Alliance (WCA). It uses Gilman's fluctuating alliances with sex educator Mary Ware Dennett and social purity reformer Reverend William Sheafe Chase to demonstrate how, why, and to what effect the WCA used explicit sex education as a tool for divesting obscene amusements of their allure. Among other things, the author concludes that the WCA inadvertently helped liberate the commercial forms of sexual expression it fought against. By extending protection to graphic educational information, even while continuing to suppress sexually explicit commercial material, Gilman and the WCA helped to dismantle existing obscenity law in ways that fueled the growing free speech movement and eventually undermined the law's usefulness for fighting obscenity.

Matriarchs of England's cooperative movement: a study in gender politics and female leadership, 1883-1921

Introduction Women in the English Cooperative Movement Women's Space/Women's Place The Woman's Corner of the Co-operative News The Gendered Geography of the Cooperative Movement Angels in the Store The Early Leaders of the Women's Cooperative Guild Margaret Llewelyn Davies: A Woman with a Mission The Dysfunctional Commonwealth Rent at the Seams: Sisterhood in the Women's Cooperative Guild The Battle between the Sexes in the Cooperative Movement Conclusion Contradictions and Conflicts Bibliography Index

Economic crisis helps to 'demarginalize' women

This article discusses processes that demarginalize women in developing countries. The case study pertained to women in the Santa coffee growing area of North West Province, Cameroon. Coffee is the main source of income for families. Women obtain land for growing subsistence crops with the permission of their husbands and with pleading. The sharp fall in coffee prices left families in economic difficulties. It forced families to reduce coffee production or abandon coffee production entirely. Women found an alternative in growing vegetables for retail sale. The women formed associations that provided instruction on how to farm, sell produce, and obtain credit. Men observed the increase in income from the women's sale of produce. Women included the men in discussions about their progress and difficulties. Men were thus encouraged to sell their land to women. Women gained power by becoming the sole source of family income. The women's groups helped women improve land use and the use of income. This experience proved that crises can have positive outcomes. Men's power was based on economic control over resources rather than culture or machismo. Women's cooperation with men in nation building resulted in economic independence. Marginalization of women was based on money. Women proved that participation, rather than power, was the appropriate means to social change and more equitable relations. The obstacles to women's power included cultural expectations about their roles and choices, sex discrimination, and lack of access to leadership networks.

The promotion of women's cooperatives in Mexico: Is feminist technical assistance an Oxymoron?

Abstract This article examines one of the fundamental dilemmas in grass roots planning practice—how to provide planning expertise to disenfranchised clients while not creating systems of dependence among those clients on that expertise. Specifically, the article investigates attempts to provide feminist technical assistance to women in rural production cooperatives in three communities in central Mexico. The three cases provide both positive and negative insights into how to provide empowering, and feminist, technical assistance. The cases raise questions about two issues in local development planning for women: why is it that a ‘cult of expertise’ tends to develop in technical assistance agencies, and how can we develop alternative approaches that respect women's ‘local knowledge'?; and how can cooperatives construct a feminist labour process’ that integrates domestic and market relations.

One Step Backward, Two Steps Forward: The Establishment of ‘Tribal’ Women's Co-operatives in Bankura District, West Bengal

One Step Backward, Two Steps Forward: The Establishment of ‘Tribal’ Women's Co-operatives in Bankura District, West Bengal

Where women are leaders: the Sewa movement in India

* Frontispiece * List of Photographs and Illustrations * Preface * Acknowledgements * 1. SEWA: Women in Movement * 2. Emergence * 3. Independence * 4. SEWA's Shakti: Growing Up and Leading Out * 5. The Union: Struggles of Solidarity * 6. Video SEWA: Focusing on Issues * 7. The SEWA Bank: 'This Bank is Like Our Mother's Place' * 8. Women's Cooperatives: A Lever for Change * 9. Health Services: 'This Body is My Only Asset' * 10. SEWA Bharat: Reaching Across the Country * 11. Moving on: Pushing Policy Outward * Appendices * Glossary of Terms * Index

Gender inequality and entrepreneurship: the Indian silk industry.

The production of raw silk yarns from cocoons (reeling) is a crucial middle stage in the silk industry. The author reviews the experience of attempts to encourage women's entrepreneurship in this industry in Karnataka, South India. Reeling is a potentially lucrative field with possibilities for upward mobility from small-scale to large-scale production if credit is readily available. The industry in India employs large numbers of skilled female workers from all communities and is one of few in which a sectoral gender policy is being implemented. While these factors may be thought to be conducive to the development of women entrepreneurs, none were in the areas studied at the time of research. No women were involved in marketing through the official marketing system and no women's co-operatives were operating. While women were listed among registered reelers, men controlled the businesses. Men simply used women to obtain supplementary bank loans or funds through other avenues otherwise open to only women. Policies for women in reeling have therefore proved to be overwhelmingly unsuccessful. The author considers gender inequality and gender policy at length in this context and concludes that the problem is systemic and structural in nature. Policy implications are considered.

NGOs and gender policy: some issues from the south Indian silk-reeling industry.

In India, silk reeling, the middle stage in silk production, is potentially very profitable, and the silk industry has been required to adopt gender-aware policies such as appointing female staff and introducing gender sensitization training. To date, policies designed to encourage women's entrepreneurship in the reeling industry have been unsuccessful. Men have appropriated credit issued in women's names, and no women's cooperatives are currently in operation. The policies designed to encourage female entrepreneurship in reeling woefully overlooked the complexity of this work which involves a substantial investment of capital and significant risk. Women and girls continue to work as unpaid family workers and wage laborers without the benefits of governmental policies to protect their interests. In fact, attempts to introduce labor legislation to protect women have been blocked on the national level by the powerful Reelers' Association. Policies which address gender issues in the family and in the wider context of the silk industry are also lacking, and there is a wide variation in how women are able or unable to manipulate their positions to their advantage. Women's inabilities are the root cause of their inability to become entrepreneurs and improve their labor status. Nongovernmental organizations can enhance entrepreneurship and cooperative development by improving training in all aspects of running a business and in group formation. Women laborers must organize to improve wages and working conditions, and women must be able to increase their control over income and resources and their access to the outside world even as they decrease the time spent on unpaid reproductive labor.

Women's Cooperatives in Cameroon: The Cooperative Experiences of the Northwest and Southwest Provinces

In the history of the cooperative movement in anglophone Cameroon, women's cooperatives have played a particularly small role. Although the first cooperatives opened in the anglophone portion of the country in the 1920s and a small-scale women's project was attempted in the 1950s, the currently existing cooperatives for women began only in 1970. Today, in terms of number of members, amount of capitalization, scale of economic transactions, number of viable (or even operating) organizations, or any other measure, the women's cooperatives account for only a small portion of the total cooperative movement. In early 1970, beginning in the southern, coastal portions of the then West Cameroon state (the anglophone state in the bilingual Federal Republic of Cameroon) several governmental bodies and the women's wing of the Cameroon National Union (WCNU) began to organize women in urban areas in palm oil cooperatives. A number of societies came into being in a short period of time and the idea soon spread from its original site in the Southwest Province to the Northwest Province. Most of the original structures established in the coastal area have failed, but those in the Northwest Province continue to exist, though with a mixed record of success. Although in many respects the experiments in the Southwest and Northwest were similar, there are differences in purpose, governmental involvement, and social situation that may be related to the differences in success. Interviews with Cameroon officials and foreign assistance workers, archival and documentary material, and personal observations during two periods of research in Cameroon (1975-76 and 1980-81) have provided the data upon which to compare and analyze these two experiences.

The Limits of Sisterhood: The Woman's Building in Seattle, 1908-1921

A modest, two-story wooden structure has stood on the University of Washington campus in Seattle since 1909. Known as the Woman's Building, it served to nurture cooperation among all women at the Alaska-YukonPacific Exposition and then, more importantly, between female students at the school and the community's clubwomen. In 1916, however, female separatism and the sisterhood that it cultivated lost the battle to a new ideology-that of women's equality with men in the larger society. Only seven years after its inception, the space, which fostered women's cooperation, was assigned for other purposes and no facility was substituted by the institution to serve such an outmoded goal. The history of the emergence and downfall of the Woman's Building serves to illustrate a national phenomenon of the era, that of women's efforts to halt, in colleges and all society, the demise of respect for women's collaborative efforts. Here is simply one example of the broad and unsuccessful effort to stay the erosion of sisterhood. Mature women, since the late nineteenth century, had formed their own clubs and societies in reaction to their

Developing women's cooperatives: An experiment in rural Nigeria

This study focuses on the experiences of two groups of Yoruba women who tried to organise themselves along modern cooperative lines. The progress of the first group which tried to adhere to government regulations, is compared to that of the second, which moulded its own rules. Cohesion, personal development, and financial growth were found to be greater in the self‐regulating group. Implications for cooperative policy are discussed.