Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals

Collective agency is a critical component of women’s empowerment within and beyond the household. Women often rely on groups to identify and achieve goals that advance them professionally, socially, economically and politically. However, a lack of clear measures of collective agency has hampered eff...

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Autores principales: Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S., ElDidi, Hagar, Pereira, Audrey, Heckert, Jessica, Kosec, Katrina, Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh, Seymour, Greg
Formato: Ponencia
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/137126
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author Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.
ElDidi, Hagar
Pereira, Audrey
Heckert, Jessica
Kosec, Katrina
Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh
Seymour, Greg
author_browse ElDidi, Hagar
Heckert, Jessica
Kosec, Katrina
Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.
Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh
Pereira, Audrey
Seymour, Greg
author_facet Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.
ElDidi, Hagar
Pereira, Audrey
Heckert, Jessica
Kosec, Katrina
Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh
Seymour, Greg
author_sort Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Collective agency is a critical component of women’s empowerment within and beyond the household. Women often rely on groups to identify and achieve goals that advance them professionally, socially, economically and politically. However, a lack of clear measures of collective agency has hampered efforts to study when groups are effective and why, and how is group effectiveness is shaped by features of the group and factors external to the group. Lack of clarity about the underlying concepts of collective agency, collective efficacy and collective action hampers efforts to develop systematic measures. This has resulted in a limited evidence base about the effectiveness and equity of different group-based approaches and governance arrangements for empowering women of different backgrounds beyond the household. We conduct a synthetic review of the terms used; and develop a conceptual framework for collective agency by applying Kabeer’s framework of resources, agency and achievements to the collective level, and examining the literature on collective agency, collective action and collective efficacy. We also draw from the proceedings of an expert workshop on conceptual foundations and measures of collective agency, with particular attention to conceptual clarity, applicability across contexts, costs, and feasibility of application within development project contexts. We discuss the challenges of developing a common instrument to measure collective agency in theory and practice—with examples of indicators of particular constructs drawn from a portfolio of projects—and offer a list of criteria for effective and holistic measurement of collective agency
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spelling CGSpace1371262025-11-06T05:03:12Z Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S. ElDidi, Hagar Pereira, Audrey Heckert, Jessica Kosec, Katrina Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh Seymour, Greg gender agriculture research women's empowerment Collective agency is a critical component of women’s empowerment within and beyond the household. Women often rely on groups to identify and achieve goals that advance them professionally, socially, economically and politically. However, a lack of clear measures of collective agency has hampered efforts to study when groups are effective and why, and how is group effectiveness is shaped by features of the group and factors external to the group. Lack of clarity about the underlying concepts of collective agency, collective efficacy and collective action hampers efforts to develop systematic measures. This has resulted in a limited evidence base about the effectiveness and equity of different group-based approaches and governance arrangements for empowering women of different backgrounds beyond the household. We conduct a synthetic review of the terms used; and develop a conceptual framework for collective agency by applying Kabeer’s framework of resources, agency and achievements to the collective level, and examining the literature on collective agency, collective action and collective efficacy. We also draw from the proceedings of an expert workshop on conceptual foundations and measures of collective agency, with particular attention to conceptual clarity, applicability across contexts, costs, and feasibility of application within development project contexts. We discuss the challenges of developing a common instrument to measure collective agency in theory and practice—with examples of indicators of particular constructs drawn from a portfolio of projects—and offer a list of criteria for effective and holistic measurement of collective agency 2023-10-12 2024-01-04T12:47:37Z 2024-01-04T12:47:37Z Presentation https://hdl.handle.net/10568/137126 en Open Access application/pdf CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform Meinzen-Dick, Ruth; ElDidi, Hagar; Pereira, Audrey; Heckert, Jessica; Kosec, Katrina; Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh; Seymour, Greg. 2023. Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals. Presentation. Presented at the CGIAR GENDER Conference 'From Research to Impact: Towards just and resilient agri-food systems', New Delhi, India, 9-12 October 2023. CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform
spellingShingle gender
agriculture
research
women's empowerment
Meinzen-Dick, Ruth S.
ElDidi, Hagar
Pereira, Audrey
Heckert, Jessica
Kosec, Katrina
Nchanji, Eileen Bogweh
Seymour, Greg
Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title_full Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title_fullStr Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title_full_unstemmed Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title_short Empowerment Beyond the Household: Measuring and Comparing the Collective Agency of Groups and Individuals
title_sort empowerment beyond the household measuring and comparing the collective agency of groups and individuals
topic gender
agriculture
research
women's empowerment
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/137126
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