IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/devchg/v32y2001i1p33-54.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Women’s Movements and Challenges to Neopatrimonial Rule: Preliminary Observations from Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Aili Tripp

Abstract

Women’s movements in Africa represent one of the key societal forces challenging state clientelistic practices, the politicization of communal differences, and personalized rule. In the 1980s and 1990s we have witnessed not only the demise of patronage‐based women’s wings that were tied to ruling parties, but also the concurrent growth of independent women’s organizations with more far‐reaching agendas. The emergence of such autonomous organizations has been a consequence of the loss of state legitimacy, the opening‐up of political space, economic crisis, and the shrinking of state resources. Drawing on examples from Africa, this article shows why independent women’s organizations and movements have often been well situated to challenge clientelistic practices tied to the state. Gendered divisions of labour, gendered organizational modes and the general exclusion of women from both formal and informal political arenas have defined women’s relationship to the state, to power, and to patronage. These characteristics have, on occasion, put women’s movements in a position to challenge various state‐linked patronage practices. The article explores some of the implications of these challenges.

Suggested Citation

  • Aili Tripp, 2001. "Women’s Movements and Challenges to Neopatrimonial Rule: Preliminary Observations from Africa," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 32(1), pages 33-54, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:devchg:v:32:y:2001:i:1:p:33-54
    DOI: 10.1111/1467-7660.00195
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-7660.00195
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/1467-7660.00195?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mary Kay Gugerty & Michael Kremer, 2008. "Outside Funding and the Dynamics of Participation in Community Associations," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(3), pages 585-602, July.
    2. Kim, Seh Young, 2022. "Analyzing the impacts of informal institutional factors affecting gender inequality: Evidence from 43 countries," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    3. Branisa, Boris & Klasen, Stephan & Ziegler, Maria, 2013. "Gender Inequality in Social Institutions and Gendered Development Outcomes," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 252-268.
    4. Boris Branisa & Maria Ziegler, 2010. "Reexamining the link between gender and corruption: The role of social institutions," Courant Research Centre: Poverty, Equity and Growth - Discussion Papers 24, Courant Research Centre PEG.
    5. Okechukwu C. Iheduru, 2003. "Corporate Amazons or Empowerment Spice Girls?: Elite Black Businesswomen and Transformation in South Africa," Journal of Developing Societies, , vol. 19(4), pages 473-508, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:devchg:v:32:y:2001:i:1:p:33-54. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0012-155X .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.