IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/jsecdv/v19y2017i1d10.1007_s40847-017-0043-1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fuzziness in conceptualisation of women’s empowerment, access to resources and autonomy: evidence from Indian states

Author

Listed:
  • Tulika Tripathi

    (Central University of Gujarat)

  • Nripendra K. Mishra

    (Banaras Hindu University)

Abstract

Empowerment is instrumentally important for achieving positive development outcomes and well-being of life which lies in the doing and being what one values and have reason to value, i.e. agency. Sen made a strong claim for increasing the agency of the individual to enable them to be an effective agent of their own well-being and development. The concept of empowerment is very complex in itself, indeed very fuzzy also. Different scholars hold different definition of empowerment according to the need of their work. Women’s agency, autonomy and empowerment are widely used idea in development literature and capability approach. But there exists substantial ambiguity in conception of these ideas. While women’s well-being and women’s agency is sufficiently distinguished from each other, there seems to be a large overlap between agency and empowerment and between agency and autonomy. The present paper examines various conceptions of these ideas to clearly mark the overlapping zones and distinguishing features of respective concepts. It is shown that operationalisation of these concepts in empirical research covering all states of India is quite difficult and given the limitation of data sources only some dimensions of empowerment can be empirically tested at all India level. This paper uses NFHS-3 data set to do so. The second part of the paper carries out empirical testing of indicators of access to resources and autonomy for major 15 states of India and shows that access to resources and autonomy are not necessarily coterminous.

Suggested Citation

  • Tulika Tripathi & Nripendra K. Mishra, 2017. "Fuzziness in conceptualisation of women’s empowerment, access to resources and autonomy: evidence from Indian states," Journal of Social and Economic Development, Springer;Institute for Social and Economic Change, vol. 19(1), pages 60-82, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:jsecdv:v:19:y:2017:i:1:d:10.1007_s40847-017-0043-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s40847-017-0043-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s40847-017-0043-1
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s40847-017-0043-1?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hoddinott, John & Haddad, Lawrence, 1995. "Does Female Income Share Influence Household Expenditures? Evidence from Cote d'Ivoire," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 57(1), pages 77-96, February.
    2. Hippu Salk Kristle Nathan & Srijit Mishra & B. Sudhakara Reddy, 2008. "An Alternative Approach to Measure HDI," Microeconomics Working Papers 22403, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    3. Shireen J. Jejeebhoy & Zeba A. Sathar, 2001. "Women's Autonomy in India and Pakistan: The Influence of Religion and Region," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 27(4), pages 687-712, December.
    4. Tzannatos, Zafiris, 1999. "Women and Labor Market Changes in the Global Economy: Growth Helps, Inequalities Hurt and Public Policy Matters," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 551-569, March.
    5. Karen Mason & Herbert Smith, 2000. "Husbands’ versus wives’ fertility goals and use of contraception: The influence of gender context in five Asian countries," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 37(3), pages 299-311, August.
    6. Alsop, Ruth & Heinsohn, Nina, 2005. "Measuring empowerment in practice: structuring analysis and framing indicators," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3510, The World Bank.
    7. Sabina Alkire, 2005. "Subjective Quantitative Studies of Human Agency," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 74(1), pages 217-260, October.
    8. Hanny Cueva Beteta, 2006. "What is missing in measures of Women's Empowerment?," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(2), pages 221-241.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yasmin, Nazia & Grundmann, Philipp, 2020. "Home-cooked energy transitions: Women empowerment and biogas-based cooking technology in Pakistan," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    2. Robin A. Richardson, 2018. "Measuring Women’s Empowerment: A Critical Review of Current Practices and Recommendations for Researchers," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 137(2), pages 539-557, June.
    3. Roy, Sanchari & Morton, Matthew & Bhattacharya, Shrayana, 2018. "Hidden human capital: Self-efficacy, aspirations and achievements of adolescent and young women in India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 161-180.
    4. Astrid Sneyers & Anneleen Vandeplas, 2013. "Girl Power in Agricultural Production: How Much Does it Yield? A Case-Study on the Dairy Sector in India," Working Papers id:5562, eSocialSciences.
    5. Alkire, Sabina & Meinzen-Dick, Ruth & Peterman, Amber & Quisumbing, Agnes & Seymour, Greg & Vaz, Ana, 2013. "The Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 71-91.
    6. van den Bold, Mara & Quisumbing, Agnes R. & Gillespie, Stuart, 2013. "Women’s empowerment and nutrition: An evidence review:," IFPRI discussion papers 1294, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    7. Stephen Baffour Adjei, 2015. "Assessing Women Empowerment in Africa," Psychology and Developing Societies, , vol. 27(1), pages 58-80, March.
    8. Gressel, Christie M. & Rashed, Tarek & Maciuika, Laura Aswati & Sheshadri, Srividya & Coley, Christopher & Kongeseri, Sreeram & Bhavani, Rao R, 2020. "Vulnerability mapping: A conceptual framework towards a context-based approach to women’s empowerment," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 20(C).
    9. Vijayamohanan, Pillai N. & Asalatha, B. P., 2012. "Measuring Women Empowerment: Dissecting the Methodological Discourse," MPRA Paper 44077, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Maria Ana Lugo & Esfandiar Maasoumi, 2008. "Multidimensional Poverty Measures from an Information Theory Perspective," Working Papers 85, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    11. Roy Chowdhury, Soumi & Bohara, Alok K. & Horn, Brady P., 2018. "Balance of Power, Domestic Violence, and Health Injuries: Evidence from Demographic and Health Survey of Nepal," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 18-29.
    12. Ragui Assaad & Hanan Nazier & Rasha Ramadan, 2015. "Empowerment is a Community Affair: Community Level Determinants of Married Women's Empowerment in Egypt," Working Papers 959, Economic Research Forum, revised Oct 2015.
    13. Pratley, Pierre, 2016. "Associations between quantitative measures of women's empowerment and access to care and health status for mothers and their children: A systematic review of evidence from the developing world," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 119-131.
    14. Tania Burchardt & Holly Holder, 2012. "Developing Survey Measures of Inequality of Autonomy in the UK," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 106(1), pages 1-25, March.
    15. Mumtaz, Zubia & Salway, Sarah, 2009. "Understanding gendered influences on women's reproductive health in Pakistan: Moving beyond the autonomy paradigm," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(7), pages 1349-1356, April.
    16. Stephanie Seguino & Mark Setterfield, 2010. "Gender Equality and the Sustainability of Steady State Growth Paths," Chapters, in: Mark Setterfield (ed.), Handbook of Alternative Theories of Economic Growth, chapter 18, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    17. Sado, Lantona & Spaho, Alma & Hotchkiss, David R., 2014. "The influence of women's empowerment on maternal health care utilization: Evidence from Albania," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 169-177.
    18. repec:lic:licosd:34113 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Lu Gram & Joanna Morrison & Jolene Skordis-Worrall, 2019. "Organising Concepts of ‘Women’s Empowerment’ for Measurement: A Typology," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 143(3), pages 1349-1376, June.
    20. Yvonne Jie Chen & Namrata Chindarkar, 2017. "The Value of Skills – Raising the Socioeconomic Status of Rural Women in India," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 35(2), pages 229-261, January.
    21. Cristina Elisa Orso & Enrico Fabrizi, 2013. "Microcredit and women's empowerment in Bangladesh: a structural equation model for categorical observed variables," DISCE - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali dises1396, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).

    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:spr:jsecdv:v:19:y:2017:i:1:d:10.1007_s40847-017-0043-1. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.