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Micro-Finance, Women’s Empowerment and Fertility Decline in Bangladesh: How Important Was Women’s Agency?

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  • Maren Duvendack
  • Richard Palmer-Jones

Abstract

As Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen has argued “[Bangladesh’s development achievements have] important lessons for other countries across the globe, [in particular a focus on] reducing gender inequality”. A major avenue through which this emphasis has been manifest lies, according to this narrative, in enhancements to women’s agency for instrumental and intrinsic reasons particularly through innovations in family planning and microfinance. The “Bangladesh paradox” of improved wellbeing despite low economic growth over the last four decades is claimed as a paradigmatic case of the spread of both modern family planning programmes and microfinance leading to women’s empowerment and fertility reduction. In this paper we show that the links between microfinance, empowerment and fertility reduction, are fraught with problems, and far from robust; hence the claimed causal links between microfinance and family planning via women’s empowerment needs to be further reconsidered.

Suggested Citation

  • Maren Duvendack & Richard Palmer-Jones, 2017. "Micro-Finance, Women’s Empowerment and Fertility Decline in Bangladesh: How Important Was Women’s Agency?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(5), pages 664-683, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:53:y:2017:i:5:p:664-683
    DOI: 10.1080/00220388.2016.1205731
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. World Bank, 2008. "Poverty Assessment for Bangladesh," World Bank Publications - Reports 28239, The World Bank Group.
    2. World Bank, 2013. "Bangladesh - Poverty Assessment : Assessing a Decade of Progress in Reducing Poverty, 2000-2010," World Bank Publications - Reports 16622, The World Bank Group.
    3. World Bank, 2008. "Bangladesh - Poverty Assessment for Bangladesh : Creating Opportunities and Bridging the East-West Divide," World Bank Publications - Reports 6144, The World Bank Group.
    4. World Bank, 2008. "Bangladesh - Poverty Assessment for Bangladesh : Creating Opportunities and Bridging the East-West Divide," World Bank Publications - Reports 7886, The World Bank Group.
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    2. Karimli, Leyla & Lecoutere, Els & Wells, Christine R. & Ismayilova, Leyla, 2021. "More assets, more decision-making power? Mediation model in a cluster-randomized controlled trial evaluating the effect of the graduation program on women's empowerment in Burkina Faso," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    3. Ameen, Nisreen & Shah, Mahmood Hussain & Sims, Julian & Choudrie, Jyoti & Willis, Robert, 2020. "Are there peas in a pod when considering mobile phone and mobile applications use: A quantitative study," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).

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