IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v36y2008i7p1213-1232.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Reforms with a Female Face: Gender, Liberalization, and Economic Policy in Andhra Pradesh, India

Author

Listed:
  • Rao, Smriti

Abstract

Summary The state of Andhra Pradesh, India, provides a case study of a liberalization program with an emphasis on women's empowerment. Based on the state budget data and fieldwork data from two villages, this paper investigates the content of this policy regime to argue that women's empowerment policies were ultimately constrained by the policy context of liberalization. The state lowered shares of expenditure upon social reproduction and the substantive content of women's empowerment policy was reduced to a thrift and micro-credit program. Fieldwork data indicate, the latter lacks administrative support and relies upon the expenditure of time and resources by participants themselves, re-emphasizing class and caste inequalities among women and undermining the broader project of empowerment.

Suggested Citation

  • Rao, Smriti, 2008. "Reforms with a Female Face: Gender, Liberalization, and Economic Policy in Andhra Pradesh, India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(7), pages 1213-1232, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:36:y:2008:i:7:p:1213-1232
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305-750X(08)00057-0
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    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. Ghatak, Maitreesh, 2000. "Screening by the Company You Keep: Joint Liability Lending and the Peer Selection Effect," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 110(465), pages 601-631, July.
    2. Katherine Rankin, 2002. "Social Capital, Microfinance, and the Politics of Development," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(1), pages 1-24.
    3. Amin, Sajeda & Rai, Ashok S. & Topa, Giorgio, 2003. "Does microcredit reach the poor and vulnerable? Evidence from northern Bangladesh," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 59-82, February.
    4. Diagne, Aliou, 2000. "Design and sustainability issues of rural credit and savings programs," MP05 briefs 12, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    5. Vamsi Vakulabharanam, 2005. "Growth and Distress in a South Indian Peasant Economy During the Era of Economic Liberalisation," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(6), pages 971-997.
    6. Mark M. Pitt & Shahidur R. Khandker, 1998. "The Impact of Group-Based Credit Programs on Poor Households in Bangladesh: Does the Gender of Participants Matter?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 958-996, October.
    7. Morduch, Jonathan, 1999. "The role of subsidies in microfinance: evidence from the Grameen Bank," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 229-248, October.
    8. Ghatak, Maitreesh & Guinnane, Timothy W., 1999. "The economics of lending with joint liability: theory and practice," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 195-228, October.
    9. Bénédicte Vidaillet & V. d'Estaintot & P. Abécassis, 2005. "Introduction," Post-Print hal-00287137, HAL.
    10. Morduch, Jonathan, 2000. "The Microfinance Schism," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 617-629, April.
    11. Marilyn Power, 2004. "Social Provisioning As A Starting Point For Feminist Economics," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(3), pages 3-19.
    12. Khandker, S.R. & Khalily, B. & Khan, Z., 1995. "Grameen Bank: Performance and Sustainability," World Bank - Discussion Papers 306, World Bank.
    13. Armendariz de Aghion, Beatriz, 1999. "On the design of a credit agreement with peer monitoring," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 79-104, October.
    14. Goetz, Anne Marie & Gupta, Rina Sen, 1996. "Who takes the credit? Gender, power, and control over loan use in rural credit programs in Bangladesh," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 45-63, January.
    15. Elson, Diane & Cagatay, Nilufer, 2000. "The Social Content of Macroeconomic Policies," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 28(7), pages 1347-1364, July.
    16. Beatriz Armendáriz de Aghion & Jonathan Morduch, 2000. "Microfinance Beyond Group Lending," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 8(2), pages 401-420, July.
    17. Rahman, Aminur, 1999. "Micro-credit initiatives for equitable and sustainable development: Who pays?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 67-82, January.
    18. Kabeer, Naila, 2001. "Conflicts Over Credit: Re-Evaluating the Empowerment Potential of Loans to Women in Rural Bangladesh," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 63-84, January.
    19. Naila Kabeer, 1999. "Resources, Agency, Achievements: Reflections on the Measurement of Women's Empowerment," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 30(3), pages 435-464, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Isabelle Guérin, 2014. "Juggling with debt, social ties, and values the everyday use of microcredit in rural South India," Post-Print ird-01471734, HAL.
    2. Isabelle Guérin & Bert D'Espallier & G. Venkatasubramanian, 2015. "The Social Regulation of Markets: Why Microcredit Fails to Promote Jobs in Rural South India," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 46(6), pages 1277-1301, November.
    3. D'Espallier, Bert & Guérin, Isabelle & Mersland, Roy, 2011. "Women and Repayment in Microfinance: A Global Analysis," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 758-772, May.
    4. Dhar, Niladri Sekhar & Kaur, Navpreet, 2013. "Features of Rural Underemployment in India: Evidence from Nine Villages," Review of Agrarian Studies, Foundation for Agrarian Studies, vol. 3(1), July.
    5. Radhakrishnan, Smitha, 2015. "“Low Profile” or Entrepreneurial? Gender, Class, and Cultural Adaptation in the Global Microfinance Industry," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 264-274.
    6. Padmavathi Koride & Anjula Gurtoo, 2019. "A Comparison of Borrowing and Default Behaviour Between Men and Women," Studies in Microeconomics, , vol. 7(2), pages 189-209, December.
    7. Isabelle Agier & Supriya Garikipati & Isabelle Guérin & Ariane Szafarz, 2013. "Borrowing and Women’s Empowerment: Does Type of Credit Matter?," Working Papers CEB 13-038, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    8. Subash Surendran Padmaja & Aditya Korekallu Srinivasa & Pooja Trivedi & Kondapi Srinivas, 2023. "Women self‐help groups and intra‐household decision‐making in agriculture," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 94(3), pages 857-876, September.

    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. Gutiérrez-Nieto, Begoña & Serrano-Cinca, Carlos, 2019. "20 years of research in microfinance: An information management approach," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 183-197.
    2. Prabirendra Chatterjee & Sudipta, Sarangi, "undated". "Social Identity and Group Lending," Working Papers UWEC-2005-06-R, University of Washington, Department of Economics.
    3. Simon Zaby, 2019. "Science Mapping of the Global Knowledge Base on Microfinance: Influential Authors and Documents, 1989–2019," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(14), pages 1-21, July.
    4. Namizata Binaté Fofana & Gerrit Antonides & Anke Niehof & Johan Ophem, 2015. "How microfinance empowers women in Côte d’Ivoire," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 13(4), pages 1023-1041, December.
    5. Tunvir Ahamed Shohel & Sara Niner & Samanthi J. Gunawardana, 2023. "‘Even Though I Get a Loan, My Husband Controls It’: Rhetoric Versus Reality of Empowering Bangladeshi Women Through Microfinance Programs," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 35(4), pages 794-819, August.
    6. Dilruba Khanam & Muhammad Mohiuddin & Asadul Hoque & Olaf Weber, 2018. "Financing micro-entrepreneurs for poverty alleviation: a performance analysis of microfinance services offered by BRAC, ASA, and Proshika from Bangladesh," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 8(1), pages 1-17, December.
    7. Prasansha Kumari, 2022. "Elements of microfinance on spatial poverty alleviation in Sri Lanka: Structural equation modeling," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 14(2), pages 137-165, June.
    8. Craig P. Aubuchon & Rajdeep Sengupta, 2008. "The microfinance revolution: an overview," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 90(Jan), pages 9-30.
    9. Garikipati, Supriya, 2008. "The Impact of Lending to Women on Household Vulnerability and Women's Empowerment: Evidence from India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(12), pages 2620-2642, December.
    10. Islam, Asadul & Nguyen, Chau & Smyth, Russell, 2015. "Does microfinance change informal lending in village economies? Evidence from Bangladesh," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 141-156.
    11. Tassel, Eric Van, 2004. "Household bargaining and microfinance," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(2), pages 449-468, August.
    12. B, Ranjula & Wallentin, Fan Yang, 2008. "Economic or Non-Economic Factors – What Empowers Women?," Working Paper Series 2008:11, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    13. DeanS. Karlan, 2007. "Social connections and group banking," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 117(517), pages 52-84, February.
    14. M. Shahe Emran & A. K. M. Mahbub Morshed & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 2021. "Microfinance and missing markets," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(1), pages 34-67, February.
    15. Godquin, Marie, 2004. "Microfinance Repayment Performance in Bangladesh: How to Improve the Allocation of Loans by MFIs," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(11), pages 1909-1926, November.
    16. James C. Brau & Gary M. Woller, 2004. "Microfinance: A Comprehensive Review of the Existing Literature," Journal of Entrepreneurial Finance, Pepperdine University, Graziadio School of Business and Management, vol. 9(1), pages 1-28, Spring.
    17. Paul A. Onyina & Sean Turnell, 2013. "The Impacts Of A Microfinance Lending Scheme On Clients In Ghana," Accounting & Taxation, The Institute for Business and Finance Research, vol. 5(2), pages 79-88.
    18. Quibria, M. G., 2012. "Microcredit and Poverty Alleviation: Can Microcredit Close the Deal?," WIDER Working Paper Series 078, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    19. Prabal Roy Chowdhury, 2003. "Group-lending: Sequential financing, lender monitoring and joint liability," Discussion Papers 04-10, Indian Statistical Institute, Delhi.
    20. Asadul Islam & Debayan Pakrashi, 2014. "The Microcredit Puzzle: Labour Supply Behaviour of Rural Households in Bangladesh," Monash Economics Working Papers 24-14, Monash University, Department of Economics.

    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:eee:wdevel:v:36:y:2008:i:7:p:1213-1232. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    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.