Female Empowerment- Theory, Development Agencies, and Intervention (2016)

Undergraduate: Sara Khan

Faculty Advisor: Amanda Thompson
Department: Global Studies

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Female empowerment is an abstract but critical goal for the development of countries around the world. However, there should be a critical understanding of how we define female empowerment, especially considering the influences of Orientalist and Western feminism that have historically clouded the lenses of sociologists, feminists, and anthropologists about women from "other" countries. This research examines how Western feminist theory creates an incomplete understanding of women in the developing world, which then influences how agents of development like the World Health Organization and the World Bank define female empowerment and create intervention projects for certain goals. Using the case of menstrual health education in Pakistan, the thesis will detail how flawed notions of universal sisterhood and capitalist interest can shape intervention programs as "silver bullet" strategies instead of tackling actual obstacles to female empowerment- like patriarchy, access, and time.