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Micro‐finance programmes are currently dominated by the 'financial self‐sustainability paradigm' where women's participation in groups is promoted as a key means of increasing financial sustainability while at the same time assumed to automatically empower them. This article examines the experience of seven micro‐finance programmes in Cameroon. The evidence indicates that micro‐finance programmes which build social capital can indeed make a significant contribution to women's empowerment. However, serious questions need to be asked about what sorts of norms, networks and associations are to be promoted, in whose interests, and how they can best contribute to empowerment, particularly for the poorest women. Where the complexities of power relations and inequality are ignored, reliance on social capital as a mechanism for reducing programme costs may undermine programme aims not only of empowerment but also of financial sustainability and poverty targeting.

The current expansion in microfinance programs targeting women is dominated by the "financial self-sustainability paradigm" aimed at developing programs that will ultimately be independent of donor funds. Evidence from Asia & Africa indicates that although to some extent empowerment aims can be integrated into financial sustainability "Best Practice," there are also serious tensions. Increasing contribution of microfinance to women's empowerment will require a more participatory approach to program management & linking grassroots groups with other women's organizations. These in turn will require changes in current donor priorities & procedures both in relation to microfinance itself & to macrolevel economic & social policy. 1 Figure, 4 Boxes, 1 Appendix, 49 References. Adapted from the source document.

ABSTRACTIn recent years, participatory development has become an established orthodoxy among development agencies across the political spectrum; at the same time, the importance of consulting with and recruiting women has been highlighted in most discussions of participatory strategies. Drawing on the author's own research and a range of secondary sources, this article focuses on gender aspects of participatory projects. The evidence suggests that gender inequalities in resources, time availability and power, influence the activities, priorities and framework of participatory projects just as much as 'top‐down' development and market activities. Contrary to the view of a number of writers and activists on participatory development, increasing the numbers of women involved in participatory projects cannot, therefore, be seen as a soft alternative to specific attention to change in gender inequality. Meeting the demands of poor women in the South will require not only local participatory projects, but a linking with wider movements for change in the national and international development agenda.

AbstractThis paper discusses research by the author on women and cooperatives in India. The findings are supplemented by information from preliminary research by the author on a number of other cooperatives in which women were involved and from secondary sources. The research indicates that producer cooperatives for women can be successful if there are even a few women with the necessary skills and time required. Many cooperatives studied failed in part because of lack of enthusiasm of the women involved, indicating the problems the promotion of producer cooperatives involves. The paper argues that a far more wide‐ranging debate is needed about the ways in which the ideals of cooperation and empowerment can be preserved, while at the same time responding to the context in which cooperatives have to operate. There is no 'ideal cooperative' but a range of possible options. The varying needs of women require a participatory transformation of both state and NGO cooperative development agencies. Much greater commitment is needed to assist women in relevant ways.

ABSTRACTSmall‐scale industry development, particularly when targeting disadvantaged groups, has often been promoted as a possible alternative to fundamental change in property relations, and for women as a way of improving their position without direct forms of feminist organization. This article discusses a relatively successful case of small‐scale entrepreneurship development in the silk reeling industry in five villages in South India. In this area, despite the substantial amounts of capital and risk involved, an unusually high number of Scheduled Caste ex‐labourers have managed to become reasonably successful entrepreneurs. Based on the findings of survey and anthropological research conducted over a period of six months between 1989 and 1991 it considers the factors contributing to these cases' success: characteristics of the reeling industry, the nature of government intervention and the socioeconomic and historical context of this particular area. However, as argued in the second half of the article, the upward mobility for some has been dependent on the availability of cheap labour and the manipulation of caste and family loyalties within the disadvantaged groups. Significantly, gender inequalities have remained, despite the potentially powerful position of a skilled female labour force in a situation of increasing labour shortage.

ABSTRACTCo‐operatives have been widely promoted as the ideal type of project for women. Because of the focus on income earning, they have been seen as less threatening than more explicit attempts to organize feminist consciousness‐raising groups. Based on field research conducted in 1988, this article discusses the experience of women in the Nicaraguan tailoring co‐operatives. After the 1979 Revolution, these were set up on a large scale as part of a wider economic policy and grassroots political mobilization. After an initial period of expansion in which many women benefited both in improved income and access to training and management experience, the co‐operatives found themselves in serious difficulty by 1988. It is argued that even without the wider economic crisis in Nicaragua, they would have faced serious problems without extensive and probably unsustainable state support. Although co‐operative employment has considerable potential, the Nicaraguan case highlights the need for new thinking on ways to resolve basic tensions between economic efficiency and worker participation. It also casts doubt on their viability as a development alternative for women, without specific attention to basic gender inequalities.