Women's Empowerment and Good Governance Through - amarc

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Best Experiences for an Action Research Process
is slowing down access to employment opportunities. Only women from affluent backgrounds
have access to managerial positions while the majority still occupy low-level positions such as
domestic, cleaning, and, of late, security duties.
• Apathy of women for the programs that promote social change is another challenge that delays
women’s empowerment. For example, when advertisement for positions get publicized,
they are made explicitly clear that preference would be given to women as a previously disadvantaged
group, but the majority of people responding to these advertisements are men.
In addition, the majority of women who respond and make it for interviews lack confidence as
a result of traditional practices that place women as inferior to men. The laws that are put in
place are not enough to accelerate progress in putting women on par with men since “mind
change” on the side of women cannot happen overnight.
• Lack of support for and confidence in women by women also play a large part in the failure
to achievegender equality. Most obstacles that women face are not exactly in the system but
are engrossed within women themselves who still doubt their capacity and capabilities and
who still believe in being led by men. For example, women in South Africa make up 52 per
cent of the population and there are 1.2 million more on the voters’ roll than men. Considering
these statistics, women can use their collective power in voting for women in order to
access the political power. Instead, when the ruling party recently went through the process
of nominating the new leadership in preparation for the country’s elections in 2009, the ruling
party’s women’s league nominated only men for the positions of President and Deputy President
despite the fact that they had possible candidates who occupy influential positions in the
Cabinet. Unfortunately, this trend is worse in the case of the private sector, including media
organizations, where women’s representation is poor.
• Poverty and lack of financial assistance are the greatest contributors to gender inequality.
South Africa developed a “Black Economic Empowerment” policy meant to provide business
opportunities to previously disadvantaged groups, of which women are prioritized as the most
deserving group. Be that as it may, the social and economic battles for women are far from
over. Women lack capital to guarantee them access to financial assistance and need male
guarantors to secure funding for start-up businesses. Lack of capital and financial dependence
on men make women highly vulnerable to emotional and physical abuse, including rape and
other forms of violence against women. While awareness programs driven by women net-