Must Women Work Together? Development Agency Assumptions versus Changing Relations of Production in Southern Malawi Households*
| Autor: | Jean Davison |
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| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Women Wielding the Hoe ISBN: 9781003135685 Women Wielding the Hoe: Lessons from Rural Africa for Feminist Theory and Development Practice |
| DOI: | 10.4324/9781003135685-14 |
| Popis: | Rural development and income-generating activities requiring women's cooperative production have been part of development agencies' tool kit over the last decade. In some places these efforts have taken hold, but in other areas, such as Malawi, not. This article examines a key factor contributing to this failure: the assumption that women prefer cooperative production to individual production. The article examines major changes in household productive relations that have intensified women's agricultural work load while undermining their economic autonomy in matrilineal, peasant communities in Zomba district, southern Malawi. The viability of donor-funded projects in Malawi that depend on cooperative production is considered in view of existing rural labour patterns. The first section considers'cooperative' forms of labour and questions their universal applicability to rural Africa. The next section takes up key historical factors that have altered household productive relations in southern Malawi. The third section examines the preference given, historically and currently, to individual family production over collaborative production in agriculture. The conclusion outlines the implications of women's avoidance of cooperative work for donor agencies. Bibliogr. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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