INTRODUCTION
Women empowerment and social inclusion are the key components to
development discourse in developing countries. Empowerment is a multi-
dimensional process that consists of social, economic, cultural, legal,
psychological and political aspects. It helps people to gain control over their
lives by raising awareness and agency building. Agency, resources and
outcomes are the fundamental elements of empowerment. First, agency
describes the process of decision making including deception, negotiation and
manipulation which permit women to define their life goals and act upon them.
It encompasses the ability of women to formulate strategic choices, control over
resources and decisions which affect important life outcomes. Secondly, the
resource is the precondition is essential for women to exercise choice. Thus,
women should have access to future claims to human, social and material
resources. Finally, the outcomes provide the well-being that women can
experience as a result of access to agency and resources.
An inclusive society is achieved through reducing discrimination and
inequalities in different spheres of life. India is one of the world’s fastest
growing economies where the population ratio of men (51.5%) and women
(48.5%) are almost equal (Census, 2011). India as a developing country, the
participation of both men and women are critical in social and economic
development. Empirical evidence suggests that women empowerment leads to
higher social inclusion. Thus it is likely to reduce inequalities in different
aspects of the society. Social exclusion and empowerment are dynamic and
multidimensional concepts. Social exclusion can be seen when different
elements combine to trap individuals in accumulation of disadvantage. These
include but not limited to housing, education, income, access to health facilities,
financial resources and quality of the environment which affect individual’s
well-being. The causal dimensions of social exclusion are linked to restricted
access to the basic resources necessary for social belonging including non-
material resources such as interpersonal respect and trust needed for self-
confidence and self-esteem both individually and collectively.
These manifestations imply that empowerment and social exclusion are of
central importance in quality of life of the people (Philips, 2006). In the history,
women have been the vehicles and drivers of positive change and outgrowth.
Women are no exception. Women irrespective of religion have similar
expectations and aspirations as their male counterparts. Public perception is that
women are unequal and oppressed who needs to be identified, challenged and
addressed within the wider communities (DCLG, 2008). Women can instigate
the change to balance multitask and tackle the different challenges facing today.
Hence, there is a need to empower and strengthen the leadership among women
in different aspects of their life so that they can proactively support those who
are vulnerable and use their knowledge and skills to support other women in the
same community through individual and collective efforts (DCLG, 2008). They
are inadequately empowered to access the benefits of development and the
fundamental rights guaranteed in the constitution (Sachar Committee Report,
2007).
Women are suffering from low level empowerment resulted from traditional
conservative thinking and patriarchy of the society. In this backdrop, the present
study conducted at Calicut district of Kerala to study empowerment and its
relationship with social exclusion/inclusion. The study hypothesized that there
is a significant cause and effect relationship between empowerment and social
exclusion of women with a direction that higher empowerment would lead to
reduced social exclusion. Further, better socio-economic statuses predict better
empowerment of Women. Thus, this study contributes to the knowledge that
how empowerment acts as a determinant to social exclusion.
PROBLEMS FACED IN THE
COMMUNITY:
The Tamil Nadu government has come up with a peculiar rehabilitation plan for
many of those rendered homeless by the recent floods – sending them to other
areas that were inundated.
On December 7, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa announced that
10,000 poor families will be relocated to tenements in the colonies of Ezhil
Nagar and Perumbakkam on the outskirts of Chennai. There are 29,864 flats in
the two areas, according to government documents, and of these 5,650 are
occupied, says a study by the non-profit Transparent Cities Network, CAG.
Built at an estimated cost of Rs 1,775 crores under the centrally-sponsored
Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, Ezhil Nagar and
Perumbakkam are plagued by problems.
For one, they do not have a comprehensive storm water drain network, because
of which the tenements were swamped during the recent spell of heavy rain and
flooding. “The water was at neck-level,” said one resident who moved out of
Perumbakkam during the floods. “There was no way I could stay there.”
Those who stayed behind had to break into and take refuge in the empty flats on
the upper stories, says Babu, another resident. “We did not have water or
electricity for a week,” he added.
Lack of infrastructure:
Though conceived of as “integrated townships” with modern facilities, Ezhil
Nagar and Perumbakkam lack essential urban infrastructure and services. Even
in normal times, there is a shortage of water and electricity outages are
common. “We get water only once or twice a day and the electricity supply
keeps getting cut,” said a resident of Ezhil Nagar.
The colonies have only one primary school each, no ration shops or public
health centres, according to fact-finding reports of the Transparent Cities
Network, CAG.
Only two buses ply from the bus stop at Ezhil Nagar and they are invariably
late, says Murugan, another resident. Residents undertake long journeys to the
city because there are no jobs available here. “Many of us are fishermen,”
Murugan says, and “here there is no sea”.
Because of the lack of infrastructure, services and livelihood opportunities,
many residents of Ezhil Nagar and Perumbakkam have illegally rented out their
flats and moved back to slum settlements in the heart of the city. Others too
want to leave. “It is not convenient to live here,” said a resident of Ezhil Nagar.
The present occupants of Ezhil Nagar and Perumbakkam view the state
government’s plan to resettle 10,000 flood-affected families here with
apprehension. Says one resident, “If they come here, then they will face endless
difficulties. It will be a setback, not a relief package.”
Controversial project:
The tenements of Ezhil Nagar and Perumbakkam tenements have been
controversial from the start, according to activists and researchers.
A report by the Right to City movement – a coalition of slum residents,
researchers and activists – found problems with the way funds for the project
were accessed under the JNNURM. It also questioned the design of the
tenements and the quality of their construction. The report found that the project
was completed without environmental or social impact assessments, both of
which are required under the National Rehabilitation and Resettlement Policy of
2007.
“Ezhil Nagar is near a water body and Perumbakkam is built on a lake bed.
Both areas were badly affected during the recent floods,” said Priti Narayan, a
researcher and activist studying at Rutgers University, US. “Moving flood-
affected victims from... one precarious location to another is not only
counterproductive but also increases their vulnerability. Locating them in
houses where livelihoods are difficult to find will make it impossible for them
to recover from the devastation caused by the flood.”
Narayan added: “An alternative to resettling the poor outside the city is to focus
on the rehabilitation of slums in-situ where possible, or at least in central city
areas, so that the livelihoods of slum residents are not impacted and municipal
services are of better quality.”
But the government, it seems, has not learnt its lessons. It wants a quick-fix
remedy, not a long-term solution to the problems of the poor.
THE SITUATION OF WIDOWS IN
SOUTH INDIA:
Data from the 2001 census indicate that there were 13.2 million households in
India headed by widowed women, compared to about 6.7 million households
headed by widowed men (Registrar General & Census Commissioner of India,
2001). In Tamil Nadu alone, the number of widowed female heads of
households was three times greater than male widowed heads of households
(1.5 million versus 420 thousand) (Registrar General & Census Commissioner
of India, 2001).
There is some evidence suggesting that Indian women, especially from rural
areas and lower castes, have lower levels of literacy, limited access to financial
resources and opportunities, experience poor health, and have lower rates of
participation in the formal economy (Deshpande, 2002; Lahiri-Dutt & Samanta,
2006; Mohindra, 2008). Evidence also suggests that women, who become
widowed or deserted by their husbands, often experience higher levels of
marginalization due to cultural and religious practices (e.g., ceremonies that
symbolized passage into widowhood, prohibition of wearing jewelry and other
adornments, and exclusion from wedding ceremonies).
Moreover, widows’ inheritance rights, especially in relation to land, are not well
defined and recognized, further heightening vulnerability (Chen, 1998; World
Public Opinion, 2008). In a recent poll that compared 17 countries on
discrimination against widows, a significant number of the Indian sample, 42%,
reported that widowed women were treated somewhat or a great deal worse than
other women (World Public Opinion, 2008). A considerable number (46%) of
the Indian sample indicated that divorced women were treated worse than other
women.
Furthermore, in their study of widows in rural South India, Dreze and
Srinivasan (1998) found that widows experienced the highest rate of poverty
followed by women who had never been married, widowers, and men who had
never been married. Further, Mari Bhat (1994) found that mortality rates among
Indian widows were nearly twice as high as mortality rates of married women
of the same age.
Evidence also suggests that the plight of women in Tamil Nadu, particularly
widows, degenerated following the Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004. Indeed,
studies have shown that widows were vulnerable to abuse within relief camps
and experienced discrimination (see e.g., APWLD, 2006). In addition, Human
Rights Watch (2005) reported that humanitarian assistance often did not reach
women because the distribution of relief and compensation was carried out
through male heads of households. The situation of widows was further
confounded by illiteracy, a common factor among poor women, forcing many
of them to rely on family members, often males, for assistance with accessing
relief (HRW, 2005).
The limited evidence that exists on the situation of widows and/or abandoned
women in India is revealing. It suggests that this group of women is particularly
at-risk for social exclusion and various forms of gender-based discrimination.
THE PROBLEM OF WOMEN AND
SOCIETY:
Since the days of old, women have been the target of a lot of attention in
the lives of societies. In old Greek, Roman, and Indian societies, the status of
women was poor. They did not enjoy the same legal rights as men. They were
outcast and looked at with contempt. The famous Indian leader Jawaharlal
Nehru says in his book The Discovery of India:
The legal status of women in the Laws of Manu was poor and doubtful.
In Medieval times the humanness and constitution of women was subject of
doubt; it was questionable whether they had souls like men or not? Or whether
theirs were like animal souls. Some philosophers of Rome went even further
and declared that women had no souls and will not be resurrected in the
Hereafter with men.
As for Arabs before Islam, their attitude was something else; they thought of
women as a potential source of disgrace. A man hated to beget a female. Some
men even went so far as to get rid of a newly born female by burying her alive
at birth.
The French Revolution, considered by many world thinkers as a positive
historical turning point in the stream of human life and seen as a cultural
lighthouse in contemporary history, gave freedom to men, but not to women.
Article 1 of its Declaration of Human Rights says, “Men are born and remain
free.” Thus, it is quite clear that a woman had no place in the world of
freedom. When some French intellectuals tried to rectify this serious flaw, the
majority reacted with contempt and scorn. When a French lady called
Docourge submitted to the French national assembly a draft resolution that
holds women equal to men, her proposal was rejected and she was tried and
beheaded, according to Dr. George Jabour in his book Al 'Arab wa Huqooq Al-
Insaan (Arabs and Human Rights).
French scholar Gustave Le Bon declares in his book the Spirit of Sociality in
response to advocates of equality between men and women:
" Women were equal to men only in times of decadence "
The U.N. Charter, which was meant to correct the injustice and contempt
towards women committed by the French Revolution, certainly represented a
turning point in human history and a bright dawn in the horizon, giving hope to
successive generations in human communities. Yet, the share of women in that
charter was scant and did not meet their ambitions or fit their status. It did not
accord women the same degree of attention and honor that it gave to men. It
makes no more than two references to women, both casual, and in subordinate
clauses which display no special concern for women and their status.
The first reference is in the Charter’s preamble, which expresses the
determination of the peoples of the United Nations “to reaffirm faith in
fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the
equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.” The second
reference is in paragraph c of Article 76, which says that “the basic objectives
of the trusteeship system … shall be … to encourage respect for human rights
and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex,
language, or religion.”
Later, explanatory bylaws of the Charter emptied even these modest statements
of their content as regards the dignity and social status of women, and turned
them into a source of misery and harm for women, reducing their rights and
dignity. These bylaws
1. Declare equality between man and woman in rights and duties, without
consideration of any distinction or of the distinctive characteristics of the
latter;
2. Burden women with heavy and numerous tasks that are incompatible with
feminine nature and contrary to the great human mission of women;
3. Adopt disgraceful concepts of the family, the values of family ties, and the
responsibilities of family performance, which weakens the role of women
in the family structure and cancel their noble mission in the stable social
structure;
4. Endorse the principle of multiple family types and cancel the values and
controls of joint man and woman responsibility in building a stable
interactive family, thus creating chaos and disorder in the family with
consequent, uncountable social problems, one of the most serious of which
is the creation of a generation with no sense of belonging or responsibility,
with a resulting increase in the rates of crime and serious diseases, which
threaten the security and civilized future of human communities;
5. Permits all types of sexual relations, which amounts to a repulsive
aggression against the dignity of women, contempt of their femininity and
humanness, and a stark and audacious ravishment of their rights.
This, in short, is the tragic and horrifying position of women in the standards of
ancient and contemporary cultures and civilizations. Unfortunately, women are
still abused and marginalized in most human societies, although divine
religions, particularly Islam, emphasize women’s dignity and basic role in the
walks of life.
Islam in particular has laid firm foundations for the dignity and social status of
women within the context of its view of the universe, mankind, and life.
Islam’s profound view of the relationship of the three worlds – the universe,
mankind, and life – is based on a belief that the wisdom of God, the Most
Sublime, dictates that the whole universe be structured in accordance with the
principle of the mating of pairs, each of which is complementary rather than
identical.
God, the Most Exalted, made the trait of immortal singleness that has no need to
be complemented by any thing else an exclusive quality of His.
Say: “He is God, the One and only, ◘ God, the Eternal; ◘ He begets none, nor is
He begotten, ◘ and there is nothing that could be compared to Him (Al-Ikhlas
CXII: 1 – 4).
He, the Most Exalted, has no need for a partner, whether equal or inferior to
Him. He, the Most Glorious, is Self-Sufficient and Most-Exalted and has no
one that is similar or equal to Him,
When I speak of complementarity rather than similarity in reference to the
principle of mating, I should point out that God’s wisdom dictates this
complementarity and scientific laws, and applications support and confirm it.
There is no mating of identical things; they rather stand in opposition and
repulsion of each other. This can be seen in the smallest structured unit in the
universe, which is the atom. Recent scientific discoveries indicate that even a
neutron, a particle within an atom, is made of two opposite, disparate poles,
which confirms the inimitability of the Creation, which is based on the mating
of complementary, rather than identical, elements. Full similarity is a cause of
opposition and repulsion.
I believe that the issue of complementarity and identicalness and the difference
between them is an essential turning point in understanding the spirit of
man/woman relationship. It is also an objective and equitable approach to
understand the complementarity of their responsibilities in the fields of life.
Moreover, the principle of complementarity explains and clarifies the question
of differentiation between woman and man. Each of them has superior points
and inferior points, and neither of them is definitely superior to the other. Each
is superior in what God prefers him or her over the other.
Men are guardians of women, because of the advantage He has given some of
them over the others and because of what they spend of their wealth
Do not covet the things by which God has favored some of you over others.
Men are entitled to a share of what they earn, and women are similarly entitled.
Therefore, ask God to give you out of His bounty. God is a witness of
everything
The question guardianship, which some use as an excuse to abuse the dignity of
women and reduce their humanness and their status, is, the way I understand it,
by no means an advantage for men and cannot be included in the standards of
definite superiority. It is merely an administrative, conditional arrangement.
Each of the two, the woman and the man, is superior to the other by what God,
the Most Sublime, has favored him or her over the other and by the abilities
God has given him or her and not the other. Each of the two is a guardian
within the framework of his specialization and responsibilities, within the
context of the general approach of Islam and the context of the values, rules,
and controls of Islamic Law. I can say here that there are two types of
guardianship, a particular type and a general one. Each of the two, man and
woman, has a guardianship within the advantage and abilities that God, the
Most Sublime, has favored him or her with. As for general guardianship, it has
to go to one of the two in order for their relationship and cooperation to be
smooth. “Had there been deities in them other than God, they would have fallen
into ruin!” The noble Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, commands:
“If you are three, choose one of you as a leader.” All this falls within the
framework of the general divine principle of mutual support between them,
which is expressed in the words of God, the Most Sublime:
Ibn Omar, may God be pleased with him and his father says:
I have heard God’s Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, say, “Indeed
each of you is a shepherd, and each is responsible for his flock. The ruler of
people is a shepherd, responsible for his flock. A man in his house is a
shepherd, responsible for his flock. A woman in her husband’s house is a
shepherd, responsible for her flock. A servant in his/her master’s house is a
shepherd, responsible for his/her flock. Indeed each of you is a shepherd, and
each is responsible for his flock.”[1]
I find that these two quotations, the verse from the Noble Qur'an and the
Prophet’s tradition, amount, combined, to a clear view of the complementarity
of man and woman, each to the extent of his/her abilities and responsibilities.
There is no trace of and no reference to any sense of moral differentiation
between them. Each of them supports the other with the qualifications,
qualities, and skills God has given him/her or he/she has acquired.
All this has to be in accordance with the rules, values, and controls legislated by
God, the Most Sublime, and His Messenger. These rules, values, and controls
govern the man-woman relationship and manage it in accordance with God’s
Will and His pleasure, blessed are His names.
In the year 2000, we, at the Islamic World Conference in Jeddah, received a
delegation of U.S. women, headed by Mrs. Gina Abercrombie-Win Stanley,
who was then an advisor of President Clinton, a member of the U.S. Security
Council, and Head of the Office of Asian and Southeast Asian Affairs at the
State Department. Later she became the U.S. General Consul in Jeddah. The
delegation was interested in two subjects, (1) women and (2) democracy.
Our discussion of the woman question, which is related to the subject of this
chapter, began with a question made by Mrs. Abercrombie-Win Stanley, who
said, “We tried to find out by ourselves the position of women in Islam, but
were not able to. We sought assistance from Arab and Muslim friends, but the
information was contradictory. Therefore, we decided to visit Muslim lands
and hear directly Muslim’s views of this question. You at the Islamic World
Conference and Dr. Hamid in particular, have been recommended to us, for a
dialogue concerning this matter. So what do you have to say, Sir?”
After expressions of welcome, gratitude, and appreciation, I said, “I have
one word, or rather one sentence, to say. If it meets what you want, we will
thus have a short cut. Otherwise, we will open the relevant files for further
details and elaboration.”
She said, “What is that word?”
I said:
The woman for us – and for the great founders of the U.S., as well as all the
great and wise men of the world – is the mother of society, its source of
stability, and the guardian of its security. The family is the basic unit in a sound
structure of civic society, or it is rather the central institution of a civilized,
secure society. The point where you and we part, Madam, began on the day you
decided, contrary to the tradition of your forefathers and great men, to exclude
the family institution from the institutions of civic society and on the day you
replaced the family charter with social permissiveness, and based on this
incidental cultural orientation of yours the principle of liberating women from
their households, i.e. liberating them from the family culture into the no-family
culture or the multi-family culture, and the related behavioral practices that are
well-known to the members of this honorable delegation. As for us, we still
insist to hold to the principle that the family, which has the woman as its
mainstay and which is based on legal and legitimate marriage of a man and a
woman, is the basic unit and central institution among the institutions of a
civilized and secure civic society. It is even the basic unit in the structure of
national security for our societies.
She asked, smiling, “Do you want me to abandon my work at my country’s
national security council and go back to the family?”
I said, “No, but you and I, every man and woman, and the approach of every
society, should observe a balanced relationship between the duties of every
member of the family institution and those of other social institutions. We also
have to believe that the first national security institution for every nation is the
family. Other institutions and concerns that come next should be extensions of
it that activate its sacred mission. They should never exist at the expense of its
existence or its noble mission in society.”
She said, “Thank you. Your answer is sufficient, and what you have spoken
about is truly a central and essential point of difference between your and our
views of the family and society. It is worthy of being respected and
contemplated. I believe what you have said is sufficient and there is no need to
go into details, because they will most probably be based on this orientation,
which I will faithfully report in my country.”
It is worth mentioning that about a month after this interview, Mrs. Hillary
Clinton wrote in her weekly column that used to appear in the Saudi daily Arab
News a sentence that said, “It is time for us in America to establish a balanced
relationship between our duties in the family and in the other institutions of
society.”
In conclusion, I say the controversy over women and the family in the cultural
circles of our Islamic societies is promoted by many factors, among the most
prominent of which are
1. The lack of a comprehensive and clear view of the jurisprudence (Fiqh) of
the family and its role in building society and meeting its responsibilities;
2. The lack of a clearly defined methodology that organizes the man and
woman responsibilities in the family and society, and the failure to strike a
delicate balance between the responsibilities of each in the family and in
society;
3. The faulty overlapping between the rules, values, and principles of the
mission of women and the family on the one hand, and the mechanisms,
controls, and ethics of practice and performance on the other;
4. The unfortunate fact that many male and female Muslims are influenced
by the ideas put forth by the other concerning women, the family, and
society, without considering our cultural identity and distinctive
characteristics;
5. The dominant influence of customs and traditions in the way we deal with
the questions of women, the family, and society, at the expense of our
commitment to the values, principles, and ethics of our religion and its
immortal divine mission;
6. The expansion of the tenet of precautious measures to an unreasonable
extent, at the expense of the application of Islamic values, principles, and
controls.
The crucial question in all this is the lack of a practical approach to introduce
the family as a basic unit of the institutions of society and to allow it its official
position in the structure of the state and its public institutions, so that it may
enjoy its rights and perform its duties like any other institution of the state.
With such an approach, man and woman would be responsible employees of the
state within their house, in accordance with a comprehensive project and a
strategy drawn by the state through a special ministry for family and social
affairs. This would allow man and woman responsibilities in the family and in
society to be regulated and would put into practice the great and noble divine
rule:
SOCIAL
INCLUSION ON
WOMEN
Submitted To: Submitted By:
Prof.Shankar Narayan Travolta Elvis
I MSW
