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Rwanda is a leading country in gender equality indicators such as women's political participation and health. However, women's status remains largely defined by unpaid care work (UCW), a phenomenon that threatens women's access to education, income, and well-being. To promote gender equality, several non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have implemented initiatives towards recognising, reducing, and redistributing UCW. This study analyses the approaches of five selected NGOs upon women's UCW in rural Rwanda and focuses on how conducive they are to the promotion of women's empowerment, based on Kabeer's (1999) and Moser's (1989) theories on women's empowerment. This research included semi-structured individual interviews developed remotely, and the revision of NGOs' reports and the National Gender Policy. The results indicate common approaches by the chosen civil society organisations regarding unpaid care work. First, they consider that UCW Recognition implies perceiving care not (only) as an obstacle but (also) as an empowering force. Second, they promote UCW Reduction strategies that give women access to resources and other opportunities, but that can also create a discourse of 'reduce to produce' that threatens women's agency. Third, they support UCW Redistribution as a key catalyser of gender equality by supporting women's empowerment and further social changes. The joint work of the NGOs and the government can foster the transformation of Rwanda's gender equality model, so it responds to challenges such as women's empowerment and the elimination of intimate partner violence. This research aims to contribute to academic literature in gender and development by presenting a case from the Global South. ; M-DS

Rebel movements in Sri Lanka, Eritrea, Nepal, Columbia, and El Salvador among others report between 20-40% participation by female combatants. These women have largely been excluded from the literature around the recruitment, mobilization, and participation in violent social movements. If we acknowledge that young women are among those who might rebel, then existing paradigms on how rebellion occurs must also be re-imagined to include the experiences of the female combatant. Looking at the case of women's involvement in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka, this dissertation aims to address two main overarching questions around female participation in rebel movements. The first set examines how we take seriously the politics around female participation in violent politics, without resorting to a feminist debate on agency. Assuming that female fighters are agentive actors, how to we understand their politics at an individual and collective level? The second explores how variations in state repression shape political identities and impact the eventual nature of political participation for Tamil women. How do we understand the agency of women confronting multiple forms of repression? Drawing upon existing theories of mobilization and participation, I argue that in order to understand the impact of state repression on female participation, we must adopt a new theoretical framework. This dissertation highlights the interactive nature of the relationship between the individual and the collective, expands the timeline of analysis to incorporate entire life histories, and understands female combatants as exercising `restricted agency'. The analysis uses a unique data set, relying on significant field work done over ten years as both an academic and a humanitarian worker. Significant trust built over time in local communities, allowed for entry into controversial spaces (detention centers, training areas, refugee camps) and difficult to access populations (female fighters, victims of gender-based violence). The theories developed in this qualitative study rely on the insight and concepts generated using an ethnographic approach to data gathering that includes CPOs, person-centered interviews, focus groups, and gathering testimonies.Working within the framework established above, I find that given pre-existing conditions of inequality (both political and gender), the identity of Tamil women are mobilized by multiple mechanisms, among which experiences of direct and indirect state repression are most likely to shape political identities and the nature of political participation.

Feminist approaches to prostitution tend to be highly polarised in their theo­retical premises and policy implications. Radical feminist perspectives represent prostitution as the cornerstone of women's sexual exploitation, implying a strong call to eradicate sexual commerce in any form. On the opposite side are liberal perspectives emphasising women's choice, autonomy, and control over their own body, advocating for the decriminalisation of sex work, and rejecting paternalist claims for State protection. The notion of "women's consent" is crucial in both perspectives, being rejected as impossible or inexistent by those who reduce all sexual commerce to forced prostitution, and emphasized as a key discriminant by those distinguishing voluntary sex work from trafficking and forced prostitution, and sexual agents from sexual victims. In my contribution, I argue that the polarized nature of dominant feminist approaches to prostitution – especially concerned with defending theoretical stances on pros­titution – may decrease the impact of feminist-inspired policies and fail to address the needs and risks faced by those working in the sex market. Arguing that there is continuity rather than dichotomy between force and consent, I suggest more nuanced and problematic notions of victimisation and agency. Relying on ideas of human vulnerability, such as those developed by philosophers Judith Butler, Adriana Cavarero, and Martha Fineman, I present a feminist political approach to prostitution that, while rejecting any appeal to criminal laws against non-coerced adult sex work, criticises laissez-faire approaches, and advocates for social policies catering for sex workers' material and symbolic needs. ; Las aproximaciones feministas a la prostitución tienden a ser altamente po­larizadas con premisas teóricas e implicaciones políticas. Las perspectivas feministas radicales presentan a la prostitución como el paradigma de la explotación sexual de la mujer, donde se defiende la necesidad de erradicar cualquier forma de comercio sexual. En el otro lado, las perspectivas liberales enfatizan el derecho a elegir de las mujeres, su autonomía y el control de su propio cuerpo, abogando por la descriminalización del trabajo sexual y defendiendo de­mandas paternalistas de protección pública. La noción del consentimiento femenino es crucial en ambas perspectivas, siendo interpretado como imposible o inexistente, por quienes redu­cen el comercio sexual a la prostitución forzosa, y enfatizado, por quienes distinguen entre el trabajo sexual voluntario y la prostitución forzosa, así como entre los agentes sexuales y las víctimas sexuales. En este artículo, se defiende que las aproximaciones a la prostitución de naturaleza más polarizada de las feministas dominantes deberían reducir el impacto de las políticas de inspiración feminista, redirigiéndolas hacia las necesidades y riesgos de las trabajadoras del mercado sexual. Defendiendo que hay más continuidad que dicotomía entre la fuerza y el consentimiento, se sugieren nociones matizadas de victimización y agencia. En relación con las ideas de la vulnerabilidad humana, tal como ha sido desarrollada por filósofas como Judith Butler, Adriana Cavarero, y Martha Fineman, se presenta una aproximación femin­ista a la prostitución, a la vez que se rechaza cualquier apelación a la ley penal contra el trabajo sexual adulto no coercitivo y se aboga por las políticas sociales que atienden a las necesidades materiales y simbólicas de las trabajadoras sexuales.

This paper provides an introductory review of the literature mapping the gendered analyses of the categories of secularism and secularization from a sociological point of view, with the aim of providing some coordinates and bibliographical references and showing the theoretical and analytical implications of the gendered analyses of secularism in relation to the grammars of contemporary democracy. Firstly, it explores how a gendered analysis contributes to redefining the analytical concepts of secularism and secularization. Secondly, it highlights the contributions of women's, gender, and queer studies to the analysis of secularism and religion. Thirdly, it focuses on the tensions between women's and religious agency, showing how and to what extent the debate internal to the sociology of religion is in fact highly relevant to current sociological analyses. ; Através de uma revisão de caráter introdutório da literatura, este artigo visa cartografar as análises das categorias secularismo e secularização desenvolvidas a partir de uma perspetiva de género e de um ponto de vista sociológico, com o objetivo de fornecer algumas coordenadas e referências bibliográficas, bem como de mostrar as implicações teóricas e analíticas deste tipo de estudos do secularismo em relação às gramáticas da democracia contemporânea. Em primeiro lugar, explora-se a forma como uma análise levada a cabo sob a perspetiva de género contribui para redefinir os conceitos analíticos de secularismo e secularização. Em segundo lugar, destacam-se os contributos dos estudos sobre as mulheres, de género e queer para a análise do secularismo e da religião. Em terceiro lugar, realçam-se as tensões entre a intervenção política das mulheres e da religião, mostrando como e em que medida o debate em curso no âmbito da sociologia da religião é, de facto, de grande importância para os estudos sociológicos atuais. ; Par le truchement d'une révision au caractère préliminaire de la littérature, cet article a pour but de cartographier les analyses des catégories de sécularisme et de sécularisation développées à partir d'un point de vue de genre et d'une perspective sociologique, dans le but de fournir quelques coordonnés et références bibliographiques, tout autant que de montrer les implications théoriques et analytiques de ce type d'études du sécularisme para rapport aux grammaires de la démocratie contemporaine. Tout d'abord, nous cherchons à savoir comment une analyse menée d'un point de vue de genre contribue à redéfinir les concepts analytiques de sécularisme et de sécularisation. Ensuite, nous mettons en relief des études sur les femmes, de genre et queer pour l'analyse du sécularisme et de la religion. Enfin, nous soulignons les tensions existant entre l'intervention politique des femmes et la religion, en démontrant comment et dans quelle mesure le débat en cours dans le cadre de la sociologie de la religion revêt, de fait, une haute importance pour les études sociologiques actuelles.

Egyptian women's increasingly active presence in the public sphere, throughout the 20th century, has recently reflected itself in their active involvement and visible participation in the Egyptian revolution, since as Ahdaf Soueif states in an interview: "women have always been part of national and social movements and of politics. This revolution has been about everybody claiming agency and women have been very much part of that" (Soueif April2012, 63). It is in the light of women's agency, as both participants in and narrators of the revolution, that this paper attempts to study two women's literary texts, with particular emphasis on self­ representations of women's activism in the Egyptian revolution: Mona Prince's lsmi Thawra (My Name Is Revolution 2011) and Ahdaf Soueifs Cairo: My City, Our Revolution (2011).

This book proposes a new theoretical framework for agency thinking by examining the ethical, discursive and practical engagements of a group of women development workers in north-west India with developmentalism and individual rights. Rethinking Agency asks an underexplored question, tracks the entry, encounter, experience and practice of developmentalism and individual rights, and examines their normative and political trajectory. Through an ethnography of a moral encounter with developmentalism, it raises a critical question: how do we think of agency in oppressive con.

Cover -- Contents -- Figures, Tables, and Boxes -- Acknowledgments -- Exchange Rates -- Abbreviations -- Executive Summary -- 1 Introduction: Participation, Benefit, and Agency -- 2 Women's Economic Empowerment: Status, Trends, and Emerging Issues -- 2.1 Status: Participation -- 2.2 Status: Benefit -- 2.3 Status: Agency -- 2.4 Emerging Trends -- 3 Obstacles to Women's Economic Empowerment -- 3.1 Unpaid Domestic and Care Work -- 3.2 Low Literacy and Education Levels -- 3.3 Issues in Agriculture and Rural Livelihoods -- 3.4 Issues in Business Development -- 3.5 Issues in Wage Employment and the Garment Sector -- 4 Women and Labor Migration -- 4.1 Migration from Rural Areas to Phnom Penh -- 4.2 International Migration -- 4.3 Migration and Participation, Benefit, and Agency -- 5 Girls' and Women's Vulnerability to Shocks and Crises -- 5.1 Poverty, Vulnerability, and Gender -- 5.2 Women's Vulnerability Over the Life Cycle -- 5.3 Girls' and Women's Vulnerability to Macroeconomic Shocks -- 5.4 Girls' and Women's Vulnerability to Natural Disasters -- 5.5 Multiple Vulnerabilities Inhibit Women's Participation, Benefit, and Agency -- 6 The Institutional and Legal Context for Women's Economic Empowerment -- 6.1 Institutions for Women's Economic Empowerment -- 6.2 Legal Norms -- 7 Policy Recommendations and Areas for Further Research -- 7.1 Address the Unequal Unpaid Domestic and Care Work Burden of Men and Women and Enhance Women's Human Capital -- 7.2 Increase Women's Access to the Assets and Resources that Enhance Agricultural and Rural Livelihoods (Land, Labor, and Human and Financial Capital) -- 7.3 Support a Business Enabling Environment that Recognizes Women's Specific Constraints and Increases Women's Access to Assets and Resources that Enable Business Development and Expansion.

Abstract
This paper explores how the normalization of 'breast is best' has conceptualized women's agency in relation to their role as (breast)feeders and how this has contributed to a very particular framing of women as working in private for the 'public' good. It does so by critically evaluating three case studies in which breastfeeding was framed as the best source of food for newborns: the 1970s campaigns against baby formula manufacturers, efforts during the early 2000s to assure HIV-positive mothers that they should breastfeed, and more contemporary framings by the agroecology movement of breastfeeding as the "first act of food sovereignty." In each of these case studies we reflect on how the costs that this particular food/feeding practice imposes on women are obscured, ignored, or normalized. We suggest that breastfeeding, and exclusive breastfeeding in particular, often functions as a hegemonic practice, because breastfeeding is configured as ultimately being the personal responsibility of individual women (biological mothers). In what sense is this practice hegemonic? The case studies show that breastfeeding tends to be understood as something that is a universal good, but in practice constrains the agency of breastfeeding women and normalizes the status of women (and mothers in particular) as a dominated social group.

This essay suggests that common themes in recent feminist ethical thought can dislodge the guiding assumptions of traditional theories of free agency and thereby foster an account of freedom which might be more fruitful for feminist discussion of moral and political agency. The essay proposes constructing that account around a condition ofnormative‐competence. It argues that this view permits insight into why women's labor of reclaiming and augmenting their agency is both difficult and possible in a sexist society.