Magic Bullets

Jessica Reed, 27 July 2007
Subjects:

"Magic bullets" is the name for several forms of action in the gender field which can come across as a magic band-aid that will fix everything. Two of them are micro-credits and women in politics, and according to many women at the conference, they need to be questionned.

Take micro-credits for example: it is now presented as a solution which enables women to single-handily solve all their issues by creating their own micro-businesses. In reality, this is not entirely true (see our related entry written by World Neighbours on the openSummit blog), as the power of decision is still held by those who loan women funds. Without a complete control over their capital, these small communities of women are not empowered, but reliant on micro-crediting.

Related: Pro-Mujer, an association in Latin America which integrates women’s health and microfinancing. services.

 

This article is published by Jessica Reed, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence. You may republish it with attribution for non-commercial purposes following the CC guidelines. For other queries about reuse, click here. Some articles on this site are published under different terms. No images on the site or in articles may be re-used without permission unless specifically licensed under Creative Commons.