BRIDGE is a research and information programme located within IDS Knowledge Services. We are part of a global movement whose vision is a world where gender equality, dignity and social justice prevail, where poverty is eliminated and where human rights – including women’s rights - are realised. We believe that we play an important role in realising this vision by generating and sharing diverse, accessible gender information, and by stimulating collaborative, groundbreaking thinking on key issues related to gender and development. We also support the exchange of experience and ideas of how to put this thinking into practice in ways that will make a difference.
Our approach BRIDGE acts as a catalyst by facilitating the generation and exchange of relevant, accessible and diverse gender information in print, online and through other innovative forms of communication. This supports the needs of policymakers, practitioners, advocates and researchers in bridging the gaps between gender theory, policy and practice to make gender equality happen. BRIDGE targets both gender and non-gender specialists in an effort to ensure gender is central to all development thinking and practice, and to inspire transformation in attitudes, policies and legislation.
We do this by: Producing BRIDGE resources such as Cutting Edge Packs and In Briefs on relevant, timely gender and development issues through collaborative processes Taking a nuanced approach that focuses on transforming gender relations, and challenging gender stereotypes rather than only being about women and development Facilitating information sharing, partnerships and networking, and reflecting perspectives from non English-speaking contributors Setting and influencing gender and development agendas by creating platforms for discussion, debate and new ideas Supporting the specific information needs of development practitioners and policy-makers with a gender mainstreaming remit.
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Displaying 26 - 30 of 78Women's Status, Rights and Interests in Land Diversion
Previously in China, all land was controlled by the communes. Over the past twenty years, with the break up of the communes, new land tenure arrangements have given greater control over land to individual households. This essay argues that recent transfers in land tenure between households have caused women to lose rights and decision making power over land, as well as possibilities to benefit from land. Men's migration to cities has caused a 'feminisation' of agriculture which fuels a market for tenure transfer.
Land Reform and Human Rights in Contemporary Zimbabwe: Balancing Individual and Social Justice through an Integrated Human Rights Framework
Land distribution and access to land are key issues in Zimbabwe. In recent years, nearly all of the country's commercial farm land has been re-designated, leaving most farm workers dislocated from their farm villages. The government of Zimbabwe argues that the land reform programme is needed to achieve historical and social justice. However, this article concludes that the government is engaged in serious human rights violations and is appropriating land to distribute to its followers for political not social justice ends.
Widows, AIDS, Health and Human Rights in Africa
This paper argues that widows and female children in Tanzania have traditionally been denied the right to inherit property from their husbands, even when the property was acquired during the marriage. This is further complicated by a three-part legal system consisting of customary law (law grounded in customs or traditions), Islamic law, and statutory law (law set down by a legislature). As a result, Tanzanian women and their children are often left homeless upon the death of their husbands.
Rural Women's Access to Land and Property in Selected Countries: Progress Towards Achieving the Aims of Articles 14, 15 and 16 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)
Women's access to land is a fundamental factor in food security. Yet women all over the world suffer under discriminatory property and inheritance laws and customary practices which restrict their rights over the land on which they live and work. Articles 15 and 16 of CEDAW state the rights of women to property and inheritance. This report is a tool to help non-governmental organisations and multilateral agencies in advocacy and policy dialogue using CEDAW and the Optional Protocol (which allows individuals and groups to make complaints directly to the CEDAW committee).
Are wealth transfers biased against girls?: Gender differences in land inheritance and schooling investment in Ghana's western region
This study attempts to analyse changing patterns of land transfer and ownership, as well as school investments by gender over three generations in customary land areas of Ghana's Western Region. Traditional inheritance rules deny land ownership rights to women. Yet the increase in the demand for women's labour due to the expansion of labour intensive cocoa cultivation has created incentives for husbands to give their wives and children land. Through this and other gift mechanisms, women have increasingly acquired land, thereby reducing the gender gap in land ownership.