Women's participation in rural tourism is frequently promoted as a pathway toward inclusive development and livelihood diversification. However, in many rural contexts, such participation remains uneven and constrained by intersecting socio-cultural, economic, and institutional factors. This study examines the dynamics shaping women's participation in rural tourism in selected villages in northeastern Iran using a qualitative research design grounded in Critical Communicative Methodology (CCM).Data were collected through communicative focus group discussions with 12 rural women over a six-month fieldwork period. The findings reveal that the interaction of entrenched gender norms, limited access to financial and market resources, and uneven empowerment processes shapes women's participation. While socio-cultural constraints restrict women's mobility and visibility, participants actively negotiate these limitations through culturally acceptable and home-based forms of engagement.The study further identifies a critical gap between local production capacities and market integration, highlighting that economic barriers extend beyond resource scarcity to include structural limitations within value chains. Empowerment emerges as a gradual, context-dependent process influenced by access to training, knowledge exchange, and communicative spaces.By integrating structural, economic, and empowerment dimensions, the study challenges the assumption that tourism inherently promotes inclusive development. Instead, it argues that without coordinated, context-sensitive interventions, tourism may reproduce existing inequalities. The findings underscore the need for multi-level strategies that simultaneously address socio-cultural norms, market access, and sustained empowerment processes.
This paper examines the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and psychological well-being (PWB) in Africa, with a focus on the moderating role of religiosity across regional contexts. Drawing on pooled data from eighteen African countries covered in the World Values Survey (Wave 2–7, 1999–2022), the study employs multilevel mixed-effects ordered logistic regression models to analyze both individual- and regional-level determinants of happiness and life satisfaction. The findings reveal that psychological well-being in Africa is affected by both material and psychosocial dimensions of life. Subjective health status is the strongest predictor of well-being, followed by subjective and objective income levels. Education and employment significantly enhance life satisfaction, but not happiness, suggesting distinct cognitive and affective pathways through which SES influences well-being. Religiosity demonstrates nuanced and context-dependent effects: individuals who regard religion as important or express confidence in religious institutions report higher happiness. While frequent attendance at religious services slightly reduces life satisfaction. Interaction effects show that religiosity moderates the SES–PWB relationship, buffering the adverse effects of poor health and low social class, but diminishing the marginal benefits of higher income. Regional heterogeneity indicates that the religiosity–well-being nexus is stronger in North and West Africa than in the more secular Southern region, underscoring the cultural embeddedness of spiritual life in shaping resilience and life evaluation. The study concludes that psychological well-being in Africa depends not only on economic advancement but also on social and spiritual inclusion. Integrating faith-based partnerships and psychosocial indicators into development policy can enhance the holistic effectiveness of well-being strategies across the continent.
The study investigates how female self-employment is linked to female health performance, measured by the risk of maternal death and female life expectancy in 43 countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The quantile regression estimation technique is employed as the empirical strategy in order to assess the linkages throughout the conditional distribution of health performance dynamics. The findings show that female self-employment is negatively related to the risk of maternal death throughout the conditional distribution of the risk of maternal death while there is a negative nexus between female self-employment and life expectancy throughout the conditional distribution of life expectancy. The negative response of the risk of maternal death to female self-employment broadly increases with increasing levels of the risk of maternal death, while the negative response of female life expectancy to female self-employment is an increasing function of female life expectancy. Policy implications are discussed.
This study examines the perceptions of mine-affected community members regarding the governance framework for compensation assessment and payment, as well as intergenerational considerations in managing compensation proceeds. Focusing on two communities within the Newmont Ahafo South Mine's catchment area, the research showcases the temporal effects and distributive justice that exist in large-scale mining land acquisitions. Using Newmont Ghana Gold Limited as a case study, the paper analyzes responses from 115 community members and five representatives from the Compensation Negotiation Committee in the study areas. The results reveal a disparity between good governance principles and actual implementation procedures, exacerbated by a weak legal and regulatory regime. Consequently, the study discusses the legal and policy implications of current practices and underscores the need for regulatory reforms that promote intergenerational equity in mining compensation.
Participatory learning and action programmes have been shown to improve maternal and neonatal health outcomes. Implemented through women's self-help groups, these programmes aim to empower women to solve community problems. However, evidence on their impact on women's empowerment is limited.We used a mixed methods cluster-randomized controlled trial to evaluate the impact of a large-scale participatory learning and action programme called Gram Varta on indicators of women's empowerment in rural Bihar. The programme was implemented by state-supported agencies in women's self-help groups and aimed to improve women's and children's health and nutrition by empowering them. Using data collected from more than 3000 women in 68 village clusters, we estimated the community-level intention-to-treat effect of Gram Varta. Qualitative data was used to understand the setting and prevalent norms, processes of change, and barriers to programme success.Our findings suggest that Gram Varta did not improve women's empowerment. The qualitative data identifies several barriers, including irregularities in programme delivery, entrenched caste discrimination, and strong patriarchal norms.In the setting of this study, a strongly patriarchal context with stifling caste dynamics, challenges to women's empowerment are deeply rooted and difficult to address. The participatory approach of Gram Varta implemented at scale through women's self-help groups was not sufficient to overcome barriers to women's empowerment.
In extractive, climate-stressed regions, water governance is not just a matter of delivery and infrastructure but a question of power and who has authority to define access, who participates and who controls water. This paper investigates a situation I call the participation paradox-when participation is invited, counted and logged but decision-making is highly concentrated, and often mediated through local elites. With a qualitative-led mixed methods design (document analysis, serial semi-structured interviews, focus group discussion, participant observation, quantitative household and scheme-level data) the article examines rural drinking water delivery and livelihood and agriculture adaptation in two districts (Purulia and Birbhum) of southwestern West Bengal. Comparing Jal Jeevan Mission (drinking water), Anandadhara (livelihoods) and Matir Srishti (agriculture adaptation), it illustrates two contrasting trends. In JJM and Anandadhara, invited participation is often mediated by hierarchical bureaucracy, uneven elite negotiation and a top-down, metrics-oriented delivery approach that results in what the article identifies as hydrosocial traps—circular dependencies driven by extractive pressure, climate stress, and top-down delivery that fail to address the core scarcity issue. In contrast, Matir Srishti illustrates that when control over production, inputs and market chains is more diffused with community members, participation can better lead to a shared ownership of the resource and an improved ability to adapt. The paper argues that the key question is not the presence of participation in policy discourses but its potential to shift power over decisions, accountability and resources to the community. The findings contribute to discourse on hydrosocial governance, scalar politics and participatory development in extractive regions and offer concrete indicators for ensuring the synergies between rural water and livelihood schemes and SDG 6 and SDG 13.
Overlapping global shocks have renewed concerns about the sustainability of health financing in low- and middle-income countries. This paper examines how COVID-19, commodity price shocks, exchange rate pressures and debt dynamics affected fiscal space for HIV and health across country income groups. Using a descriptive macro-comparative design, it draws on IMF, World Bank, OECD, UNAIDS and Global Fund data to compare trends in growth, inflation, fiscal balances, public debt, external financing and HIV resource availability. The analysis shows that COVID-19 generated a broadly shared output shock but a highly unequal fiscal response: high-income countries mobilised around 428 times more per capita than low-income countries. Real GDP growth alone understates fiscal pressure because import bills, currency depreciation and health commodity prices affect budget purchasing power. Commodity shocks and tighter financing conditions further exposed countries with high import dependence, external debt and limited concessional finance. The paper does not estimate causal effects on HIV outcomes or UHC. Rather, it identifies macro-fiscal channels through which overlapping crises can constrain HIV and health financing sustainability. The findings support a sequenced response in which governments protect priority interventions, mobilise domestic revenue where feasible and strengthen budget execution; external partners provide predictable, differentiated transition finance; and creditors and international financial institutions deploy debt solutions where debt service crowds out essential social spending.
In the United States, racialized women are disproportionately responsible for unpaid care work and occupationally segregated into the paid care industry. Despite the importance of their labor, they are often devalued, resulting in poor compensation and exploitative working conditions that erode their health and well-being. For familial caregivers, this is compounded by gendered and cultural notions which demand their caring labor because of love and duty. Scholars have theorized that unconditional cash interventions, such as guaranteed income (GI), may provide caregivers with the resources to better support themselves, achieve autonomy, and reject oppressive and disadvantageous social structures. This paper draws on narrative data from participants in a GI micro-pilot in Los Angeles County, one of the first studies exploring the impacts of GI on familial caregivers in the United States. Participants experienced 'fragility by proxy,' or poor well-being due to financial strain and pressures to serve as primary caregivers for their families. The GI alleviated stressors related to housing and care-related costs, and gave participants greater autonomy to prioritize self-care, thereby resisting the burnout and dehumanization associated with capitalism. However, the GI was insufficient in fully countering gendered and cultural caregiving scripts and facilitating participants' autonomy to decide how they structured their caring responsibilities. Instead, it dampened the burden of care work and functioned as an inflection point for participants on their relationship to the market.
This study explores the intersectional impacts of flood disasters on minority health within the unique context of Bangladesh's wetlands. Focusing on minority communities, it investigates the disproportionate vulnerabilities and health challenges they face during and after floods compared to the mainstream population. The research focuses into the intricate intersections of socio-economic disparities, cultural practices, and religious identity, examining how these factors contribute to heightened risks and hindered access to essential resources for minority communities. The study assesses community-based adaptations undertaken by these minorities to enhance their resilience in the face of recurrent flood disasters. Learning from decolonial research approach, including interviews, surveys, and participant observations, the findings aim to illuminate the nuanced dynamics of minority health and the effectiveness of community-driven strategies in mitigating the adverse impacts of floods. The study contributes valuable insights to the discourse on inclusive disaster management, emphasizing the importance of culturally sensitive and community-based approaches for promoting health equity and resilience among minority populations in the unique environmental context of Bangladesh's wetlands.
Microcredit programs in Africa are promoted as instruments for alleviating rural poverty by enabling smallholder farmers to access agricultural input loans. However, long-term participation dynamics and factors associated with client drop-out remain underexamined, particularly in contexts marked by socio-economic and structural inequalities. This study analyzes two years of portfolio data from approximately 20,000 smallholder farmers in Western Kenya. We integrate socio-economic variables (gender, mobile phone ownership, household bereavement), institutional characteristics (group leader performance, loan officer attributes, supervision intensity), and field-level vegetation indicators derived from remote sensing, alongside exploratory machine learning techniques. Results indicate that 63% of farmers participated for only one year, highlighting challenges in sustaining engagement. Gender and mobile phone ownership were strongly associated with continued participation and higher repayment rates (p < 0.001). Bereaved households (n = 228) exhibited repayment rates exceeding 90% over two years, with 40% continuing participation. Peer effects were most pronounced in low-to-moderate performing groups, and female loan officers were associated with higher repayment outcomes (p < 0.001). Repeat participants also displayed slightly higher maize vegetation indices than drop-outs, suggesting that environmental productivity conditions correspond with participation status. By jointly analyzing socioeconomic, institutional, and environmental factors, this study advances understanding of microcredit continuity in rural Africa. The findings highlight both opportunities and structural constraints within agricultural microcredit programs and offer evidence relevant to policy and programme design.
Centering a community's objectives within engineering decision-making is crucial in the development of robust and sustainable infrastructure, as it fosters a greater sense of autonomy for a community to maintain new technology over time. These considerations are not widely understood within engineering practice, resulting in a variety of approaches towards community engagement, many of which lack the processes to effectively integrate community considerations back into technical design. This paper contrasts the common approach to humanitarian engineering projects with an emerging paradigm called contextual engineering, which is validated through a cross-disciplinary investigation of community organizing projects regarding community engagement and decision-making. Case study investigation illustrated that project milestones in community organizing and contextual engineering cannot be achieved without heavy participation and genuine contribution from the client community stakeholders. However, in the humanitarian engineering approach, actions to engage the community were peripheral to the sequence of steps and not a requirement for proceeding. There still lacks a widespread common process for synthesizing qualitative data with technical decision-making - one that can mold to the unique conditions of different communities without becoming a rigid step-by-step plan. Contextual engineering recognizes this, but an approach has yet to be broadly defined and adopted.
It is well known that women's empowerment is a multidimensional process, yet most empirical studies view it as linear and cumulative. This paper focuses on perceived total empowerment among women in Northern Pakistan, discussing it in the context of psychological, economic, political, educational, and social factors. The analysis of the relationship between these dimensions and the probability of women reporting various degrees of empowerment is performed using primary survey data and an ordered logistic regression framework. The findings indicate that empowerment is neither progressive nor consistent. Psychological awareness and social empowerment have a significant effect on reducing the risk of disempowerment, but their impact on overall empowerment is minimal. Economic competence has a positive impact, whereas stronger financial responsibility and political independence are associated with lower perceived empowerment, suggesting that there are social and psychological agency costs. Above all, social status is a threshold condition: a significant increase in empowerment is observed only among women in the highest social group. These results indicate that empowerment is a limited and stratified process, which is governed by both internal agency and social legitimacy and protection. The research warns against policy forms that equilibrate participation with empowerment and the need to have interventions that can manage the social costs and structural constraints of women in patriarchal environments.
Noting that commute duration has increased over time and the negative relationship between commute time and wellbeing, this paper examines the relationship between commuting and wellbeing in a developing country context. The premise is that the welfare loss associated with increased travel time is not uniformly distributed and disproportionately affect those of lower socioeconomic status. Data is sourced from the Gauteng City-Region Observatory Quality of Life (QoL) survey. Adopting the multivalued treatment framework, I estimate the relationship between commute duration and subjective wellbeing using the Double Machine Learning approach. I also check the robustness of results to unobserved factors. The result shows that longer commute (>45 mumites) is associated with significant decline in wellbeing and concentrated amongst those of lower socioeconomic status. The key result links the literature on commuting and wellbeing to the literature on crime/safety and wellbeing. It is shown that safety concerns do not only mediate the relationship between commute duration and subjective wellbeing, but the mediation effect is gendered. The implication is that women of lower socioeconomic status account for a large proportion of welfare loss associated with increased travel time.
This study examines Chinese perceptions of China-Africa cultural exchanges within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), focusing on civilizational mutual learning, civilizational values, and soft power dynamics. Using a mixed-methods approach, the study collected data from 862 Chinese public stakeholders through structured surveys, combining quantitative statistical analysis with thematic interpretation of qualitative open-ended responses. The results indicate strong enthusiasm for cultural collaboration, particularly in educational programs, artistic festivals, and academic partnerships. However, a significant gap exists between expressed willingness to participate and actual engagement, highlighting barriers related to accessibility, program visibility, and institutional support. The study also identifies a positive correlation between ideological alignment, such as the belief in a shared future, and increased cultural participation. These findings provide insights into how identity, ideology, and values-based diplomacy shape China-Africa relations. The research recommends bottom-up, youth-oriented strategies to strengthen sustained people-to-people connectivity under the BRI. It offers actionable policy suggestions for designing inclusive, decentralized, and culturally reciprocal programs that respect both Chinese aspirations and the cultural agency of African partners. By emphasizing grassroots perspectives, this study contributes to theoretical and practical discussions on civilizational mutual learning and soft power in international development initiatives.
Gold mining plays a key role in the economies of many African countries. However, the predominantly artisanal, small-scale, and informal nature of mining activities in Nigeria and other African nations often results in significant land and environmental damage, leading to farmland loss and reduced food production. This situation necessitates immediate efforts to restore degraded land to maintain environmental health, soil fertility, agricultural productivity, and food security. These restoration processes, however, involve substantial costs. Therefore, it is important to understand farmers' willingness to pay for restoring degraded agricultural land and identify the factors that influence it. The study uses a stated preference survey, collecting primary data from a randomly selected group of 240 farmers, and applies the dichotomous choice contingent valuation method along with binary logistic regression to meet its objectives. The findings indicate that artisanal gold mining is the main cause of land degradation in the area, which has led to decreased agricultural yields. About 92.5% of farmers are willing to pay for restoring land degraded by gold mining, with an average willingness to pay of (sic)250,313.42 (USD 154.47). Key factors influencing farmers' willingness include awareness of land degradation's negative effects, access to credit, income level, education, farm size, participation in cooperative associations, and gender. These outcomes highlight the need for policy interventions to prevent the abandonment of degraded land by artisanal miners and to provide financial support to farmers for land restoration.
The present study investigates how financial and time scarcity undermine university students' sense of agency and explores the potential of an unconditional basic income (UBI) as an educational policy intervention. Using a mixedmethods design, this study examines a comprehensive sample of 504 university students from Germany, through qualitative content analysis and quantitative correlation analysis to investigate to what extent, financial and time scarcity deplete students' motivational resources, restricts their capacity for agentic decision-making, and influences their perceptions of UBI as a means to enhance both academic and personal agency. Results indicate that students experiencing greater financial and time scarcity tend to experience a greater amount of mental load, manifested in frequent concerns about finances, worries about bills, and constant ruminating about expenses, burdens they believe could be alleviated with UBI. In contrast, students who do not experience financial and time scarcity, were more likely to regard UBI as unnecessary and offer fewer ideas for its potential impact on their lives and education. These findings suggest that students in our sample do not view UBI merely as material support or increased consumption, but as a profound psychological relief from scarcity-related pressures, with the potential to strengthen students' agency, enabling them to engage more in their education as well as support agentic decisions and self-directed futures. This study deepens the understanding of university students' needs and barriers through the lens of scarcity mindset research, while exploring the transformative potential of universal basic income to expand educational opportunities and empower young adults to make free and agentic decisions for their lives and learning.
Small-scale fisheries constitute a vital source of livelihood and food security for millions of households in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet access to fisheries resources is not simply market-based; it is politically and relationally mediated through gendered systems of control, patronage, and social obligation. This article examines those dynamics along the Lake Kivu fisheries supply chain in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Drawing on Feminist Political Economy and patron–client theory, we argue that the fish value chain operates not as a neutral market arena but as a politically organized system in which male boat owners and captains hold strategic power over distribution. Women's access to fish depends less on what they can afford than on who they know, what obligations bind them, and what compromises they are willing, or forced to make. Based on 36 semi-structured interviews conducted across four landing sites in Bukavu between May and August, 2025, the findings show that women's access to fish depends not only on purchasing power but also on relational capital, personalized networks, and hierarchical patronage ties. In contexts of scarcity and weak institutional regulation, transactional sexual relations often described as “fish-for-sex”, are not aberrations in this system but an embedded feature of how access gets negotiated when institutional protections are absent. Fish, in this context, is not just a commodity. It is a medium through which authority, dependency, and gender inequality are enacted every day.
