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empowerment now including health, education and employment issues, among others. There are clearly many different aspects to women’s economic empowerment and, among them, land rights are necessary, if not always sufficient. However, property rights more broadly – including rights to hold land, housing, vehicles, bank accounts and all other forms of productive resources, such as tools or equipment – are the very foundation of it all. Moreover, although women’s economic empowerment is often treated primarily as an economic concept, true empowerment for women actually rests on mental well-being and is also a political concept. Land and property rights are central here. Having secure land rights – ‘peace of mind’ – help women to be more confident in engaging with political struggles over resources, and over sexual and gender politics within their individual households and societies. We can see these ‘economic empowerment–political empowerment’ links in real examples of changes in, and struggles over, land rights in Rwanda and Tanzania. Rwanda: Reform and property rights In Rwanda, the Succession Law of 1999 made two key changes to property rights. The first change was that couples who were legally and monogamously married were deemed to have joint ownership of all their property, unless they specifically elected at the time of their marriage to keep their property separate. This gave legally married women a formal share of property rights where before they had none, as well as the possibility of having their own completely separate property. Second, inheritance rights for legitimate children were made equal for sons and daughters. There have been some problems in implementation, and not all sisters have inherited the same amount and/or quality of land as their brothers, but, nevertheless, there have been many positive changes since the passing of this law. During government-led field consultations in Rwanda in 2006, as part of the planning process for the national land tenure registration that has since taken place there, men spoke openly about the value to them of women being able to own land and did not see women’s inheritance rights meaning a loss of rights for them. Instead, many were perceptive enough to realise that a woman who inherits land from her parents has something to bring Wome n ’s l a n d a n d p r o p e r t y r i g h t s into a marriage – and in Rwanda, where the population is very dense and land is at a premium, property brought into a marriage is a valuable asset. Owning property gives a married woman a stronger bargaining position in household relations because it gives her the option of leaving and taking her land with her – an idea that Agarwal also talks about in her book in relation to South Asia. Of course, not all men are as enlightened and nor do they all support women’s rights. The whole Pandora’s box of gendered social norms, and customary and traditional laws and practices, also has to be factored in. But having land rights at least makes this kind of empowerment a possibility. The government further supported women’s political and economic empowerment by making it a constitutional requirement from 2003 (and one that has been enforced) for all public decisionmaking committees from the village level up (including on land) to have at least 30 per cent of all positions filled by women. Tanzania: The Loliondo case The Maasai rangelands in northern Tanzania have long been subject to encroachment by investors, especially for tourist ventures, and conflict over this is long running. What has become very interesting over the past year or two, however, is the extent to which Maasai women have become involved in the grass-roots movement to oppose land grabbing in this area. They have had major success, with the Prime Minister of Tanzania intervening in the famous Loliondo case to support them. In 2013–14, within a broader research project around pastoral women’s land rights in Tanzania, it was found that women’s capacity for mobilisation in the Loliondo case had arisen because of the long-term engagement of local non-governmental organisations in establishing women’s leadership forums, promoting gender equality, facilitating local collective action around land rights and providing women with information about their rights (Maliasili Initiatives, 2013). Economic and political empowerment The implications of all this are that women’s economic empowerment requires women not only to have secure land tenure (and thus peace of mind), but also to become politically engaged and empowered through active participation in all aspects of land governance. This key message is one that has been embraced by FAO in its technical guide on gender and land tenure, Governing Land for Women and Men (see box: The FAO Guide). Commonwealth Governance Handbook 2014/15 95 ELIZABETH DALEY is a principal consultant at Mokoro whose work focuses mainly on issues such as land, natural resources, agriculture and livelihoods. She has practical field, policy and technical experience in Laos, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. Her most recent assignments include policy work and training on gender and responsible governance of land tenure within the Voluntary Guidelines process; field research and policy work on the gendered implications of commercial pressures on land and large-scale land acquisitions; a mid-term evaluation of a pioneering women’s land rights and legal empowerment project in Mozambique; and research on pastoral women’s land rights in Tanzania. The FAO guide Governing Land for Women and Men was published by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to provide technical advice on ensuring the achievement of gender equity in the implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security. Mokoro supported the FAO in developing this guide, which provides dozens of examples of how women’s land rights can be claimed and strengthened in practice, including through women’s full participation in decision-making over resources. The key message of the guide is that having land rights is not enough: gender equity demands that women participate on an equal basis alongside men in all aspects of land governance, from the grass roots to the highest policy- and decision-making circles.


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