Women and Land in Africa: Culture, Religion and Realizing Women's Rights - Hardcover

L Muthoni Wanyeki

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1842770969 ISBN 13: 9781842770962

Publisher: Zed Books, 2003

Synopsis

This volume is the product of original research into the changing situations which rural African women are experiencing in relation to land rights. The contributors highlight key land rights issues and make recommendations for each country. In a particularly interesting innovation, the volume examines the case of Ethiopia where an explicit attempt has been made not only to make the research findings available beyond the academic community, but to deploy this information in a rolling programme of advocacy. The authors argue that various social forces are now weakening customary and religious institutions; and innovative approaches to advocacy are seeking to assert women's human rights in this changing context.

About this title

Review:

'Offers those of us not familiar with studies on customary law an extraordinarily rich collection of information and perspectives.'
International Feminist Journal

Synopsis:

This work brings together ongoing research into rural African women and land rights, with the aim of contributing towards gender equality and the economic independence and human rights of African women. It looks at a number of countries from West and East Africa and the Horn - Islamic and non-Islamic. The contributors examine women's land rights in theory and practice in each country, highlight the key issues and make recommendations. Important commonalities emerge, including the dualism between customary and religious land law, and statute law; the gap between women's rights in theory and practice; and the superior rights, power and control of men over land, decision-making, and household income. The situation is not static and the contributors argue that new customary and religious interpretations are needed which recognise that today's communities are both urban and rural, multi-ethnic and pluralistic, and that women's equal status and full enjoyment of rights are things to be welcomed and enshrined in customary, religious and statutory law.

About this edition

• Publisher: Zed Books
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1842770969
• ISBN 13: 9781842770962
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 400
• Editor: L Muthoni Wanyeki