Take a look at Men’s violence against women in rural Bangladesh: undermined or exacerbated by microcredit programmes? It’s a 1998 article by Sidney Schuler, Syed Hashemi, and Shamsul Badal that seems ultimately inconclusive but still raises some important questions that we have to consider. You can read in the bulk of it some of the observed relationships between domestic violence against women and their participation in microcredit programs, but I want to specifically discuss the final section.
Grameen and BRAC, in this study, did nothing to attempt to stop domestic violence in the target villages, preferring instead to let cultural changes take whatever natural course and admonishing abusive husbands only when their actions were completely blatant and disruptive to the program. Were they right in doing so? Is it appropriate, let alone wise, to directly confront the issue of domestic violence within the target village and risk undermining a husband’s perceived authority over his wife? What is our role?
This post was written by Hart on October 8, 2008