Women’s Economic Empowerment and Care (WE-Care) – Oxfam: Phase 1 final report

Overview

The eradication of poverty and injustice depends on women’s equal enjoyment of their human rights. Oxfam has invested significantly in women’s economic leadership, and affirms that economic empowerment requires parallel progress in women’s political, social and personal empowerment. Women’s control over their own time and labour is increasingly recognized as a precondition for, and component of, empowerment. To address the issue of unpaid care work, in 2014 Oxfam initiated a three-year programme, ‘Women’s Economic Empowerment and Care: Evidence for Influencing (WE-Care)’. The first phase of the WE-Care programme built on Oxfam’s previous experience with Rapid Care Analysis methodologies in livelihoods programmes. The programme aimed to complement and strengthen Oxfam’s initiatives on women’s leadership and livelihoods by building evidence for influencing change on care, while also providing the development sector with methods and knowledge to strengthen future advocacy on women’s economic empowerment and care work.