The DOI matches its Crossref record; 69 of the 72 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Missing men? The debate over rural poverty and women‐headed households in Southern Africa
Abstract
Migrant labour in Southern Africa is associated historically with rural poverty and a high incidence of women‐headed households. Poverty alleviation approaches to social policy ask whether in this context rural women‐headed households are poorer than those headed by men. Ample research from the region shows that the answer is not always, a finding once more confirmed here in an analysis of Botswana. This case suggests, however, that the wrong question is being asked. The incidence of both women‐headed households and rural poverty has increased with the polarisation of agrarian production and the exclusionary restructuring of the migrant labour system. We need to ask not whom to target, but what should be done when capital no longer needs the labour that it pulled from rural households over so many generations.
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“For example, a focus on households as a unit potentially ignores many important intra-household relations, and results sometimes in the emphasising of male livelihood activities, to the exclusion of women and young people (Guyer and Peters, 1987;O'Laughlin, 1998).”
From Livelihood Change in Rural Zimbabwe over 20 Years (2012) · cites this paper as O'Laughlin, 1998
In the citing paper
“Womenmay well benefit, through improved living conditions, investments in education, and funds for their own business, but the marital contract within households becomes key in negotiating access to these resources (O'Laughlin, 1998).”
From Tobacco, contract farming, and agrarian change in Zimbabwe (2018) · cites this paper as O'Laughlin, 1998
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“The migrant labor system that characterized the South African economy in the apartheid system is regarded as one of the most important factors that historically contributed to the rapid increase in female-headed households across southern Africa (O’laughlin, 1998).”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- O'laughlin, B.
- Venue
- The Journal of Peasant Studies
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 1998-01
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 1-48
- ISSN
- 0306-6150 (ISSN-L)
- 1743-9361
- OpenAlex
- W1977971987
- Cited by
- 117
- References
- 72
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 2 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 7 · 2013: 4 · 2012: 10
- FWCI
- 18.91
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- The Journal of Peasant Studies (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Income, Poverty, and Inequality
- Social Sciences › Gender Studies › Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › HIV/AIDS Impact and Responses
- Keywords
- rural poverty, female-headed households, migrant labour, Southern Africa, Botswana, poverty reduction, social policy targeting, rural women, labor-capital relations
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