Empowerment in action: Savings groups improving community water, sanitation, and hygiene services.
Abstract
With 748 million people worldwide lacking adequate water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services (WHO/UNICEF, 2014), increased access to these services is a significant global challenge. Savings groups (SGs) combined with social empowerment strategies can be used to engage communities meaningfully in addressing development challenges such as access to clean water and a functioning latrine. As participants in PCI's SG initiative entitled Women Empowered (WE), women have independently identified WASH needs in their communities and have organized and carried out collective actions to improve their situation. This paper highlights results from a qualitative study in which PCI looked at SGs within two international development programmes in urban and rural Guatemala. The paper explores key opportunities in implementing an integrated, social and economic empowerment strategy and how changes in self-efficacy and leadership can lead to positive community impact. PCI found that participation by women in rural and urban Women Empowered SGs contributes to increased decision-making abilities and leadership, as well as increases in collaborative, collective actions at the community-level. Moreover, when one integrates SGs as a component of larger, multi-intervention development programmes, one can create a facilitative environment which encourages SGs to participate as active development partners rather than passive development recipients.
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Women in Guatemalan savings groups reported having at least equal participation in household WASH decisions, with many reporting greater decision-making power than their husbands.
“Women in Guatemalan savings groups reported having at least equal participation in household WASH decisions, with many reporting greater decision-making power than their husbands [73].”
From Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis (2022) · cites this paper as [73]
Select water and sanitation programs in Costa Rica, Guatemala, India, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam positively influenced the growth of women's leadership and support for women leaders.
“Select water and sanitation programs in Costa Rica, [63] Guatemala, [73] India, [126, 145] Sri Lanka, [56] and Vietnam [58] positively influenced the growth of women's leadership and support for women leaders.”
From Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis (2022) · cites this paper as [73]
Women's formal leadership has led to increased confidence among and toward women leaders.
“Women's formal leadership has led to increased confidence among and toward women leaders [26,56,73,126,146,157].”
From Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis (2022) · cites this paper as [73]
Women have organized to form lending groups to support women-led WASH businesses, provide community education about water safety, monitor open defecation, and respond to sanitation-related harassment.
“Women have organized to form lending groups to support women-led WASH businesses, [66] provide community education about water safety, [56, 61, 73, 78, 89, 91, 125, 129, 163, 165, 168, 169, 193, 296] monitor open defecation, [145] and respond to sanitation-related harassment.[174]”
From Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis (2022) · cites this paper as [73]
Women's collective action has led to funding, demand, construction, repair, and maintenance of water services and latrines.
“Women's collective action has led to funding, demand, construction, repair, and maintenance of water services [56, 61, 73, 78, 89, 91, 125, 129, 163, 165, 168, 169, 193, 296] and latrines [129, 139, 147, 168, 170, 174, 175].”
From Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis (2022) · cites this paper as [73]
Cites
Sanyal, P. (2009) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.1177/000312240907400402 · Cited by 355 · see citing works
Savings Groups at the Frontier
(2013) · Practical Action Publishing eBooks · doi:10.3362/9781780447766 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Prelims - Savings Groups at the Frontier
(2013) · Practical Action Publishing eBooks · doi:10.3362/9781780447766.000 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
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Water, sanitation, and women’s empowerment: A systematic review and qualitative metasynthesis
Caruso, B. A., Conrad, A., Patrick, M., Owens, A., Kviten, K., Zarella, O., Rogers, H., & Sinharoy, S. S. (2022) · PLOS Water · doi:10.1371/journal.pwat.0000026 · Cited by 94 · see citing works
- Authors
- Kaelyn DeVries, K. D., & Alejandro Rizo, A. R.
- Venue
- Enterprise Development & Microfinance
- Publisher
- Practical Action Publishing
- Published
- 2015-03-01
- Volume
- 26
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 34-44
- ISSN
- 1755-1978 (ISSN-L)
- 1755-1986
- OpenAlex
- W2064262932
- Cited by
- 7
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 2
- FWCI
- 0.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Enterprise Development and Microfinance (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- UNICEF
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Microfinance and Financial Inclusion
- Social Sciences › Education › Community and Sustainable Development
- Health Sciences › Nursing › Nutrition and Dietetics › Child Nutrition and Water Access
- Keywords
- savings groups, women's empowerment, WASH access, collective action, women in leadership, self-efficacy, community participation, development partnerships, microfinance
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