Our unique approach and methodology
SuPWR applies a unique approach based on utilising a variety of research methodologies. Our research explores 16 women’s struggles in four countries that represent the largest populations of South Asia: Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan. Within each country, we will select on-going and contentious cases of struggle in one of four arenas within which gains in women’s rights are being sought: family, community, market and the state.
Our research uses a variety of methods, including:
- identifying and analysing the types of backlash created by processes of contemporary change;
- mapping critical players and what shapes their motivations for action;
- tracing the struggles, nature and trajectory of each movement to counter backlash – through oral history methods, reflective and participatory techniques, qualitative interviews and archival research;
- undertaking comparative analysis to compare how different movements may have triggered, galvanised or been strengthened by power struggles across different arenas; and
- identifying and systematising which combinations of mechanisms and strategies work to defend women’s rights in South Asia and beyond.
SuPWR is a collaborative research project that draws together a multi-disciplinary research team with deep in-country and conceptual expertise on women’s rights and contemporary power struggles in South Asia.
Our approach privileges members of women’s movements’ own understandings of power and struggles, and SuPWR seeks to deliver impact by building their capacity and co-constructing knowledge using reflective processes.