Advancing Gender Equality in Bangladesh

In 1994, BRAC, the world's largest NGO, made headlines by putting women's rights centre stage in Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world. The Gender Quality Action Learning (GQAL) Program was one of the very first large-scale efforts to mainstream gender equality. Advancing Gender Equality in Bangladesh describes the history, implementation, and results of this major 20 year initiative and discusses what it teaches us about the fight to achieve gender equality outcomes such as empowerment and gender transformation.

GQAL aimed to weave objectives of gender equality throughout BRAC's microfinance, education and health services. As the program grew, it was adapted for rural communities and spread out, to the point where it now touches the lives of over two million people and has influenced many other programs elsewhere. At a time when many gender equality programs are still relatively young, this book offers a unique opportunity to track 20 years of intervention. This in-depth analysis of how strategies for change have operated in practive will be of considerable interest to students, researchers and development practitioners looking for new, more effective and practical ideas on how to promote equality and inclusion.