Enhancing Political Participation of Marginalised Women in Nepal

The sustainability of these networks was already jeopardized by the lack of financial and organizational resources locally. The pyramidal organization designed by the project is fragile. However, numerous beneficiaries declared that the project created networks that will enable them to continue to share ideas and undertake initiatives, even if funding does not continue. Thus, the sustainability may be based more on human capital and relationships than on questions of funding.

The male participants in the project were officials, trainers, and project managers, but not community members from the target groups. Although some women said they passed their newly acquired knowledge to men in their family, the project could have made sure that information reached male community members to avoid any exclusion or loss of impact.

Since top-down government approaches have failed to address social exclusion and effective participation of marginalized women, the project combined a top-down strategy within a bottom-up approach. Planned activities were supported by strong top-down mechanisms and implementing partners were firmly rooted in a bottom-up approach, with the direct participation of the target audience. The adoption of the community organization pyramid, which involved monitoring of all activities by resource persons appointed by beneficiaries, consolidated the networks step by step. Stakeholders were able to collaborate at the local level while remaining connected to Kathmandu.

The target audience was directly involved with outputs such as training and advocacy tools. All progress was shared and discussed directly with the target audience at the local and national level. The methodological and operational project framework was adopted and adjusted with the direct participation of the target groups. This contributed to the project’s efficiency and set a precedent for joint work with women’s communities, local authorities, and political parties beyond ethnic lines or political ideology.

The project strategy was designed to operate progressively in stages, beginning with a database that tracked progress with measurable indicators. The activities designed and developed by the stakeholders were modified with the findings of rapid assessment reports. All stages were discussed by the target audience. This approach helped identify related grassroots capacity-building needs, develop suitable awareness and training materials, and forge ties between marginalized women and local authorities.

Radio programmes were considered the best media for enabling women to make their voices heard. Participants remarked on the quality of the broadcasts and the effectiveness of media outputs. Local journalists said that these programs had helped individual women realize that they were not alone in enduring discrimination, and that sharing experiences about discrimination is no longer taboo.

Dissemination methods, including traditional and alternative means, were used so as to address the lack of literacy among participants. Representatives of marginalized women’s communities, as well as other stakeholders, identified street theater and radio programs as the most relevant media. Five street plays were originally planned, but 16 were produced and seen by some 2,000 people.

Women are commonly separated from one another in Nepal by caste identity. One of the major achievements of the project was getting the highest and lowest castes to cooperate with each other, which is normally a social taboo. Under this project, Brahmins worked with Dalits and Janajatis. It is noteworthy that Brahmins were involved, as they represent one of the highest castes in Nepal. It confirmed how innovative this project was in stimulating cooperation between different castes.