The basic premise of this book is that one of the most effective ways to ensure increased and sustainable development in Africa is through the improvement of African women’s skills and ensuring their access to tools such as credit, training, and technology. Understanding and supporting the potentialities of African women in the context of the new economic realities facing Africa (i.e. globalization) is crucial to the future of Africa’s economic development. However, political, legal, and cultural impediments to women’s full participation in economic and political life remain in place in many, if not most, African countries. Thus, strategies designed to overcome such impediments to women’s full participation in economic and political life are crucial to the future of Africa.

This book is the first of its kind to analyze and bring to the forefront of policy-making the linkages that exist between globalization and the role of women in development in Africa. These essays put an emphasis on practical solutions to the issues raised throughout the book. Furthermore, the book stands to become a policy manual, which will help to disseminate the strategies, conclusions, and recommendations that emanated from the variety of research presented, to a diversity of audiences, including NGO’s, national and international government agencies, businesses, women’s groups, international educational organizations, as well as academic institutions and multilateral financial institutions.

ABOUT THE EDITORS
SYLVAIN BOKO is an associate professor of economics at Wake Forest University. He is the author of Decentralization and Reform in Africain addition to numerous other publications on economic development in Africa. He also serves as consultant on regional development projects in the West African region.

MINA BALIAMOUNE-LUTZ is assistant professor of Economics in the Coggin College of Business at the University of North Florida. She was a Fulbright Fellow (1997) and a sabbatical fellow at the United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (2002).

SITAWA R. KIMUNA is an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at East Carolina University.

CATEGORY
Development Studies/AFRICA