Author: Nguyen Thi Thanh Ha
AIT Library Call Number: AIT Thesis no.GD-07-15
Year: 2007
Academic Program: Gender and Development Studies (GDS)
Type: Thesis (M.Sc.) – Asian Institute of Technology, 2007
Examination Committee: Bernadette P. Resurreccion (Chairperson); Barbara Earth, Dietrich Schmidt-Vogt, Philippe Doneys (Examination Committee Members)
Abstract: The research aims to assess how women of Bru-Van Kieu ethnic group in the central part of Vietnam benefit from sharing legal land titles with their husbands. The research also examines influences of traditional and cultural norms regarding land ownership and marriage on women’s perceptions of their land rights and their ability to claim for their land entitlements. I am using B. Agarwal’s (2003) and N. Kabeer’s (1999) arguments on welfare, efficiency and empowerment to measure social and economic benefits brought about by the land title. Customary laws on land ownership and marriage is explored through examination of women’s roles and positions in Bru-Van Kieu society, using C. Jackson’s framework on women’s subjected identity and subjectivities. The results indicate that the joint-title LTC has not brought about economic benefits to women from the perspectives of welfare and efficiency because it does not have any impacts on women’s access to credit, diversification of livelihood strategies and increase of farm productivity. However, it raises women’s awareness on their equal land entitlements to men, hence increase their sense of self-confident and security on land. Women’s ability to exert their new identity as co-owner of the land is obstructed by patriarchal cultural and social norms which places women in dependent positions to men. In addition, women’s acquiescence to the norms of their society and their reproduction of patrilocal and patrilineal norms are subjective obstacles to women’s ability to claim land
Scholarship Donor(s): International Development Research Center (IDRC)
Note: A thesis submitted in pa1tial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Sciences in Gender and Development Studies, School of Environment, Resources and Development
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