Cultural

• Gender-specific socialization
• Cultural definitions of appropriate sex roles
• Expectations of roles within relationships
• Belief in the inherent superiority of males
• Values that give men proprietary rights over women and girls
• Notion of the family as the private sphere and under male control
• Customs of marriage (bride price/dowry)
• Acceptability of violence as a means to resolve conflict

Economic

• Women’s economic dependence on men
• Limited access to cash and credit
• Discriminatory laws regarding inheritance, property rights, use of
• communal lands, and maintenance after divorce or widowhood
• Limited access to employment in formal and informal sectors
• Limited access to education and training for women

Legal

• Lesser legal status of women either by written law and/or by practice
• Laws regarding divorce, child custody, maintenance and inheritance
• Legal definitions of rape and domestic abuse
• Low levels of legal literacy among women
• Insensitive treatment of women and girls by police and judiciary

Political

• Under-representation of women in power, politics, the media and in the
• legal and medical professions
• Domestic violence not taken seriously
• Notions of family being private and beyond control of the state
• Risk of challenge to status quo/religious laws
• Limited organization of women as a political force
• Limited participation of women in organized political system