How to Develop Core Elements of Empowerment

Abstract: The aim of the study is to examine how young women conceive their empowerment processes through access to ICTs, provided by the non-governmental organization IT for Children. The thesis is a qualitative case study of young women’s empowerment. Accordingly, a minor field study was conducted in the village Dixcove in the south of the western region of Ghana. Material was gathered through semi-structured interviews with young female students and key informants with knowledge of the village and lives of the women in the village. Jo Rowland’s theoretical framework of women’s empowerment is employed to give prominence to the young women’s ‘core’ values, its connection to access to computers and the internet as well as inhibiting and encouraging factors to the empowerment process. The results indicate that the young women attending the IT for Children academy in Dixcove have progressed empowerment by developing ‘core’ elements of empowerment personally, in relationships and collectively. Factors inhibiting the empowerment process consist predominantly of external factors of high burden of house chores and work. Factors encouraging the empowerment process consist of support from family and friends, financial stability and inspiration from peers.