The Women

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The Women Powered By Docstoc
					The Women’s Crusade

Katy Grannan for The New York Times

embroidery business.

to build a small business.

IN THE 19TH CENTURY, the paramount moral challenge was slavery. In the 20th

“Women hold up half the sky,” in the words of a Chinese saying, yet that‟s mostly an
and it‟s not an accident that those same countries are disproportionately mired in poverty
and riven by fundamentalism and chaos. There‟s a growing recognition among everyone
from the World Bank to the U.S. military‟s Joint Chiefs of Staff to aid organizations like
and extremism. That‟s why foreign aid is increasingly directed to women. The world is
awakening to a powerful truth: Women and girls aren‟t the problem; they‟re the solution.

to live with an aunt, because there wasn‟t enough food to go around.

“My sister-in-law made fun of me, saying, „You can‟t even feed your children,‟ ” recalled
My brother-in-law beat me up. I had an awful life.” Saima‟s husband accumulated a debt
generations. Then when Saima‟s second child was born and turned out to be a girl as

“She‟s not going to have a son,” Sharifa told Saima‟s husband, in front of her. “So you
into hysterical tears.

exclusively to women, in groups of 25. The women guarantee one another‟s debts and
her husband‟s permission, but husbands tolerate these meetings because the women
return with cash and investment ideas.

took her elder daughter back from the aunt and began paying off her husband‟s debt.

When merchants requested more embroidery than Saima could produce, she paid
husband‟s entire debt, keep her daughters in school, renovate the house, connect running
water and buy a television.

now come to my house to watch TV.”

She doesn‟t even pretend to be subordinate to her husband. He spends his days mostly
child, also a girl, but now that‟s not a problem. “Girls are just as good as boys,” he

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