International Journal of Gender & Women's Studies

Myth and Fallacy: The Alternative Model of Women’s Political Empowerment
Daisy T. Besing

Abstract
Despite the rise of various women in the political arena, myths and fallacies about women’s political empowerment still exist. This study aimed to assess women's political empowerment status and build an alternative model of women’s political empowerment. It employed a descriptive phenomenology research design where the data from the interviews with the women local leaders in Region XI, Philippines, were analyzed using thematic analysis. The results show two essential stages of being an empowered woman in the Philippine political arena. The first stage is women’s political participation with two significant elements, namely, (1) leaders capabilities composed of political values, personality, direction and knowledge, and (2) sources of powers entail the women's personality characteristics, financial conditions, and organizational connections. The second stage is women's political empowerment, with two significant elements - access to information and budget resources. However, even if they are already politically empowered women, they still act as the agents of their politically inclined families. Thus, women's political empowerment denotes women's representation in the legislative and executive posts not by number but according to their purpose, influence, competencies, political values, and presence of powers. The results suggest that the alternative model of women’s political empowerment will champion issues concerning women.

Full Text: PDF      DOI: 10.15640/ijgws.v9n1a2