Gender and political empowerment in the Third Millennium
Ngaiza, Magdalene / 1999

This paper is organised in four parts. We give a brief historical background and draw inspiration from past experiences of other struggles as a basis for our hope in political empowerment endeavors. We describe the current status quo of gender and political empowerment in Tanzania highlighting also some misconceptions. The main gender gaps are identified both in their qualitative and quantitative characteristics including their multi-level causes. Against this background, we explore gender and political empowerment rationale based on the argument that " the personal is political" focusing on the political dimensions of the female life cycle.