About

The concept of women's empowerment has received increased attention by the international development community in recent years. Yet, more work is needed to clarify what constitutes women's empowerment in contemporary circumstances, and how to evaluate various policies and practices for their impact on promoting various forms of women's empowerment.

The Women's Empowerment in Development (WED) Lab, in partnership with McGill University's Institute for the Study of International Development (ISID), builds on interdisciplinary research to connect academics, practitioners and policy makers in Canada and globally on issues related to women's empowerment in developing countries.

Purpose of the Lab

  • Advance knowledge

    Advance knowledge creation, dissemination and outreach on issues of women’s empowerment in global development.

  • Strengthen the evidence-base

    Strengthen the evidence-base on what works, and does not work, to empower women in developing countries.

  • Understand the role of policy

    Understand how social and economic policy can help in providing real development solutions to eliminate global gender inequality.

  • Enable experts

    Enable researchers, policy makers and practitioners, including CSOs and NGOs, to address global forms of gender inequality.

  • Eliminate barriers

    Understand and eliminate the barriers that prevent women in developing countries from reaching their full potential, and from fully engaging with the economy, political systems and communities in which they live.