Entrepreneurship, Empowerment and Marital Adjustment of Women Micro Entrepreneurs

“Employment of women increases her power as she earns money and keeps control over it. It gives her more confidence. She becomes more assertive. Employment changes the attitude of women towards society. Increased income... [ view full abstract ]

“Employment of women increases her power as she earns money and keeps control over it. It gives her more confidence. She becomes more assertive. Employment changes the attitude of women towards society. Increased income raises the standard of living by acquiring assets of worldly comforts” - Sharma, 1992

 In India women as an independent target group account for about 495.74 million and represent 48.3 percent of the country’s total population as per the 2001 census report. Women in the economically active age group 15-59 years who count for 289.40 million (58.4 %) have different demand like those of education and training, employment, income generation and participation in the developmental process, decision making etc (Tenth Plan 2002-2007). With the advent of industrialization and modernization, women have assumed greater responsibility, both at home and in the world of work. This is reflected in the increasing work participation rate of women which was 19.7% in 1981 and rose to 25.7% in 2001. However, this is still low compared to male work participation rate, which was 52.6% in 1981 and 51.9 % in 2001. The structural changes made in education and employment has led to empowerment of women in contemporary India (Singh, 2004:137).

In this study Empowerment theory was tested. Empowerment" is a term that has become increasingly popular in psychology, social work, and other disciplines that deal with clients or communities. Empowerment is a process by which people, organizations, and communities gain mastery over issues of concern to them (Rappaport, 1987, as cited by Zimmerman, 1995).Empowerment is defined as a process through which people become strong enough to participate within share in the control of and influence events and institutions affecting their lives: in part empowerment necessitates that people gain particular skills, knowledge, and sufficient power to influence their lives and the lives of those they care about (Torre, 1985).

Empowerment of client is the long standing theme and philosophy of social work (Simon, 1994). Empowerment based practice received increased attention during 1980s and 1990s.Power and powerlessness are common issues for clients of social work. Empowerment is viewed as a counter to perceived powerlessness (Freeman, 1979). Some of the important values and principles are as follows: Commitment to practice with the most oppressed populations, focus on clients’ strengths, and promotion of social justice, egalitarian relationship between the client and the worker and education of the clients.

The process of empowerment is ongoing and involves changes in three dimensions of one’s self: personal (self-perception), interpersonal (knowledge and skills), and socio- political participation (action). The personal outcomes of empowerment practice are self- awareness, self -acceptance, belief in self, self- esteem, feeling that they have rights. The interpersonal outcomes are assertiveness and critical thinking. The outcomes related to socio- political participation are joining organisations, giving back by helping others, making a contribution, voting writing letters speaking in public, taking control in generalized area of one’s life (Parsons 1994, 1998, 2000).

This study titled Entrepreneurship, Empowerment and Marital Adjustment of Women Entrepreneurs was undertaken with the following objectives: To study the demographic condition of the respondents, to study the entrepreneurial effectiveness of the respondents to study the output of the entrepreneurial activities of the respondents, to study the psycho- social wellbeing of the respondents, to study the level of marital adjustment of the respondents.

Descriptive research design was adopted in-order to describe more specific details related to the respondents, micro enterprises, their entrepreneurial effectiveness and marital adjustment. The respondents were selected based on the following criteria: women between the age group of 18 to 45, those who were married and involved in micro entrepreneurship. The list of women entrepreneurs was received from Anbagam a non government organization located in Chennai which promotes social entrepreneurship. Thirty respondents were selected from the sampling frame. The primary source of data was women entrepreneurs. The secondary sources were the documents published by Tamilnadu, Micro Small Medium Enterprises Development Institute, Entrepreneurship Development Institute, Madurai and Entrepreneurship Development Institute, Chennai Small Industries Development Corporation, reports of Government of India and Government of Tamilnadu and Anbagam on performance of women entrepreneurs, etc.

This study aimed at finding whether empowerment and marital adjustment were positively correlated for entrepreneurs..

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