ABSTRACT
This chapter will:
address the following question: Is religion bad for women’s development and the pursuit of gender equality?;
examine how ‘gender and development’ (GAD) has approached religions;
discuss the ways in which attitudes towards women in religious traditions present challenges for mainstream development policy and practice;
look at the engagement with ‘religious feminisms’ as a culturally located strategy for encouraging and realizing female empowerment;
evaluate concerns that the ‘turn to religion’ by donor-driven development policy and practice has gender costs that have not been adequately considered.
