Michèle Amacker
Biographic Data
| ID | 220108 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Michèle Amacker |
| GIVEN NAMES | Michèle |
| FAMILY NAME | Amacker |
| SIGNATURE | AMACKER M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Bern |
| ORCID | 0009-0003-9232-9048 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 12 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 53 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 12 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2010 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
A typology of gender-based needs
Feminism—both in its activist and theoretical form—arguably always focuses on exposing, challenging and re-thinking how gender is assumed, discussed and practiced. One key focus of feminists has been to show how gender—in the sense of assumptions and practices about masculinity and femininity—significantly influences the needs and demands of people and how they—in turn—are responded to (or not) across different political and societal regimes. How…
Informal Women's Work in Public Spaces
Informal women's work in public spaces is central to livelihoods and social dynamics in cities of the Global South. For decades, public spaces have functioned as vital sites of economic activity, particularly for women engaged in informal work. Yet, recent urban redevelopment initiatives lead to the displacement and marginalization of these workers. This article investigates the complex, everyday ways in which women's work sustains social reprodu…
The right to health
Despite Nepal's relatively comprehensive set of legal and policy instruments aimed at protecting the right to health of people with disability, women with disability in the country face numerous barriers to accessing health care, which ultimately compromises their full enjoyment of this right. This research examines the lived experience of women with physical, sensory, or mental health disability in relation to their access to health care and exp…
The Role of High-Value Agriculture in Capability Expansion
High-value agriculture contributes to rural incomes, but does it also contribute to expanding “human capabilities” (Sen, Development as freedom, Knopf, New York, 1999) in a durable way? Through long-term qualitative fieldwork in three landlocked LDCs—Nepal, Rwanda and Laos—resulting in over 150 interviews, we found expansions of the three analysed capabilities: paid work, mobility and social relations. Yet, those improvements were characterised b…
The dilemma of women empowerment in informal artisanal and small-scale gold ore mining in Ghana
For several years, women demand more decision-making power from their husbands and the society. Studies indicate that egalitarian decision-making power can be beneficial in many important ways to the household and society, and the pathway to this desire policy objective is through women empowerment. Yet, this is not as obvious as it seems. On the one hand, women empowerment is a game changer. On the other hand, the problem of women empowerment is…
D like Day- and Dream-Job. Eine explorative Untersuchung zu ambivalenten Aushandlungsprozessen sozialer Mobilität auf Instagram
Soziale Mobilität wird aktuell vermehrt diskutiert, sowohl im Rahmen wissenschaftlicher Studien als auch auf digitalen Plattformen wie Instagram. Hier sind neue, un(ter)bezahlte Arbeitsorte entstanden, die stark flexibilisiert und prekarisiert sind. Zudem teilen sie eine zentrale Eigenschaft mit anderen feminisierten Tätigkeiten wie jene der Care-Arbeit: Sie ist weitgehend unsichtbar, wobei die Subjekte selbst hypervisibel sind. Der Beitrag unter…
A view of the transformation of Rwanda's highland through the lens of gender
Constraints and opportunities in gender relations
Who gains from contract farming? Dependencies, power relations, and institutional change
The paper highlights the mechanisms through which outgrower contract farming creates dependencies at the local level. Using sugarcane case study in Malawi, we show that dependencies are created through redefinition of use rights to customary land and through the redefinition of cash flows into outgrower communities. Through this two-dimensional process, corporations can secure access to land, exert control over local communities and transform the…
The Development of Gender-Responsive Indicators
There is an increasing level of importance around evidence-based policy making and a growing interest in big data in the field of gender equality. Most of the research has been about the amount of data, so much less is known about the quality of data that is needed to be transformative and which indicators should be selected. Poorly selected indicators often lead to the representation of simplified social realities and tend to reproduce gender st…
Rwanda's gendered agricultural transformation
Conceptualizing ‘precarious prosperity’
Empirical studies have recently pointed towards a socio-structural category largely overlooked in social inequality research: the dynamic positions of households adjacent to those of the poor and yet not representing those of the established, more prosperous positions in society. These results suggest that the population in this category fluctuates into and out of poverty more often than moving into and out of secure prosperity. This category — s…
Who gains from contract farming? Dependencies, power relations, and institutional change
The paper highlights the mechanisms through which outgrower contract farming creates dependencies at the local level. Using sugarcane case study in Malawi, we show that dependencies are created through redefinition of use rights to customary land and through the redefinition of cash flows into outgrower communities. Through this two-dimensional process, corporations can secure access to land, exert control over local communities and transform the…
Rwanda's gendered agricultural transformation
Conceptualizing ‘precarious prosperity’
Empirical studies have recently pointed towards a socio-structural category largely overlooked in social inequality research: the dynamic positions of households adjacent to those of the poor and yet not representing those of the established, more prosperous positions in society. These results suggest that the population in this category fluctuates into and out of poverty more often than moving into and out of secure prosperity. This category — s…
Constraints and opportunities in gender relations
A view of the transformation of Rwanda's highland through the lens of gender
Conceptualizing ‘precarious prosperity’
Empirical studies have recently pointed towards a socio-structural category largely overlooked in social inequality research: the dynamic positions of households adjacent to those of the poor and yet not representing those of the established, more prosperous positions in society. These results suggest that the population in this category fluctuates into and out of poverty more often than moving into and out of secure prosperity. This category — s…
The Development of Gender-Responsive Indicators
There is an increasing level of importance around evidence-based policy making and a growing interest in big data in the field of gender equality. Most of the research has been about the amount of data, so much less is known about the quality of data that is needed to be transformative and which indicators should be selected. Poorly selected indicators often lead to the representation of simplified social realities and tend to reproduce gender st…
Rwanda's gendered agricultural transformation
A view of the transformation of Rwanda's highland through the lens of gender
Constraints and opportunities in gender relations
Who gains from contract farming? Dependencies, power relations, and institutional change
The paper highlights the mechanisms through which outgrower contract farming creates dependencies at the local level. Using sugarcane case study in Malawi, we show that dependencies are created through redefinition of use rights to customary land and through the redefinition of cash flows into outgrower communities. Through this two-dimensional process, corporations can secure access to land, exert control over local communities and transform the…
D like Day- and Dream-Job. Eine explorative Untersuchung zu ambivalenten Aushandlungsprozessen sozialer Mobilität auf Instagram
Soziale Mobilität wird aktuell vermehrt diskutiert, sowohl im Rahmen wissenschaftlicher Studien als auch auf digitalen Plattformen wie Instagram. Hier sind neue, un(ter)bezahlte Arbeitsorte entstanden, die stark flexibilisiert und prekarisiert sind. Zudem teilen sie eine zentrale Eigenschaft mit anderen feminisierten Tätigkeiten wie jene der Care-Arbeit: Sie ist weitgehend unsichtbar, wobei die Subjekte selbst hypervisibel sind. Der Beitrag unter…
The dilemma of women empowerment in informal artisanal and small-scale gold ore mining in Ghana
For several years, women demand more decision-making power from their husbands and the society. Studies indicate that egalitarian decision-making power can be beneficial in many important ways to the household and society, and the pathway to this desire policy objective is through women empowerment. Yet, this is not as obvious as it seems. On the one hand, women empowerment is a game changer. On the other hand, the problem of women empowerment is…
The right to health
Despite Nepal's relatively comprehensive set of legal and policy instruments aimed at protecting the right to health of people with disability, women with disability in the country face numerous barriers to accessing health care, which ultimately compromises their full enjoyment of this right. This research examines the lived experience of women with physical, sensory, or mental health disability in relation to their access to health care and exp…
The Role of High-Value Agriculture in Capability Expansion
High-value agriculture contributes to rural incomes, but does it also contribute to expanding “human capabilities” (Sen, Development as freedom, Knopf, New York, 1999) in a durable way? Through long-term qualitative fieldwork in three landlocked LDCs—Nepal, Rwanda and Laos—resulting in over 150 interviews, we found expansions of the three analysed capabilities: paid work, mobility and social relations. Yet, those improvements were characterised b…
A typology of gender-based needs
Feminism—both in its activist and theoretical form—arguably always focuses on exposing, challenging and re-thinking how gender is assumed, discussed and practiced. One key focus of feminists has been to show how gender—in the sense of assumptions and practices about masculinity and femininity—significantly influences the needs and demands of people and how they—in turn—are responded to (or not) across different political and societal regimes. How…
Informal Women's Work in Public Spaces
Informal women's work in public spaces is central to livelihoods and social dynamics in cities of the Global South. For decades, public spaces have functioned as vital sites of economic activity, particularly for women engaged in informal work. Yet, recent urban redevelopment initiatives lead to the displacement and marginalization of these workers. This article investigates the complex, everyday ways in which women's work sustains social reprodu…
Sociology (8 works) · Economics (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Business (6 works) · Economic growth (6 works) · Agriculture (5 works) · Geography (5 works) · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development (4 works) · Cash crop (3 works) · Development economics (3 works)