The Development Studies Association 2022 Conference was hosted online by University College London on 6-8 July. The theme was ‘Just sustainable futures in an urbanising and mobile world’, with contributions exploring what justice and equity look like in a post-pandemic world affected by an escalating climate crisis.

1. Intersectional approaches to adolescent voice and agency:
gender and participation in the context of multiple crises
Friday 8 July, 11:50-12:30
Convenors: Kate Pincock and Nicola Jones (GAGE/ODI)
Chair: Sabina Rashid (BRAC James P. Grant School of Public Health, BRAC University)

2. Presenter Introductions
 Elena Samonova, Postdoctoral fellow at University College
Dublin
 Elizabeth Dessie, Postdoctoral Fellow at the African Cities
Research Consortium, Global Development
Institute, University of Manchester
 Rose Pinnington, Senior Associate at King’s College London
 Kerry Selvester, monitoring, evaluation and learning
coordinator (MEL) at MUVA
 Tony Roberts, Fellow at the Institute of Development
Studies
 Jo Howard, Research Fellow at the Institute of
Development Studies

3. ‘Children have the right to be controlled by
their parents’. Children’s voice in rural Sierra
Leone: between participation and control.
Dr. Elena Samonova
University College Dublin
elena.samonova@ucd.ie

4. “Children have the right to be controlled by their parents”. Children’s voice in rural
Sierra Leone: between participation and control
Safe Learning Study (2017-2022)
Dr. Elena Samonova
University College Dublin
elena.samonova@ucd.ie
A longitudinal mixed-methods study that explores socio-cultural and gender dynamics, well-
being and experiences of primary schooling in rural Sierra Leone
Quantitative Methods Qualitative methods
100 schools 4 communities
Surveys Students + Teachers+ Headteachers Interviews
Students+Relatives+Teachers
Early Grade Reading Assessment Classroom observation
Photovoice

5. Summary
 Local interpretations of children’s
rights focus on education and other
socio-economic rights
 No recognition of the right to
participation for children and youth
 Participation is wanted by youth but
feared by elders
 Clashes within gendered and
generational orders
I think it a good thing for us to be aware about our
children's right. Children have the right to be
educated, and they also have the right to be
controlled by their parents
(Grandmother of class 2 student)

6. Being young and rural in the city:
a longitudinal study of gendered
livelihood strategies in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia
Elizabeth Dessie
University of Manchester
African Cities Research Consortium

7. Being young and rural in the city: a longitudinal study of gendered livelihood strategies in
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Qualitative study building on research conducted in 2018
• Focusing on gendered experiences of the city through feminist geography and intersectionality
• Examining the livelihood strategies and responses to change adopted by youth in a post-pandemic and
post-conflict setting
Elizabeth Dessie
University of Manchester
African Cities Research Consortium

8. Reflections based on preliminary findings:
• Gendered experiences of becoming ‘adults’ as rural urban dwellers
• Adaptations to uncertainty through a diversification of everyday practices
• Approaching the covid-19 pandemic as a crisis experienced ‘differently’ in SSA cities
Subjective changes and transitions to ‘adulthood’ – how can intersectionality challenge
understandings of youth and adulthood as social categories?

9. ‘Cities as fertile grounds for change? The effects
of physical and sociocultural urban spaces on
the economic empowerment of marginalised
adolescent girls and young women in
Mozambique’
Authors: Rose Pinnington & Kerry Selvester
Development Studies Association Conference, 2022
W08: ‘Intersectional approaches to adolescent voice
and agency: gender and participation in the context of
multiple of crises’

10. Context of the research
1. MUVA programme (UKAid-funded, 2015 – 2022): economic empowerment of marginalised adolescent girls
and young women in several of the poorest neighbourhoods in urban centres across Mozambique, with a
focus on increasing their access to quality jobs.
2. Question: what are the opportunities and barriers presented by urban spaces for the economic
empowerment of young marginalised women?
3. Existing knowledge: not clear whether urbanisation is supporting the economic empowerment of young
women. Plus: recent major analyses of urbanisation in Mozambique are largely gender blind (e.g. World
Bank, 2017 ‘Republic of Mozambique Urbanization Review’)
4. Methodology: paper presents findings from both quantitative and qualitative studies conducted by MUVA
between 2015 and 2020, including:
1. ‘Youth Perceptions Study on Access to Services’ (2015)
2. ‘Social Norms Aspirations, perceptions and experience related to work among teenage young
women and young women in four cities in Mozambique - Tete, Beira, Nampula and Maputo’ (2016)
3. ‘Urban Youth Survey – Beira and Maputo’ (2018)
4. ‘Understanding the Digital Gender Gap in Urban Mozambique: the case of Maputo’ (2020)

11. Findings: how the physical and social infrastructure of the city affects the
economic empowerment of marginalised young women
• Young people (both male and female) spend majority of their time in their own neighbourhoods, despite
limited economic opportunities
• Barriers: the price of public transport, unsafe conditions, including crowded vehicles, poor quality roads
and, for the teenage girls interviewed, sexual harassment
• Other factors included the feeling that in their neighborhood ‘they have everything they need’ & and a lack
of confidence to go elsewhere
• Connected to a lack of information about economic opportunities or possibilities beyond the invisible
boundary of the ‘bairro’
• Also affected by: a lack of spaces for adolescents to socially interact within their neighbourhoods
• Young women more mobility-constrained: less likely than young men to work outside the home and far less
likely to spend leisure time outside of the house (75% compared to 51%)
• Young women require permission from relatives, usually male relatives, to work or socialise outside of the
home
• More than half of young people (59%) in Maputo and Beira belonged to a social group
• But young men disproportionately belonged to groups likely to expand social networks and effect change
(e.g. political organisations)
• Feminist scholarship: importance of social networks outside of the family for advancing gender equality
(enabling feminist organising & questioning of dominant gender norms) e.g. Kabeer & Huq, 2014.

12. Impact & programming implications
• Results: In the MUVA classroom
assistants project, post-
intervention surveys showed that
the young women had more
agency over their movements
than similar women who had not
participated
• How? Emphasis on soft skills –
using a multifaceted definition of
economic empowerment that
includes psychosocial elements:
including promoting sense of self-
efficacy and agency through
teaming young women up with
mentors

14. New tools for assessing voice and agency:
Unpacking and tracing participation across 3 axes of
the 'participation cube' can enable better
intersectional planning and implementation of
initiatives.
Jo Howard & Tony Roberts
Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex

15. Participation Cube Participation Tracing

16. Participation Cube (Uganda) Participation Tracing (Uganda)

17. Discussants
• Adolescent Girls’ Investment Plan (AGIP)
Pooja Singh
• GAGE Jordan
Sarah Alheiwidi
• John Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
Kara Hunersen

18. Audience Q&A

19. For further information
Nicola Jones: www.gage.odi.org
Elizabeth Dessie: www.african-cities.org
Tony Roberts: www.AppropriatingTechnology.org
Jo Howard: www.ids.ac.uk/clusters-and-
teams/participation/
Elena Samonova: elena.samonova@ucd.ie
Rose Pinnington: r.pinnington@gmail.com
Sabina Rashid: sabina@bracu.ac.bd
Pooja Singh: AGIP.Youth@girlsnotbrides.org
Kara Hunersen: https://www.geastudy.org
Sarah Alheiwidi: Sarahalheiwidi97@outlook.com