Gender and rural livelihoods in Kenya

Abstract

This article considers the implications for gender relations of different rural livelihoods. While many rural areas in Kenya have been drawn into intensive commercial production, others, formerly dependent on remittances from migrant labour, have seen these diminish. Recent empirical studies of gender and livelihoods in Kenya are compared. Commercial production and the drying up of remittances set up quite different processes in rural households. These may lead to greater corporateness, to conflict or even to fragmentation. The outcome depends on the potential rewards of co‐operation, but also on domestic authority relations and on ideologies of common or divided interest.