The Role of Education in Promoting Empowerment as Agency in the Lives of Women and Girls in Somaliland

Abstract

This article draws on 100 qualitative interviews with young women who participated in a girls’ education programme known as SOMGEP (Somali Girls Education Programme). The underpinning research sought to explore the impact of SOMGEP education on and for the later life outcomes of the participating girls now women. Researchers were able to revisit former SOMGEP students 7 years after the end of the programme. The findings made links between higher levels of educational attendance and attainment and its positive impact on agency. What also emerged was the ways in which the expression of agency is hampered by wider contextual factors that often act as a backlash to the transformative potential of a secular education.

This article reflects on both the achievements and limitations of a secular western donor–funded education programme in Somaliland. The underpinning research takes a gendered political economy lens in order to answer the question: can education deliver positive inroads into empowering girls given the challenging context of Somaliland? The article combines qualitative perspectives of 40 participants of SOMGEP (Somali Girls Education Programme), with a detailed gendered, political economy analysis. The 40 participants were interviewed 3 times over a space of 9 months (January–September 2022); each time new questions were posed based on learning that emerged from each round of analysis and the political economy research. In total, 120 scripts were generated. Specifically, the article examines the pathways and options available to these women as a result of being SOMGEP educated. It also assesses the impact of the broader gendered political-economic context on the life routes and options available to women. The analysis is guided by Kabeer’s model of empowerment which she sees broadly as the ability of women to make life choices. Empowerment, in Kabeer’s work, is set out as a staged process involving resources, agency and achievements. The responses of the 40 women were measured against these 3 categories with deeper consideration given as to where and why control over life choices was greater in some areas compared to others.

Before going further more detail on SOMGEP is needed. The specific programme sites were mainly in Togdheer (central Somaliland), Sool and Sanaag, of which the latter two regions are disputed between Puntland and Somaliland. The remaining schools involved in the programme were in northern Galmudug and southern Puntland, concentrated in the rural areas between Galkayo and the Ethiopian border. The programme combined incentivised packages for girls and their families, including free uniform, dignity packs and an allowance for attendance. The curriculum combined core academic subjects with the addition of specialist girls’ clubs which focused on empowering girls offering them examples of positive role models and mentoring (for full details, see Conroy et al., 2022).

The interviews this article is partially based on were conducted 7 years after the end of the programme. The participants were asked to share their recollections of SOMGEP focusing on what they remembered and any possible benefits they feel now. The participants were also asked broader questions about their agency and specifically the extent to which they felt they had autonomy over decision-making. Questions on agency were divided into those focused-on decisions to pursue further and higher education, autonomy to work outside of the home, and control of sexual and reproductive decisions. Questions were also posed around the perceived treatment of women and levels of different forms of violence including intimate partner violence (IPV) and female genital mutilation (FGM). Also, questions were posed on what resilience mechanisms women have available to them to resist and challenge violence and controlling behaviours that limit their freedoms. The data were analysed through a grounded thematic hand-coded approach using headline codes drawn from Kabeer’s work (resources, agency, achievements). This analysis was then triangulated and synthesised through the use of NVivo version 20. In the absence of a specific national-level process for ethical clearance in Somaliland, ethical approval was given by the Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Science, University of Portsmouth. The required permits to conduct the data collection were issued by the Department of Statistics, Government of Somaliland.

The findings add more evidence to the critique of western development models of empowerment. As Kabeer’s (1991) work shows, models of empowerment often present a universal set of indicators. These indicators are largely applied based on the assumption that women and girls in poor Global South contexts display weak life outcomes across many spheres of life and that these materialise in similar ways requiring the same set of interventions (see also Alkire et al., 2013; Alsop and Heinsohn, 2005). Kabeer (1991, 1999) argues,

Inasmuch as women’s subordinate status is a product of the patriarchal structures of constraint that prevail in specific contexts, pathways of women’s empowerment are likely to be ‘path dependent’. They will be shaped by women’s struggles to act on the constraints that prevail in their societies, as much by what they seek to defend as by what they seek to change. The universal value that many feminists claim for individual autonomy may not therefore have the same purchase in all contexts. (p. 1)

The research of Kabeer and many others in the late 1980s and 1990s called for nuanced approach to understanding empowerment. Not least because empowerment is a term, which often cannot be translated into local languages (Kabeer, 1991a, 1991b, 1992). Much of this early research emerged from data collected in South Asian contexts, but it helps us here in thinking through what empowerment means for Somali women and girls. Despite these first calls for empowerment to be contextualised, in 1995 the UN Development Index introduced the gender empowerment measure (GEM). The GEM was based on indicators relating to political and economic participation and decision-making. Early critics of the GEM highlight how its quantitative focus on a limited number of indicators (economic engagement, political representation and control over decisions making in relation to household income) fails to take the cultural and social contextual factors into account (Pillarisetti and McGillivray, 1998). Furthermore, it does not capture the ways in which women navigate through the pathways available to them (Kabeer, 1999; Malhotra and Schuler, 2005; Mason and Smith, 2003).

In this article, these arguments are taken a step further by showing how the wider political economy, which is highly gendered, has immense impact in determining not just the available pathways in a practical sense, but also in shaping the social and cultural norms that girls and women exist within and draw on in shaping their sense of identity. As such, this research contributes not just to literature on girls’ education and empowerment but also the body of work on social norms and their impact in shaping attitudes and behaviours. Arguably, both these fields can be blind to the nuances of local contexts that determine the life paths available to women.

This article begins by unpacking further Kabeer’s model of empowerment outlining its usefulness as a frame for measuring and analysing the impact of programmes such as SOMGEP. The article then gives a concise historic overview of the broader national political economy of Somaliland including the legal and policy environment. The article then summarises the education system in Somaliland. The analysis of context highlights the spheres of opportunity for women and girls as they have emerged through time shaped by deeper cultural, religious and social norms. The remaining sections present an analysis of the data applying Kabeer’s models of agency and empowerment. The article ends by returning to the original research question reflecting on the role education plays in empowering women in Somaliland. Specifically, it offers a summary of the remaining challenges for women’s empowerment in Somaliland and points to a number of research gaps and areas of development practice that need greater thought.

Unpacking and contextualising models of agency and decision-making

Given that if models of agency and decision-making are to be useful in helping us understand the barriers facing girls, they must take account of patriarchal power structures. Definitions of agency often describe it as the ability to identify individual goals and act upon them (Kabeer, 1999). Agency is frequently seen as a central component of women’s empowerment (Kabeer, 1999; Malhotra and Schuler, 2005). Sen (1999) in his early work on human capabilities pinpointed agency as a defining characteristic of being able to exercise freedom to make decisions. Kabeer also works with this central focus of decision-making but goes further in outlining three main spheres in life where autonomy should be exercised if freedom is experienced: resources, agency and achievements.

Kabeer links each category with resource as the thread running through. Resources are not just economic but should also be measured as access to a safe and secure environment in which girls are educated and have the social capital to make choices (and that choices exist) (Kabeer, 1999; Malhotra and Schuler, 2005). Agency then for Sen and Kabeer relates to the freedom to make choices and to have the resources available to achieve the goals individuals set for themselves. Women might have a high level of decision-making power in some areas and not in others (Gupta and Yesudian, 2006; Malhotra and Mather, 1997; Mason and Smith, 2000). Applying agency to an analysis of a woman’s life needs to be broken down into different domains, which will likely be different across contexts (Richardson et al., 2019) and include an assessment of the impact of gendered power structures and norms on her decision-making options. This article takes these domains of empowerment and considers how they are shaped by the broader political economy.

This article will now turn to consider the legacy of history in shaping the current context in which women and girls must navigate their life pathways. This contextual summary helps to argue that even when space is given for education founded on a liberal secular concept of gendered empowerment, the extent to which it can realistically lead to more life choices for girls is limited.

A brief political-economy history of Somaliland

A British Protectorate from 1884, in 1960, Somaliland declared its independence from Britain, and 5 days later joined the Trust Territory of Somalia (formerly Italian Somaliland and now Somalia) to form the Somali Republic. In 1991, Somaliland announced itself as an independent state, breaking its union with the Somali Republic. This declaration happened against a backdrop of long-term insurgency in Somaliland and the descent of southern Somalia into civil war (Bradbury, 2008). Muse Bihi Abdi was officially sworn in as the fifth President of the Republic of Somaliland on 13 December 2017. Today, Somaliland has its own political system, government, police force and currency, but its self-declared independence remains unrecognised by the United Nations and Somalia continues to consider Somaliland as a federal member state. While it is considered relatively stable, the process of state-building in Somaliland has been fractious and prone to periods of civil conflict. As Boege et al. (2008) argue, state-building is always a highly fraught political process that often leads to conflict as distributions of power are contested and negotiated and Somaliland is not an exception to this (see also Azam, 2013; Balthasar, 2013; Meagher, 2012).

Goetz et al. (2003) articulate the implications a lack of commitment to building strong equitable institutions has on and for gender equality and women’s rights. They argue that ‘the design of political institutions [. . . ] profoundly hampers the perceived legitimacy of women politicians and of gender equity concerns, and hence the effectiveness of feminists in advancing gender equity policy’ (Goetz et al., 2003: 5). This quote reflects the challenging environment for women which has implications for the ways in which agency can be experienced and expressed. The restrictive options available to female leaders to transform the inequalities embedded in political structures translate into limited room for manoeuvre for women at other levels including household.

Foreign investment from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates is supporting the growth of the private sector. Investment though is also being directed towards funding an educational infrastructure consisting of madrassas. As stated in the previous section, religious education has become highly accessible to boys and girls and increasingly bridges the rural–urban divide and is offered from kindergarten age. The roots of the influence of Wahhabism can be traced to the Islamic backlash to the socialist reforms introduced by President Mohamed Siad Barre through the introduction of family law in 1975 (see Richards, 2015). Barre found loyal support in women who were actively recruited to support the revolution and war, with many women enlisted into the Somali Women’s Democratic Organisation (see also Ingiriis and Hoehne, 2013; Samatar, 1985). The law introduced greater equality between men and women who were deemed to have equal decision-making power, promoting the education of girls and women’s employment outside of the home including maternity provision, banning of dowry and reducing polygamy. The law also gave women equal inheritance rights. Critics of the law did not see it is as a sign of feminist socialism in the way that Barre did since patriarchal values still prevailed with male household heads the key decision-makers (Ingiriis and Hoehne, 2013).

The secular values of equality and rights introduced by Barre upset the religious elite, consequently he faced protest from Islamic scholars who were increasingly supported by Islamic movements from outside, mainly from Saudi Arabia (ibid). Barre turned to violence in an attempt to remove opposition; this ultimately lost him support and led to his demise. The removal of Barre was promptly followed by the rewriting of the law, which removed many of the more progressive components of gender equality. Arguably, the removal of Barre signalled the reintroduction of more conservative gendered norms which have shaped every aspect of life in Somaliland. Most Islamic schools in Somaliland receive funding through the Wahabi charitable network (Rayale et al., 2015). As our qualitative findings given below reveal, teachings on gender in madrassas can be highly conservative and potentially set limits to the life pathways for women. Wahabi Islam is widely reported to project conservative gender norms (Delavande and Zafar, 2013).

Policies, laws, legislation

Somaliland’s legal system is a mixture of civil law, Islamic (Sharia) law and customary law. Sharia law takes precedence over all laws, and customary law also has a strong influence. This mixed system can lead to conflict and is not generally supportive of women’s rights (Farley, 2010). Somaliland is not listed as a separate jurisdiction among the signatories to the international and regional treaties most relevant to protecting women and girls from forms of gender-based violence (e.g. CEDAW). However, the Constitution of the Republic of Somaliland (2001) confirmed compliance with all international agreements and treaties formerly signed and ratified by Somalia in Article 10(1), ‘provided that these do not conflict with the interests and concerns of the Republic of Somaliland’ (Renders and Terlinden, 2010).

A Somaliland National Gender Policy was developed in 2009, comprising commitments to ensure gender equality across department portfolios. ¹ According to a report compiled by Nagaad (see Tungaraza, 2010), ‘The Ministry of Family Affairs and Social Development, which has the overall mandate for coordinating women’s rights and gender interventions, was only established in 2006’. Nagaad goes on to state,

needless to say, gender mainstreaming is perceived as the responsibility of the Ministry of Family Affairs and Social Development, instead of as a multisectoral issue. The government budget is very meagre, accounting for less than $30 million; consequently, the development of enabling policies and laws to cater for gender mainstreaming has been a very slow and painful process.

This obviously has implications for the level of gender responsiveness across departments including Education. The gendered historical context outlined above is critical in explaining the ways in which girls and women can and do express agency and in assessing the role secular education can and has played in promoting it. This article will now turn to consider the impact of context on and for the voice and place of girls and women in Somaliland society.

It is well acknowledged that women and girls often lack a strong voice in Somaliland society, as decisions in the home and government are made almost exclusively by men. In Somaliland, 97% of girls aged between 4 and 11 have endured FGM (28Toomany, 2019). The low literacy rates explain the limited awareness of legal rights that in turn increases the vulnerability of women and girls to a range of abuse. The gender gap index of 0.45 (Oxfam, 2019) indicates that women are severely disadvantaged across a number of areas ranging from fewer economic opportunities to a lack of representation in political decision-making processes to the already detailed lower educational attainments. Available report data does not reflect improvements over time, but the national education strategy published in 2017 is hopeful that inroads will be made. As it stands now, women are far less likely than men to participate in the labour market and Somaliland’s economy offers limited opportunities for formal employment. Women are twice as likely as men to be unemployed but many are actively looking for a work (30.1% of the female labour force, compared to 16.4% among men). This indicates that despite the socio-cultural norms that place women in the domestic sphere, plenty of women are looking for economic opportunities outside the house. This gap is particularly evident among youth, 53.8% of women aged 15–24 are not in employment or in education, compared to 24.4% of young men in the same cohort (Kenny et al., 2019). The economic aspiration of women highlighted by Kenny et al. is significant when applying Kabeer’s model. It highlights that despite the highly conservative and restrictive context, many women desire life pathways that give them greater equality and are demonstrating agency in seeking them.

Overview of the education system in Somaliland

In Somaliland, there are 8 years of primary school starting at age 6 and 4 years of secondary school starting at age 14. The official age range for secondary education in Somaliland is between 14 and 18. However, even before primary, a system of early childhood education exists that incorporates social skills with religious instruction (Melesse and Obsiye, 2022). This is in line with how the government of Somaliland views education as a vehicle to shape the moral outlook of pupils as well as provide them with the skills needed to be economically productive (Somaliland Government Review of Education and Higher Studies, 2017).

The growth of the Madrassa system in Somaliland has broadened educational access to kindergarten-aged children. In both the primary and secondary systems, there are both formal and informal systems. It is important to note that across both primary and secondary levels, girls access more informal education to a greater degree than boys. Non-formal education (NFE) is widely seen as more accessible to girls and women as it is provided via informal centres or hubs with flexible class times that can fit around domestic responsibilities. NFE focuses on basic literacy and numeracy and as such does not lead to the awarding of more formal qualifications. In addition, a system of alternative basic education (ABE) exists primarily focused on providing basic literacy and numeracy too hard to reach nomadic pastoralist communities (Ali, 2019). Delivery is adapted to the transient nature of pastoral life. Overall, formal education is still more highly valued for boys (Oxfam, 2019). In terms of how the system relates to the agency and empowerment of girls, it is clear that resource allocation is gendered and girls are not valued as equally income generators. More research is needed focused on the possible link between the conservative gendered norms validated by Islamic teaching and patriarchal traditions and their impact on girls’ access to more formal secular education. For example, the extent to which religious gendered norms have influenced and shaped government policy that clearly designates the purpose of education for girls as different from their male counterparts. Article 36 ‘The Rights of Women in the National Constitution’ which states,

In order to raise the level of education and income of women, and also the welfare of the family, women shall have the right to have extended to them an education in home economics and to have opened for them vocational, special skills and adult education schools.

The influence of gender can be seen in this statement, which clearly sets out what type of education is deemed appropriate for girls. This potentially sets limits to what is practically available to girls by way of curriculum and educational settings, but also psychologically in terms of instilling a limited sense of pathways. The educational attainment gap is 0.68 (Oxfam, 2019), reflecting the disadvantage girls suffer as a result of a deep gender bias in the system. In explaining this disadvantage, we need to drill more deeply into the gendered norms, values and beliefs that unpin shape these inequalities and which secular education, if it is to be a route to empowerment, must transform.

The impact of religious education on the life pathways for women

Scholars have reported for decades the potential negative impact conservative religious teachings may have for and on the pursuit of gender equality (e.g. King and Beattie, 2005; Schnabel, 2016; Tomalin, 2013). While the research presented here was not intended to explore the impact of conservative Islam on women’s lives in Somaliland, many participants did share the narrow view taught in madrassa settings on the societal role of women. Stepping back and considering again the impact of the historic legacy on and for the lives of women and girls and the challenges female politicians experience in trying to push for equality, it is clear any deepening of a gender-restricted ideology will limit the room for manoeuvre available to those that wish to claim more liberal life outcomes. Indeed, to do so may well come with considerable social sanctioning. The period following Barre has been fragile with the area pulled into regional and geo-political agendas, including, from the mid-2000s, the ‘war on terror’. Deepening poverty and the failures of state-building left Somaliland with no functioning welfare state and education system (Delavande and Zafar, 2013). This left an opportunity for more conservative Islamic movements to take a stronger hold. With increasing numbers of men migrating to Arab states for work and coming into contact with Wahabi Islam, the influence of Saudi Arabi and other Arab nations strengthened. Control over building and funding a system of Islamic education was a key route to wider influence over the structures of governance and political decision-making (see Marangio, 2012). Jhazbhay (2008) stated,

A major agency for disseminating Islam as a religion and culture in Somaliland, as elsewhere throughout the Muslim world, has been education. The funding of religious and/or religious-based education by Arab/Islamic charities, which have emerged as a major vehicle for channelling what are identified as Wahhabi-Salafi expressions of Islamic fundamentalism and jihadist tendencies, is subjected to major scrutiny in terms of how the education–charities link is influencing Somaliland society. (Jhazbhay, 2008: 175)

Importantly, after Somaliland’s declaration of independence in 1991, the Islamic movement of Waxda had become ‘deeply involved in educational institutions, (while) keeping close links with Kuwait’ (ibid, 176). Ronald Regan has been associated with the rise in prominence of Wahabi Islam in Saudi Arabia seeing it as a liberation movement that could counter the influence of Soviet Russia. As such, the Wahabi influenced Waxda movement was able to grow its footprint across Somaliland drawing on the Islamic principles of charity and welfare to do so. The impact of certain Islamic values cannot be ignored as a strong dimension in shaping the gendered roles and expectations for women (Rayale et al., 2015). The impact and influence a secular framed education empowerment programme may be able to have in such a contextual reality is likely to be limited. The extent to which the legal and policy context of Somaliland offers women and girls protection and leverage for greater rights, as already covered above, is also questionable.

Given how widespread madrassa education now is in Somaliland, it is possible girls may be receiving a clash in messaging over gender if they are also accessing secular education through programmes such as SOMGEP. The potential impact of religious conservative views on later life outcomes is unclear, but they do run counter to liberal notions of empowerment as agency that underpin SOMGEP. This is evident from the passage below shared by one of our participants,

Our madrassa teacher fought us hard to attend school for three years, declaring ‘Choose between me or the school’. And so, it took us three years to persuade him to let us go to school, which set us back three years. He always liked saying, ‘did you guys choose to go to the formal school after I taught you for the past few years?’ As well since he believed bad things from school, no student who went to the formal schools was ever allowed to come to madrassa.

The conservative nature of the madrassa teaching received by participants was apparent, for example, ‘The madrassa teachers preach about the religion . . . They advised us to wear hijab, lower our voice when speaking, and obey our husbands’. Another participant shared,

When it comes to religion, a woman should have good manners, faith, patience and take good care of her husband and children. After that, her honour will be noticeable, which are the traits of a good woman. On the other hand, a good wife should respect and care for her husband as well as her children.

A further participant shared, ‘She could be a good wife if she obeys her husband, cares for him, and serves him well’.

If we turn now to consider the potential clash in gendered values between the secular and liberal education delivered by SOMGEP and the more conservative religious teaching of the madrasa system, the complexity of what girls have to navigate becomes clear.

Education as empowerment

What comes through strongly in the participants’ responses is that the secular education of SOMGEP coupled with the additional girl club curricula focused on building agency and life expectations has had a lasting positive impact. Most of our participants recognised education as an important resource in their lives. Being able to confidently read, write and be numerate had a positive impact on how they view themselves and their place in the world:

They gave me a good quality of education that allowed me to sit in front of you and talk freely and openly. My answers would’ve been short if I didn’t get the education. They helped me learn Mathematics and English and overall increased my knowledge.

I am grateful because I increased my knowledge to the level that I am at today. It increased my self-confidence.

When you’re educated, but you will not become a visionary if you’re not educated. If you’re uneducated, you will not see the light of life; all they think of is what to cook for dinner.

The importance of mentoring support was also clear in the following reflections: That agency hired a female teacher to mentor us and give us advice on our health and education; she also taught us how to be more confident.

A further example of the importance of the holistic approach taken by SOMGEP can be seen in the following passage: ‘I can now read and send money to my mother on her mobile phone, so I appreciate their support. Now, I know everything, such as the self-help groups and the basic mathematics’. Clearly, participants recognised that education gave them increased confidence and greater self-esteem. The question though remains, to what extent the room to exercise this confidence will be limited both structurally but also psychologically, by the influence of conservative religious gendered beliefs.

The impact of intergenerational change

Our political economy analysis, given above, took a historical approach tracing how gendered relations and expectations have been shaped over time. As such they determine the pathways available to women and girls both past and present. The research did optimistically reveal intergenerational changes which may signal a more empowered outlook for girls and women in expressing their agency and seeking new opportunities compared to their mothers and grandmothers. We can perhaps see it more in how our participants talk about their hopes for their children. In applying Kabeer’s model, we identify our participants strongly expressed hopes for their children (sons and daughters) as evidence of achievement. Linked to this projection forward into the lives of their daughters, participants shared the positive shifts in their own life compared to previous generations.

Participants were reflective of the lack of opportunity their mothers and grandmothers had. They all noted and spoke positively of the opportunity they had as a result of going to school, both secular and Islamic:

My goals and aspirations are different from the goals and aspirations of my mother and grandmother. My goal is to continue making progress and to take my role in this modernized world just like the others. I would like to be independent and have my own business but my mother and grandmother’s goal was to get married since they weren’t educated and didn’t have the ability to make businesses since they lived in rural areas.

Despite reflections on how opportunities are better for our participants compared to their mothers, many are not economically engaged. The maternal relationship emerged as an important source of emotional and psychological resilience. The closeness of the mother–daughter bond was very evident: ‘my mother and I have strong mother-daughter relationship, we are both women and we are friends’. The support mothers give daughters was acknowledged across participants and should be seen as a form of resilience.

The reflections shared suggest that family relationships are critical and should perhaps be included as a form of resilience, within Kabeer’s model as a resource drawn on to gain the confidence needed to express agency and make different decisions than the generation before. Interestingly, and differing from other contexts, (e.g. South Asia; see Bradley et al., 2023), our participants do not draw on peer support but rather turn to their parents and specifically mothers and grandmothers. In relating resilience to the model of ‘agency as empowerment’, it should be placed as a central enabling pillar. As Kabeer (1999) shared, living in a place that is safe and free from violence and abuse is critical for agency to thrive and individuals to flourish. The emotional security gained through the mother–daughter relationship in this research seems central to creating a stable environment for girls. This emotional stability becomes even more important in the lives of girls when considered within the broader context of conflict and drought historically endured by communities in Puntland.

Agency in deciding on whom to marry and divorce

The strongest sign of a shift in decision-making agency appears to be reflected in the autonomy to choose a husband. Most participants felt they had control over making their own choice of partner. Those who shared they had their marriage arranged or were forced indicated that financial insecurity lay behind their family’s decision. Research conducted by Kenny et al. (2019) points to agency and technology as important factors supporting this greater freedom to choose a husband. Many women, according to Kenny et al., are not just choosing their partners but finding them, and data from this study support this finding, as one participant shared:

I was in Hargeisa when we first met. We met through social media, especially Facebook. We got to know each other, and our love reached to the point of moving to the next step, marriage.

The link between this autonomy to choose and the age of marriage is not clear. Kenny et al. report that in their qualitative data set the age of marriage is in fact decreasing. This phenomenon can perhaps be explained by the enduring norm that relationships outside of marriage are a taboo. When young men and women meet and want to pursue a relationship, marriage is the only option to avoid bringing stigma to the honour of the family. This was also noted by a participant for this study: ‘On the other hand, I got married at a younger age because I was young and wanted to have children. I think these are good changes’.

It should be noted that the quantitative study conducted by Conroy et al. (2022) found that secular education, such as that provided by SOMGEP, leads overall to later marriage. This is clearly an area that needs further research in order to understand the complex norms and contextual dynamics that shape and determine agency in relation to marriage. Regardless of the age of marriage, the centrality of marriage to Islamic women’s identity is still strong. Many of the participants shared that they are actively pursuing marriage in order to conform to the gendered norms of their religion. This suggests it is not just fear of being seen to have a relationship outside of marriage that is the motivation, but rather a desire to fulfil religious obligation. Agency in making a partner choice is evident, but pressure to marry in order to conform to gender norms is still dominant.

Clearly, literacy is necessary in order to utilise mobile and digital technology, intuitively then there is a link between higher levels of education and the ability to use technology to exercise autonomy in finding a partner: ‘finding a good husband is just luck, and using the Social media platforms may cause you to get a good husband’.

Another indication that participants experience and express agency in the form of decision-making can be seen in relation to divorce. Many participants felt they were able to divorce if things did not work out. These stories of divorce and family support for this decision point again to a key source of resilience for women and girls in their maternal family networks and specifically in their relationship with their mothers.

This article so far has explored the relationships between different forms of education, the political economic context and deeper religious gendered norms, and the impact of these dimensions in shaping different expressions of empowerment as agency. This article now will shift in exploring the third sphere in Kabeer’s model, that of achievement. In practical terms, what opportunities do women and girls have in Somaliland? It is one thing to feel confident in making decisions, but if opportunities do not exist to express agency what may achieved will be limited.

Opportunities and life outcomes

While the list of possible life outcomes is scarce for the participants in this study, they all acknowledge that they had greater opportunities than their mothers and grandmothers. All the women shared positive feelings about education and its importance for boys and girls. Many also shared that their parents had supported them in pursuing learning, both religious and secular. They also spoke about wanting to continue with their education into vocational studies. The options available were limited consisting mainly of training in medical care or learning a skill such as henna which would enable them to set up a small business. Clearly, the narrow labour market has a massive impact on a woman’s economic achievements. It also points to the importance of investing in income-generating opportunities for women. Without pathways into work, education cannot increase the achievements of women. Applying the category of resources to this research, the following emerge as key indicators: educational attainment and the freedom to decide when to finish education. The most available income options for our participants were identified by them as either owning a business or entering a health profession. In relation to agency, being able to choose your own husband and having a degree of mobility outside of the home (defined as freedom to decide when to go out and for a range of reasons, for example, domestic, work and social reasons) emerged as the most relevant (see also Allendorf, 2012; Gupta and Yesudian, 2006; Sandberg and Rafail, 2013). Bodily autonomy stood out in the data set as an area of contestation for our participants who struggled to exert the same level of control over sexual and reproductive decisions compared to household spending. Bodily autonomy then emerged as an important marker of empowerment in Somaliland, which includes resilience to violence including harmful practices (e.g. FGM/C) (see Sandberg and Rafail, 2013; Shroff et al., 2011).

Our data highlight that many women aspire but may not yet be able to go further. Marrying young is certainly a key factor limiting the progression of women and girls into the labour market. For example, one participant shared, ‘I am planning to continue my education when my child grows a bit. I will go to a private school and improve my English, then go to medical school and get a diploma at the university level’. Those women who were not yet married and who had taken a conscious choice to delay marriage were the only group of participants to go on to further studies. For example, ‘I am not planning to marry until my grandmother becomes healthier. I want to get married when I accomplish my goals for the future, no matter how long it takes. I believe 25 years’.

Across the political economy analysis and qualitative data, we see how participants have limited ‘room for maneuver’. Those women who have continued into Higher Education or Further Education seem likely to succeed in securing professional status mainly in the health/medical sector or as business women. Participants voiced hopes for their children (including daughters) that they may live a life with greater opportunities than they had available to them. For example,

I want my children to succeed in their studies and achieve a high level of education. Yes, I believe it would be different because I grew up in a harsh environment and want my child to have a better life than mine.

Overall, a shift can be seen in terms of life aspiration that holds the potential to translate into more outcomes that will be taken should the economic conditions positively change.

Mothers were documented as being happy that their daughters would also be able to go to school. What is less clear in the data is the extent to which participants would now prioritise equally the education of sons and daughters even in resource-poor families. SOMGEP made financial provision to remove barriers for girls attending school. The extent to which this financial incentive is still needed in the case of our participants is not clear. If the desired decision to send daughters to school even without grants is present, this would reflect a significant shift in gendered norms. It is perhaps too soon to capture this level of attitudinal change, but the signs are hopeful.

Conclusion

This article has sought to apply and adapt Kabeer’s model of empowerment as agency to the context of Somaliland. The analysis combined a gendered political economic analysis with 40 interviews from participants interviewed 3 times over the course of 9 months (totalling 120 scripts). The analysis of data drew on existing literature in order to help map out how and where participants expressed confidence in making decisions and where they seemed to have less autonomy. The article sought to understand why limitations and barriers exist in terms of the outcomes available and the motivation to choose them. Central to the discussion was the role that secular education plays in building agency. The political economy analysis highlighted the growth of madrassa education working alongside secular programmes such as SOMGEP. The influence of religious education on and for women’s empowerment in Somaliland as framed through models such as Kabeer’s is largely unresearched. The data presented in this article need to be explored in greater detail. There is a potential clash emerging between the secular, liberal shaping of education which arguably promotes more westernised and feminist values and the much more conservative Islamic values and beliefs on gender promoted in madrassa teaching. This unwitting tension may not be helpful in supporting women in accessing greater choice and freedoms.

The central research question underpinning this research given at the start was: can education deliver positive inroads into empowering girls given the challenging context of Somaliland? The analysis points to a yes, but answer. Participants shared directly how SOMGEP had given them increased self-confidence and aspirations. Decision-making in some spheres was evident; participants felt able to make choices over work outside of the home and expressed autonomy in spending money earnt. SOMGEP, through its girl club curriculum, encouraged participants to pursue independent income generation. However, when it came to issues of bodily autonomy (e.g. decisions over how many children to have and when), women had considerably less control despite these also being areas covered by SOMGEP (see Conroy et al., 2022). The historic role of men as household head remains the status quo. Male authority in the home seems to still be primarily expressed through control over women’s bodies. The importance of including an historical dimension to the contextualisation of agency is also apparent in the data and analysis. Setting current levels of agency within a continuum of intergenerational change allows us to see where positive shifts have happened and to appreciate the role and impact secular education may have had in influencing change. It also reveals where there is potential for agency to be lost, the potential shift to more conservative religious norms as a result of the growth of madrassa education on gender roles will be important to monitor.

The limited labour market is a significant factor in reducing opportunities to realise agency gained through education. Overwhelmingly, we can see the importance of a holistic approach to secular education in Somaliland. SOMGEP combined core subjects with an additional wrap around programme of mentoring and role modelling. This approach seems to have contributed to raising the aspirations of women which may still lead to greater opportunities for daughters. Perhaps one area for educational programming to reflect on is whether or not mentoring should speak more closely to the actual pathways and opportunities available to women. A more systematic focus on the realistic options available may further empower girls and offer a counter to restrictive gendered norms. The research presented here certainly points to a number of areas for urgent further research not least the continued monitoring of political economy changes on and for gendered empowerment. Second, greater reflection is needed on how secular and religious forms of education may work together in order to promote a more unified and positive message of gendered equality. Finally, this article has demonstrated the value of research that traces the life outcomes and experiences of women who participant in and complete educational programmes such as SOMGEP. Evidence of the value, but also the challenges, of secular development education programmes is needed if funding is to be retained and the inroads achieved so far built on.