Women’s Leadership in Grassroots Environmental Movements

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-575-1_7How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Gender Equality; Sustainable Development; Customary norms; Legal Framework; Environmental justice

Abstract

Women’s secure access to land and natural resources remains a crucial factor for ensuring gender equality and sustainable development. Although the statutory laws in many jurisdictions formally recognize women’s property and rights related to other resources, their implementation is often constrained by entrenched customary norms and patriarchal traditions. This paper examines the conflict between statutory and customary legal frameworks and its impact on women’s access, control, and participation in resource governance. A mixed-methods design is attempted in this paper, where the research combines doctrinal legal analysis and community-level case studies, supported by comparative policy analysis across global jurisdictions. The study examines legal contradictions and institutional gaps in the background of feminist legal theory, environmental jurisprudence, and legal pluralism. The result shows the exclusion of gender from ownership of resources and the decision-making process. It highlights that different types of laws and weak enforcement systems affect women’s tenure security, while the gender-responsive legal reforms and participatory governance models promote sustainable stewardship. The study suggests measures for reform, including amendments to the law and rules and gender quotas in resource management bodies. This is to balance legal frameworks and recognize women’s rights. This research is a valuable contribution to the literature on gender and environmental law since it connects women’s tenure with the aspects of security and sustainability outcomes. It establishes that promoting women’s equitable access to natural resources is not only a matter of justice but also a critical component of effective and sustainable environmental management.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - A. R. Vidya
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/05/06
TI  - Women’s Leadership in Grassroots Environmental Movements
BT  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Dynamics of Environment, Sustainability, and Gender Disparities: A Holistic Dialogue for Inclusive Futures (ICDESGD 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 92
EP  - 108
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-575-1_7
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-575-1_7
ID  - Vidya2026
ER  -