International Journal of Education and Social Science (IJESS)

Since the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan, the situation for women has deteriorated dramatically. In this article we`ll discuss a vocational training project named ‘Empowering Women in Afghanistan’ in the field of literacy and tailoring in the north of Afghanistan only a few months before the Taliban took power again. The goal of the project was to educate and empower women to earn their own living and therefore gain a more independent and autonomous status within families and communities. The lack of access to education, to paid work and the lack of integration of Afghan women into the political system can be seen as structural violence that makes women powerless. With the help of low-threshold educational opportunities such as the project presented here, women can build up resources and social networks. These, in turn, can have an empowering effect on the social group level, because networking creates additional usable resources.