Women’s Agency in Community-Based Agriculture: A Systematic Review of Women Farmers’ Groups

Abstrak

This article examines women’s agency in community-based agriculture, focusing on Women Farmers’ Groups (Kelompok Wanita Tani). The study explores how agency is conceptualised, enabled, and constrained within these collectives, clearly distinguishing it from mere participation and outcome-based measures of empowerment. A Systematic Literature Review of 31 peer-reviewed articles published since 2010 was conducted using Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. By applying qualitative thematic synthesis, the findings reveal four interrelated themes. First, agency is a multidimensional and process-oriented construct that encompasses decision-making power, resource control, and autonomy, though it has varying levels of conceptual clarity. Second, collective action, participatory governance, and capacity-building act as highly context-dependent enabling mechanisms. Third, institutional support is critical but carries the risk of creating program-dependent empowerment through top-down interventions. Fourth, persistent structural constraints such as gender norms, unequal resource control, and time poverty continue to limit autonomy despite active participation. Ultimately, these organizations only foster transformative empowerment when conditions permit meaningful decision-making and control over agricultural practices. This review contributes by clarifying the conceptual boundaries between participation, empowerment outcomes, and women’s agency, providing a process-oriented understanding of how this agency is negotiated.