The purpose of this essay is to review the Swedish international development cooperation carried out by Sida to control whether the implementation of the international aid is compatible with the policy. There are a lot of different ways to implement the economic aid that are being used by the donors today. The Swedish method has since the 1960s mainly been focused on attempting to diminish the poverty in the world. In the latest time another goal has been added, that is a focus on supporting the civil rights. This essay will be concentrated to aim on what kind of countries receiving aid from Sweden, and exactly why these countries are being chosen. The main question of this essay is: What countries are receiving the international developing aid, and how can this distribution be understood? To answer the main question there are two themes in the essay: • What kind of countries is supposed to receive developing aid from Sweden according to the policy? • What kind of countries is receiving the aid, and how can this be understood? This essay is mainly based on quantitative data obtained from Sida, together with index of corruption and poverty will the different types of Swedish cooperation countries be described. The conclusions of this essay are that there are two objectives of the policy: to fight poverty, and to strengthen the civil rights. What is noticeable in this essay is that it seems like there are more recipient of the aid from Sida that are relatively wealthy than there are poor. Still, it is obvious that the poor countries recieve a bigger amount of aid than the wealthy countries do. It is in other words difficult to declare which objective that is the superior one

The primary goal of development organizations is poverty reduction, but their initiatives have in recent years also been recognized as a potential tool in empowering women and raising their status. Previous knowledge on the topic is largely based in an understanding of empowerment that seems to miss or overlook limitations and impacts of initiatives which authors with a more feminist view on empowerment address. Thus, this thesis aims to increase the understanding of women’s empowerment in relation to development initiatives. A case study focusing on women who had previously participated in the business training and microcredit program of an NGO in Nairobi, Kenya was conducted. The study shows that through development organizations’ various initiatives women can be empowered on a personal and a collective level. For instance, the women’s self-confidence has increased and they see themselves as entitled to do things on their own, such as running a business. Further, through coming together as a group they gain access to new spaces and agency to act on their collective interests. However, little evidence of women’s empowerment on a relational level is seen. The study also shows that there are economic and gender-related barriers constraining the empowerment process. / Utvecklingsorganisationers primära mål är att minska fattigdom, men deras initiativ har på senare tid också kommit att erkännas som ett potentiellt verktyg för att främja kvinnors egenmakt och höja deras status. Tidigare kunskap om kopplingen mellan egenmakt och organisationers initiativ utgår i stor utsträckning från en förståelse av begreppet egenmakt som verkar missa eller förbise vissa begränsningar och effekter av initiativen, som andra med en mer feministisk syn på egenmakt lyckas belysa. Syftet med denna uppsats är därför att öka förståelsen för kvinnors egenmakt i förhållande till utvecklingsinitiativ och den har utförts som en fallstudie fokuserad på kvinnor som tidigare deltagit i ett entreprenörskaps- och mikrokreditprogram hos en ideell organisation i Nairobi, Kenya. Studien visar att genom organisationers olika initiativ kan kvinnors egenmakt stärkas på ett personligt och ett kollektivt plan. Bland annat har kvinnornas självförtroende ökat och de ser sin rätt att göra saker på egen hand, såsom att driva ett företag. Genom att samlas som grupp får kvinnorna dessutom tillgång till nya utrymmen och möjligheter att agera på sina kollektiva intressen. I studien ses emellertid svaga tecken på kvinnors egenmakt inom äktenskapet. Slutligen visar studien att det finns ekonomiska och könsrelaterade barriärer som begränsar utvecklingen av kvinnors egenmakt.