The civic and political participation of the Nairobi female elites in Kenya

Abstract

In this thesis, the Nairobi female elite's political and civic functions and participation have been observed so as to determine their role in Kenyan society. The female elite in Nairobi included females in political office, organizational leadership and top level business, police and professions. In Chapter I, the historical background is presented by observing the women's role in traditional and colonial African society. Chapter II follows with a presentation of paradigms of sexual stratification, based on biological, ecological, ideological, socio-economic and political dimensions, that are particularly applicable to the African and the Kenyan experience in particular. In Chapter III, the theories related to this thesis have been observed by surveying the enormous body of literature on the phenomena of economic and political development. In Chapter IV, the methodology for this thesis -- the hypotheses relating to the empirical data; the data collection procedures -- interview and questionnaire; the scales utilized -- prestige, consciousness, political cynicism, power differential and organizational authority; and the statistics used -- frequency distributions, and cross-tabulations have been elaborated upon. In Chapter V this methodology facilitated a clear understanding of the presentation of the empirical data which has been used to present the Socio-political dimensions' of the Kenyan female elite. Chapter VI deals wi'th the data from interviews,meetings and the Kenyan mass media. This has been used to present the perceptions of the female elites civic, political ·and social role in Kenyan society. The concluding chapter includes a summary of the findings; recommendations for scholars, researchers, policy makers and for future research; the dilemma of female leadership within the Kenyan Socio-political context; a summary of the perceptions of the Kenyan female elite; and an evaluation of the female elite's power.