Abstract
CHANGING PARADIGMS IN THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN SAUDI ECONOMY
*Suheela Shabir and 2Zubair Amin
ABSTRACT
Women have always been contributing to enable the economy achieve tremendous progress. The contribution of women is omnipresent and all pervasive in every sphere of life as Saudi Arabia seeks to march steadily towards the path of growth. All these become possible only with the active participation of women who are the catalysts of qualitative growth of future generation as well. Vision 2030 envisages that Saudi Arabia?s policies and programs are focused on the road to women?s full participation in its labor market. However, women still make up less than 15 percent of the national workforce; this represents an enormous source of untapped potential for the Kingdom, whose labor force currently relies heavily on expatriates. This working research paper seeks to identify the paradigm shift in the labor force in KSA. The study is a qualitative study. This paper points to actions that can help to turn around this inequitable situation. The paper also suggests a broadening of the women in development approach toward a gender in development strategy that takes into account the relative roles and responsibilities of women and men. It has been concluded that despite the challenges faced by the female labor force in Saudi Arabia, Vision 2030 paves a new path to empower women to contribute to the economic growth of the Kingdom. The research has certain limitation with further directions of conducting research in related field to get results that are more accurate.
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