This volume breaks new ground in the study of women's social capital in the Global South through an exploration of informal networks among poor women in several South Asian and West African societies. Theoretically and empirically, this book transcends previous works in this field in its use of the intersectionality thesis by emphasizing such features as the impact of Islam and Hinduism on the experiences of poor women. In each case study, this work examines the distinctiveness of women's informal networks as illustrated in their family-kin relations, the world of work, and their relationships to politics and the state in regions of the world that are not typically compared, let alone included in the same volume. Further, this book also demonstrates how local, national, and global forces interact in structuring the poverty that women experience, particularly noting the growing importance of informal networks in periods of economic crisis and structural adjustment. Moreover, this is a balanced treatment ofwomen's informal networks that reveals both the positive and the negative consequences of various examples of social capital. Despite the poverty that these women experience, they are important change-agents in their societies and are empowered through t.