Linda Jones

Dr Linda Jones is a globally recognized thought-leader and action-oriented practitioner/researcher in gender equality and social inclusion (GESI), gender and poverty analysis, and financial and market systems development. With strong multi-sectoral skills across the project life cycle (research, design, implementation, evaluation), Jones has held senior technical roles at Cowater International, MEDA Canada, the Aga Khan Foundation and the Coady International Institute. Jones has consulted for many years, contributing to a wide range of bilateral and multilateral programs as well as private sector initiatives, offering strategic direction, research and analysis, capacity building and technical backstopping in Africa, the Middle East and Asia Pacific. Jones is known as a field builder with numerous contributions: leadership in industry organizations including the SEEP Network; member of faculty at multiple institutes serving development practitioners (e.g., Boulder Institute); and author/editor of frameworks and tools, books/chapters, published reports, and peer-reviewed articles. Recently, Jones has integrated a strong risk and resilience approach into her work, leading Cowater International’s GESI teams to develop: a COVID-19 guide for response, recovery, resilience; COVID-19 action plans and budgets; COVID-19 gender inclusion and gender-based violence tools; and a corporate COVID-19 resource library as well as guest-editing a special COVID-19 issue of the Enterprise Development and Microfinance Journal and preparing COVID-19 articles/documents. Jones, a commonwealth scholar, holds a M.A. and Ph.D. in Anthropology from McMaster University in Canada where she received numerous awards for academic excellence.

Contributions

Blogs

• Reimagining the EDM Journal – open access, digitalisation, poverty outreach and more [2022]
• Lessons and early evidence of COVID-19 resilience and recovery [2021]
• Women's economic empowerment and a market systems paradigm shift [2016]
• A growing knowledgebase on WEE part 2: exciting developments supported by Australia's aid programme [2015]
• A growing knowledge base on women's economic empowerment in market systems programming [2015]

Resources

• Getting off the ground: practical lessons for the launch phase of MSD programmes [2020]
• GEM framework [2018]
• M4P WEE framework [2016]
• The WEAMS framework: women’s empowerment and markets systems concepts [2016]
• Women’s economic empowerment through market systems approaches [2016]
• Women's economic empowerment through market systems approaches [2016]
• The social norms factor: How gendered social norms influence how we empower women in market systems development [2016]
• The social norms factor: How gendered social norms influence how we empower women in market systems development [2016]
• Assessing gendered social norms: Strengthening Dairy Value Chains in Bangladesh [2016]
• Women's economic empowerment: How women contribute to and benefit from growth [2015]