Socio-economic Empowerment of Women in Handloom Sector: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

This article extensively studies the literature on women’s empowerment and livelihood generation in the handloom industry. The focus is to identify the structural and thematic limitations present and suggest future research directions for interdisciplinary studies. We combine qualitative content and bibliometric analysis with a systematic literature review (SLR) to unravel thematic evolution and intellectual structure in this underexplored area. We use VOSviewer software to analyse sixty-two articles from Google Scholar and twenty-five articles from the Scopus database, published between 2010 and 2026. Our analysis provides a qualitative synthesis that highlights conceptual patterns and research gaps. Extant literature has looked at themes like socio-economic development, women’s empowerment, employment, and livelihoods. However, important issues such as digital inclusion, sustainability and market integration remain scantily discussed. Results show weak collaboration networks, fragmented knowledge structures and limited thematic diversity. The study also offers insights for development agencies, policymakers, and practitioners to promote sustainable livelihood generation and inclusive growth in the handloom sector.