However, at one point, remittances, or people sending back money from working in a city, made up 20-50% of family budgets, especially around the arid regions of the Senegal river. This is a problem that is common throughout impoverished countries, showing how only certain areas, usually urbanized, industrialized regions in cities, are the only locations capable of creating any form of income. This also leads to a change in the social structures of families, with the men working and their families in the countryside. South Africa used it because they used control of women as a way to control the whole black population. Senegal has a longer history of urban life, however, and it is not an entirely western concept to them, leaving women to have more room to maneuver socially. They particularly used urban life as a way to escape the rural patriarchy.
Universal suffrage was gained in 1956, not only allowing Africans to vote, but also allowing the women to vote. Women hold 40% of parliamentary seats in Senegal. West Africa also has a tradition of the “Market Woman” who actually held significant social power and autonomy within their businesses and