Policy Approaches to Women and Gender Equality

Approaches to Women and Gender Equality Two conceptual frameworks: “Women in Development” and “Gender and Development” Different policy approaches: welfare, equity, anti-poverty, efficiency, empowerment and gender mainstreaming Explain how you will discuss different approaches to women and gender equality in two ways. The first will make a broad distinction between Women in Development (WID) and Gender and Development (GAD) conceptual frameworks. The second will go into more detail about WID and GAD by illustrating different policy approaches. Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender and Development Women in Development Gender and Development Focus on women Focus on gender relations Stress on practical needs Stress on strategic interests/needs Rationale is effectiveness Goal is equality Enabling Empowering Changes the condition of women Changes the position of women Aims to enhance women’s participation Aims to integrate gender consideration into mainstream Women primarily as agents Explain that the change in nomenclature from WID to GAD should not, however, be seen as complete, consistent or uniformly applicable to state bureaucracies, development agencies or academic institutions. While the introduction and popularization of GAD signified a conceptual change, mainly in academic circles, the degree to which GAD was adopted, in rhetoric or in practice, varies considerably. Some organizations more fully internalized the concept in theory and practice; others did so in name only whilst others simply adopted the term “gender” without changing their WID focus. As a result, the appearance of “gender” and the disappearance of WID are deceptive, making assessment of what actually changed difficult. Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender and Development Women in Development Gender and Development The Approach An approach which views women as the problem An approach to development The Focus Women Social relations between men and women The Problem The exclusion of women (half of the productive resources from the development process) Unequal relations of power (rich and poor, women and men) that prevents equitable development and women’s full participation Explain that the term “women in development” was first coined in the early 1970s. “Gender and development” emerged in the late 1970s, partly in response to criticisms of WID (see Razavi and Miller, 1995). These two frameworks can be distinguished accordingly. Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender and Development Women in Development Gender and Development The Goal More efficient , effective development Equitable, sustainable development with women and men as decision-makers The Solution Integrate women into the existing development process Empower disadvantaged women and transform unequal relations Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender and Development Women in Development Gender and Development The Strategies Women’s projects Women’s components Integrated projects Increase women’s productivity Increase women’s ability to look after the household Identify/address practical needs determined by women and men to improve their condition At the same time address women’s strategic interests Address strategic interests of the poor through people-centred development Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Approaches to Women and Gender Equality Different policy approaches: welfare, equity, anti-poverty, efficiency, empowerment gender mainstreaming Explain how we can discuss different policy approaches to women and gender equality using six broad typologies. While these will be discussed historically, they should not be seen as distinct “phases” as we still find all six being followed today, sometimes in combinations with each other Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Welfare approach earliest approach, predominant 1950-1970. aim is to bring women into the development as better mothers. women are seen as the passive beneficiaries of development emphasizing their reproductive role seeks to meet practical gender needs in that role through a top-down handouts of food aid, measures against malnutrition and family planning not challenging, especially of gender division of labour, and still widely popular. These and other examples are indicative of the approach when they subscribe to the overall characteristics of the approach. In other words, all family planning is not necessarily representative of a welfare approach, but when can be considered as such when it treats women as passive beneficiaries, privileges women’s reproductive roles and is not empowering women to have choice and control over their bodies Source: March, C., Smyth, I., and Mukhopahhyay, M. (1999). A Guide to Gender Analysis Frameworks. Oxfam: Oxford Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Equity approach original WID approach, emerged during in the 76-85 UN Women’s Decade, within the predominant “growth with equity” development approach aim is to gain equity for women who are seen as active participants in development recognizes women’s triple role (productive, reproductive and community), and seeks to meet strategic gender interests by direct state intervention giving political and economic autonomy and reducing inequality with men. challenges women’s subordinate position criticised as western feminism, is considered threatening to men and is unpopular with governments and donors. e.g., 1975 International Women’s Year called for equality between men and women, women’s fair share of benefits of development and changes in traditional roles of women and men. Focus was on women’s political and economic autonomy. Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Anti- Poverty approach 2nd WID approach, a toned-down version of equity, from 1970s onwards in the context of Basic Needs approaches to development women seen as disproportionately represented among poor aim is to ensure that poor women increase their productivity women’s poverty is seen as a problem of underdevelopment, not of subordination recognizes the productive role of women, and seeks to meet their practical to earn an income, particularly in small scale income generation projects still most popular with NGOs Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Efficiency approach 3rd WID approach, adopted since the 1980s debt crisis. aims to ensure that development is more efficient and effective through women’s economic contribution, with participation often equated with equity and decision making seeks to meet practical gender needs while relying in all three roles and an elastic concept of women’s time women seen in terms of their capacity to compensate for declining social services by extending their working day e.g., promotion of women’s community committee to generate income and provide social services, such as community kitchens and mid-wife services. Assumes women’s time is “elastic”, that she has infinite time to expand productive, reproductive and community activities. Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Empowerment articulated by third-world women with aim to empower women through greater self-reliance explicitly acknowledges centrality of power and women’s need for more power to improve position women’s subordination is expressed in terms of male oppression and colonial and neo-colonial oppression recognizes the triple role; seeks to meet strategic gender interests indirectly thru grassroots mobilization of practical gender needs potentially challenging, but its avoidance of western feminism makes it unpopular except with third world women’s NGOs. e.g., women’s organizations such as SEWA (India), Gabriela (Philippines) and DAWN (global) Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender mainstreaming associated with the 1995 World Conference on Women in Beijing and the Beijing Platform of Action that signaled the UN’s first official use of the term call for “gender mainstreaming” was a culmination of two inter-related changes in discourse prior to Beijing: Women in Development to gender and development “integrating women” to “mainstreaming gender” Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl

Gender mainstreaming Women in Development to gender and development some improvements in women’s material conditions, but little progress in their status the nature of women’s relational subordination was ignored and unequal gender power relations remained unaltered “integrating women” vs. “mainstreaming gender” relates to the second problem associated with WID, the continued marginalization of women and women’s issues from “mainstream” development mainly due to how WID was implemented: the establishment of women’s national machineries and WID units and the emphasis on “women’s projects” “mainstreaming” was seen as a way of promoting gender equity in all of the “organization’s pursuits” Amsterdam, The Netherlands www.kit.nl