Mainstreaming – Examples of Best Practice

The course of the project
At the beginning of the project the City District
Committees in Gothenburg reviewed the key ratios in
the project, which were turned over to the City
Council for the annual report.
Through dialogue with key people in various administrations,
the City Office gleaned an overview of what
kind of gender divided statistics were needed. Certain
political test areas were pointed out, and the relevant
statistics were included in the next annual report.
It became apparent that there was a significant lack of
gender divided statistics in almost every area. Some
existing statistics could be easily gender divided, but a
large proportion had to be collected.
Dialogue with the administrations also determined
the equality criteria the city should work with in the
future, in order for it to be possible to evaluate equality
work, and to make comparisons between different
parts of the municipality.
24 • Gender Mainstreaming in budgeting
The criteria was sent to all relevant administrations
and committees, who then reported back on how they
worked with equality in their budget area.
It was evident from the project that the budget process
becomes more effective if all parts of the administration
have access to gender and equality expertise.
Unfortunately expert knowledge in the field has generally
received low priority.
A second important realisation was that equality is
improved if concrete goals are identified for processes
in specific political areas.