Essays On Gender And Governance - United Nations Development ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Gender and Governance : Concepts and Contexts parties, states and institutions to advance or defend women’s interests. Moreover, protest has increasingly been leaving the streets and entering institutions. The United States best exemplifies the trend towards the institutionalisation of feminism and the emergence of a powerful feminist establishment in Washington DC, comprising legal groups, political action committees and research institutes. While feminists have always engaged in associational politics, Mary Katzenstein argues that [...] What is clearly new is its development inside male dominant organizational environments—the media, law enforcement, the churches, universities, business, prisons, unions and engineering, to name just a few of these institutional locales. In these new environments, feminists have generated debates about hiring and promotion, rape and harassment, child care and workplace benefits (including coverage for lesbian and gay partners); they have sometimes engaged in intense contestation over how the quality of work and fairness and worth of what men and women do should be assessed.” (Katzenstein, p. 12). What explains this shift? And do the worries that feminists expressed now seem unwarranted or legitimised? First, with the demise of both right wing authoritarian and left wing socialist regimes and attempts to create democratic systems, women’s movements have increasingly adopted liberal goals of achieving civil and political equality. Tensions between liberal, radical and socialist feminisms seem to be a thing of the past and liberal feminism has become hegemonic. The spread of certain universalist ideas, like women’s rights and international human rights, has also brought about a closer collaboration between movements and institutions. In France, for example, the dominant segment of the women’s movement was distrustful of the state and wanted to have no relationship with it. By the 1980s, however, radical groups ceased to provide leadership to the movement and other feminist groups embraced a closer relationship with the state. Their main efforts centred on demanding the passage of legislation on sexual harassment and the protection of contraception and abortion rights. As a result of their efforts, France became the first country in the European Union to pass legislation codifying and punishing sexual 34
Gender and Governance : Concepts and Contexts harassment. In 1992, the Penal Code was revised to make sexual harassment as a punishable crime (Jenson, 1996:101-102). Second, globalization has had some important, largely positive implications for women’s roles in governance. A number of foundations in the US and Western Europe have made women’s empowerment one of their major goals and have sought ways to institutionalise women’s movements. Amidst globalization there has been a shift in many places from states seeing women’s movements as a threat to seeing them as a resource. The Indian state, for example, viewed social movements as a threat and treated them as such in the early 1980s. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi set up Kudal commission with the clear intention of closing down a large number of NGOs and restricting the activities of others. After her assassination, her son Rajiv Gandhi took office and sought to cultivate a much better relationship with NGOs. The seventh five year plan (1985-90) identified the voluntary sector as a crucial part of the development process and allotted it five times the amount of money it had received earlier. Where his mother had seen social movements and NGOs as a threat, Rajiv Gandhi saw them as aiding development work, strengthening his image among the rural poor and their middle class supporters, and attracting Western funders. Although Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated before he could implement this recommendation, the state has since sought close ties with NGOs and social movements. Third, since women’s movements have become stronger, better organized and more skilled, state agencies are increasingly relying on them to develop and implement policies and programs pertaining to women. In general, women’s organizations have become much more actively involved than in the past in drafting constitutions, budgets, and legislation in collaboration with party and elected officials. The reason for state support is primarily that states need movements at the grass roots level, to help them reach the poor. Some women’s movements which were previously committed to autonomy have come to see the value of working with the state. Historically, the Indian feminist movement was fiercely committed to retaining its autonomy from political parties and the state, to prevent the lure of resources, influence and power from blunting its radicalism. However while retaining its autonomy from political 35
Page 1 and 2: Gender and Governance India
Page 3 and 4: Martha Nussbaum Amrita Basu Yasmin
Page 5 and 6: Foreword The present volume is an o
Page 7 and 8: Contributors Martha Nussbaum is the
Page 9 and 10: Gender and Governance: An Introduct
Page 29 and 30: Gender and Governance : Concepts an
Page 41: Gender and Governance : Concepts an
Page 67 and 68: The Impact of Gender Inequality on
Page 93 and 94:
The Impact of Gender Inequality on
Page 95 and 96:
Page 97 and 98:
Page 99 and 100:
Page 101 and 102:
Page 103 and 104:
Page 105 and 106:
Locating Gender in the Governance D
Page 107 and 108:
Page 109 and 110:
Page 111 and 112:
Page 113 and 114:
Page 115 and 116:
Page 117 and 118:
Page 119 and 120:
Page 121 and 122:
Page 123 and 124:
Page 125 and 126:
Page 127 and 128:
Page 129 and 130:
Page 131 and 132:
Page 133 and 134:
Page 135 and 136:
Page 137 and 138:
Page 139 and 140:
Page 141 and 142:
Page 143:
India Gender and Governance The ess
show all

Essays On Gender And Governance - United Nations Development ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?