In order to better understand Gender
in Development I will first examine what gender and gender equality are,
who created these definitions and what systems in our world contribute to the
gendering of humans. After doing so, I will delve into how gender fits into
development, historically and up to present times. I will go into detail
discussing the current status of gender in development work is today and lastly, I will share my learnings and suggestions on where development
practitioners can go in the future.
Major actors in international development include but are not limited to
The United Nations (UN), the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank
and United States Agency for International Development (USAID). All four of
these organizations acknowledge in their definition of gender that it is a
learned social construct associated to being male or female which can be
changed (UN Women, 2011; WHO, 2015; World Bank, 2015; USAID, 2013). As the UN
states, “In most societies there are differences and inequalities between women
and men in responsibilities assigned, activities undertaken, access to and
control over resources, as well as decision-making opportunities” (UN Women,
2001, p. 1). Gender has socially constructed characteristics of both women and
men – such as norms, roles and relationships of and between groups of women and
men and therefore affects both sexes and varies from context to context. In
accordance with the aforementioned organizations and their definitions of
gender, I will proceed using that as a basis for my definition of gender.
Often times in development work one will find gender conjoined with
gender equality, the latter of which implies that there is an absence of
discrimination based on the individuals’ gender with equal access and
allocation of resources, services, opportunities, etc (USAID, 2013). A common
fallacy is the equating of gender to women but on the contrary, it is necessary
to recognize that gender and gender equality are “not women’s issues but should concern and fully engage
men as well as women” (UN Women, 2011). Because
gender is socially constructed, can be taught and therefore unlearned, it is
vital that both men and women work together in this respect. Although there is
widespread discrimination of women and girls around the world which ultimately
leads to socio-economic and political disenfranchisement, men are also
negatively impacted by gender norms and gender inequality.
The general approach development that dominated the field for decades
viewed women as passive objects of concern and excluded them from project
implementation. Often times this further marginalized them in their society. It
wasn’t until the 1970s when the “women in development“ (WID) approach was first
articulated opening up a space for women to be engaged in the discourse and
practice of development. The WID agenda was to “ensure that the benefits of modernization
accrued to women as well as men” (Rai, 2011, p. 29). However, this approach was
critiqued and fell short in many aspects as it did not address the structural
and societal processes that lead to inequality, injustice and hierarchy based
on sexual differences and instead put women into said existing gender regimes (Cornwall,
2014).
A product of this critique was the “gender and development” (GAD)
approach focusing it’s concern on transforming the patriarchal social
structures which perpetuate the unfair and unequal oppression and
marginalization of women. Ann Whitehead drew attention to the prevalent
practices of women’s subordination worldwide in 1979 noting that “it is rare to
find any social situation in which women do not experience some of the limiting
or downright oppressive dimensions of gender” (Cornwall, 2014, p. 128). Around
this same time, gender began to come more important in development work with
the emergence of gender analysis and gender mainstreaming (Rai, 2011).
Again, this school of thought was vulnerable to many critiques. For
example, Western feminist discourse became preoccupied with othering and
homogenizing “the average third world woman” (Mohanty, 1984). Ultimately, this
lead to an inability to recognize the multiple dimensions of a women’s identity
and other forms/reasons for discrimination (Cornwall, 2014).
Postcolonialists voiced most of these critiques in the 1990s and wanted
to create a de-colonized and holistic approach to gender in development.
Postcolonialist rejected the notion of a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach and wanted
to radically reconstruct history and knowledge production by giving a voice to
those are who are marginalized and dominated (McEwan, 2001). During this time,
several feminist activists from the majority world also spoke about women’s
exclusion from socio-economic and political opportunities (Cornwell, 2014) and
began to design an approach focusing on building women’s capacity to demand
rights, recognition for their work and collectively mobilize productively. This
shifted the focus from gender back to women in the early 2000’s.
Following suite was a series of axioms which caught the attention of
policy makers and major actors in international development, neither of which
were truly interested in tackling the oppressive systems that continued to
tyrannize women. These axioms provided “a narrative that situated women as more
deserving of assistance and as more useful to the development enterprise than
men” (Cornwell, 2014, p. 129) and allowed for vast generalizations to become
the norm and blanket “women empowerment” programs led by NGOs and IGOs to take
shape.
Soon it became evident that gender equality was displaced with
empowerment and the means were colonial uplift and rescue projects. These
programs often excluded men and boys who are obviously necessary catalysts for
change. Predictably, the next phase was to involve of boys and men while
changing the axioms that depicted them as evil and an obstacle to girls and
women’s empowerment.
Programs prioritizing the engagement of men sprouted up and focused on
working to alter notions of masculinity, improving the quality of men’s
relationships (as fathers, lovers, husbands, etc). This approach brings us to
our current situation of gender in development work as many of these programs
are still being implemented today, however, not without feminist critique.
Feminist scholars noted that this particular method allows men to
totally ignore male privilege and all of its manifestations and the vested
interest men have in resisting change. Additionally, they felt these programs
were taking away from the already minute development funds for women. The last
critique and one that I can personally attest to is the complaint that there is
a “ lack of interest, engagement, and solidarity among those working on and
with men for broader struggles for gender justice” (Cornwell, 2014, p. 134). At
SIT, there were several men who claimed to advocate gender equality yet were
noticeably silent on issues of injustice and at times, possibly unknowingly,
participating in the preservation of patriarchal practices and unfair treatment
of women.
Now that we have reviewed what has been done in the past and what
current trends of gender in development work are, I would like to make a few
suggestions for strategies moving forward. First and foremost I think that we
need to acknowledge women’s “informal” occupations as productive work. At the
same time we need to move away from gendering systems that dichotomize/polarize
male and female and introduce gender as a spectrum. Men need to be schooled on
their privilege and how to reform their behavior. Both men and women need to be
moved from the state of “magical thinking” to “critical consciousness”
according to Paulo Friere (1973).
We need to remove ourselves from the boxes that binaries such as
“empowering women and girls” and “engaging men and boys” put us in and imagine
a world in which we, “stop defining
each other by what we are not, and start defining ourselves by who we are”
(Watson, 2014). It is obvious that one need not be female to
be aware of and/or witness oppressive structures and do something about it. It
is also fact that it is not only women who experience the negative effects of
the gender regimes of the societies we live in.
Works Cited
Cornwall, A. (2014). Taking off International
Development's Straightjacket of Gender.
Brown Journal Of World Affairs, 21(1),
127-139.
McEwan, C. (2001). Postcolonialism, feminism and
development: intersections and
dilemmas.
Progress In Development Studies, 1(2), 93-111.
Mohanty, C. (1984). Under Western Eyes:
Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses.
The Discourse of Humanism, 12(3), 333-358.
Freire, P. (1973). Education for Critical
Consciousness. New York: Continuum International
Publishing Group
Inc.
Rai, S. (2011). Gender and development :
theoretical perspectives. In Visvanathan, N.,
Duggan, L.,
Wiegersma, N., & Nisonoff, L. (Eds.), The Women, Gender and
Development
Reader (pp. 28–37). Halifax: Fernwood Pub.
UN WOMEN. 2011. Gender Mainstreaming: Concepts
and Definitions. Retrieved from
USAID. 2013. Gender Equality at USAID:
Glossary. Retrieved from
Watson E.
(2014). Speech: “Gender Equality is Your Issue Too.” UN Women. September
20,
2014
WHO. 2015. Gender, equity and human rights:
Gender. Retrieved from
World Bank. 2015. Gender and Development: A
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