Women and Gender Equity in Development Theory and Practice

Jane S. Jaquette

Description

Seeking to catalyze innovative thinking and practice within the field of women and gender in development, editors Jane S. Jaquette and Gale Summerfield have brought together scholars, policymakers, and development workers to reflect on where the field is today and where it is headed. The contributors draw from their experiences and research in Latin America, Asia, and Africa to illuminate the connections between women's well-being and globalization, environmental conservation, land rights, access to information technology, employment, and poverty alleviation.Highlighting key institutional issues, contributors analyze the two approaches that dominate the field: women in development (WID) and gender and development (GAD). They assess the results of gender mainstreaming, the difficulties that development agencies have translating gender rhetoric into equity in practice, and the conflicts between gender and the reassertion of indigenous cultural identities. Focusing on resource allocation, contributors explore the gendered effects of land privatization, the need to challenge cultural traditions that impede women's ability to assert their legal rights, and women's access to bureaucratic levers of power. Several essays consider women's mobilizations, including a project to provide Internet access and communications strategies to African NGOs run by women. In the final essay, Irene Tinker, one of the field's founders, reflects on the interactions between policy innovation and women's organizing over the three decades since women became a focus of development work. Together the contributors bridge theory and practice to point toward productive new strategies for women and gender in development.Contributors. Maruja Barrig, Sylvia Chant, Louise Fortmann, David Hirschmann, Jane S. Jaquette, Diana Lee-Smith, Audrey Lustgarten, Doe Mayer, Faranak Miraftab, Muadi Mukenge, Barbara Pillsbury, Amara Pongsapich, Elisabeth Prugl, Kirk R. Smith, Kathleen Staudt, Gale Summerfield, Irene Tinker, Catalina Hinchey Trujillo

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique

Informations

• Publié par: Duke University Press
• Date de parution: 27 mars 2006
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780822387756
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Women and Gender Equity in Development Theory and Practice

Women and Gender Equity in Development Theory and Practice

Institutions, Resources, and Mobilization

Duke University Press

Edited by Jane S. Jaquette and Gale Summerfield

Durham and London 

©  Duke University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper  Designed by Heather Hensley Typeset in Janson by Tseng Information Systems, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data appear on the last printed page of this book.

Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments vii

Introduction Jane S. Jaquette and Gale Summerfield 

I. Institutional Opportunities and Barriers 

Women, Gender, and Development Jane S. Jaquette and Kathleen Staudt 

Mainstreaming Gender in International Organizations Elisabeth Prügl and Audrey Lustgarten 

From ‘‘Home Economics’’ to ‘‘Microfinance’’: Gender Rhetoric and Bureaucratic Resistance David Hirschmann 

Contributions of a Gender Perspective to the Analysis of Poverty Sylvia Chant 

What is Justice? Indigenous Women in Andean Development Projects Maruja Barrig 

II. Livelihood and Control of Resources 

Gender Equity and Rural Land Reform in China Gale Summerfield 

Unequal Rights: Women and Property Diana Lee-Smith and Catalina Hinchey Trujillo 

On Loan from Home: Women’s Participation in Formulating Human Settlements Policies Faranak Miraftab 

In Theory and in Practice: Women Creating Better Accounts of the World Louise Fortmann 

Women’sWork: The Kitchen Kills More than the Sword Kirk R. Smith 

III. Women’s Mobilization and Power 

Women’sMovements in the Globalizing World: The Case of Thailand Amara Pongsapich 

T-Shirts to Web Links: Women Connect! Communications Capacity-Building withWomen’ss Doe Mayer, Barbara Pillsbury, and Muadi Mukenge 

Empowerment Just Happened: The Unexpected Expansion of Women’s Organizations Irene Tinker 

Acronyms 

Bibliography 

Contributors 

Index 

Preface and Acknowledgments

We dedicate this volume to Irene Tinker (author of the final essay in Part III) in recognition of her role as a key intellectual provocateur of the field of women/ gender and development. A scholar-activist who taught at Howard University, American University, and Berkeley, Irene helped make a focus on women part of U.S. aid policy through her role in formulating and lobbying for the Percy Amendment, which established the Women and Development Office at. She co-founded several institutions, including the Wellesley Center on Women, the International Center for Research on Women, and the Equity Policy Center. For many years she headed the U.S. Council for(theInternational Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women). Throughout her career, Irene has traveled widely, seeking out activists and scholars and bringing to the fore issues that were on the minds of women in the global South, but which were not yet part of the development debate. She ran the first conference on women and development issues in Mexico City, just before the firstConference on Women in . In the s she brought to the fore issues of women, energy, and technology at the household level; her work in the s made the role of street foods visible to scholars and planners; in the s she helped pioneer work on women and property rights, looking especially at the implications for women of the privatization of land and housing. Her most re-

viii

Preface and Acknowledgments

cent work returns to her earliest research—on electoral politics—looking at the impact of gender quotas and the election of women to national legislatures. Irene has encouraged and mentored many scholars and practitioners, includ- ing the authors in this volume, over a wide range of topics and concerns. They in turn have been inspired—and pushed—by her to think more deeply and act more effectively to make change happen. This project gives us an opportunity to recognize Irene’s unique role in multiplying the impact, enhancing the vision, and expanding the agenda of the field. The editors of this volume first met in Bangkok in  at a workshop on women and socioeconomic transitions in East/Southeast Asia. Irene, at the Uni- versity of California, Berkeley, and Amara Pongsapich, at Chulalongkorn (see chapter entitled ‘‘Women’s Movements in the Globalizing World’’ in this book), organized the meeting. Irene contacted Jane and Gale separately to help with parts of the workshop which brought together specialists from China, Laos, Viet- nam, Thailand, the United States, and several other countries to identify the key issues for women in the countries undergoing transitions from socialist planning to market-oriented economies. Most countries sent four or five representatives, but the Laotian delegation amazed all of us when fourteen women in traditional dress walked into the conference room, the first meeting outside their country for most. After the requisite formal statements from each delegation, we had a l ively discussion about the need to address families as well as individuals, housing, edu- cation, employment and microenterprise, and much more. Our hosts at Chula- longkorn arranged several visits to sites in Bangkok. We walked through the lanes of the one-room apartments that had originally been set up for servants of the adjacent gold-roofed palace. Although the lanes ran into the bay and were par- tially filled with water, the rooms had electricity and some had televisions where groups cheered their favorite soccer teams playing in the World Cup, which was being held in California. Local planners talked about the importance of a par- ticipatory approach to eliminating the slum-like conditions and relocating these people. When they listened to the residents, they found that a planned relocation would have cut the low incomes they managed to earn from selling to rush-hour passersby since the proposed new location would be too far from the commuters. We went to a large red-light district which was partly transforming into a night bazaar lined with stalls selling knockoffs of Rolex watches and Polo-shirts. Dur- ing the breaks, we discussed future collaborations on research projects. The next one would be at theforum of the Fourth World Conference on Women in

Preface and Acknowledgments ix

China in  and would focus on land and housing. We also held meetings in Berkeley and Monterey, California; published a special issue of theReview of So- cial Economyin ; an edited volume,Women’s Rights to House and Land: China, Laos, Vietnam(Lynne Rienner Publishers, ); and this book, a decade after the initial workshop in Bangkok. The editors and contributors to this volume owe a great deal to Irene Tinker’s mentorship, research, and energy. A volume of this ambition has many sources and owes many debts. We would like to single out a few: the chapter authors themselves, who stayed with us through the several stages of planning and editing; Valerie Mulholland and Mir- iam Angress at Duke University Press, who recognized the value of the project and helped us carry it through, and Mark Mastromarino and Heather Hensley, who invested so much in its quality; the anonymous readers whose efforts greatly improved the text; and Kathy Martin of the Women and Gender in Global Per- spectives Program at the University of Illinois, who helped with proofreading and preparation of the manuscript. We thank our families, whose patience and commitment made the effort possible and kept us grounded. In , Irene editedPersistent Inequalities, celebrating Ester Boserup’s role as the inspiration for what became a field and a movement. We would like to ac- knowledge Irene whose initiatives, and the debates these have engendered, are still at the cutting edge.