Gender, Citizenship and Governance: A global source book
Critical Reviews and Annotated Bibliographies Series
KIT (Royal Tropical Institute), The Netherlands
OXFAM, GB
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Excerpt from Introduction:
This volume brings together case studies of citizen action aimed at giving voice to women’s needs and concerns, carving out spaces for equal participation of women and men in governance, and improving accountability and responsiveness of governance institutions to poor women’s interests.
In 1999 KIT Gender, at the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT) in Amsterdam, initiated a three-year programme entitled ‘Gender, Citizenship and Governance’. This programme aimed to contribute to the generation of knowledge and practice that would help to make gender equity and equality a core concern in the debate on and practice of good governance. It provided a framework to facilitate innovative gender and governance initiatives and was undertaken in collaboration with 16 organizations from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa. The development of these partnerships and of collaborative action research was the cornerstone of the programme. The aim was to construct a forum for linking and learning, in the best traditions of participatory and action-oriented research, and contribute the insights generated to improving development policy and practice.
Our concern was that the debates about and approaches to improving governance structures to obtain better development outcomes did not automatically address the question of gender inequality. If the desired outcome of good governance is distributional equity then gender equality should stand high on the agenda of this project. As for example, enhancing governmental capability to design, formulate and discharge its functions especially with regard to economic management does not necessarily entail recognizing the central contribution of unpaid labour (mostly performed by women) thereby excluding from public accountability a significant area of priorities and exacerbating the gender divide. Establishing the rule of law does not automatically translate into the legal recognition of violence against women as a crime. Expanding the scope of citizen participation in governance through decentralization of government does not by itself ensure that women and men will be represented on an equal basis. In all of these areas special efforts have been necessary to integrate gender equality concerns, which in turn has necessitated changes in institutional rules and practices.
Download the “Gender, Citizenship and Governance: A global source book” report (pdf version)