‘Southern Feminism’ and the Impact of Civil-Society Gender Equity Advocacy

When writing about women, I use the term Feminism with trepidation, expecting the reader to judge this article as promoting angry, anti-male, anti-family, pro-promiscuity actions alongside the destruction of traditional social roles. Where this assumption is predominantly true of the concept in the West, the term ‘Feminism’ here is more in line with what Goetz terms an ‘analytical and practical approach based on the premises that women are oppressed, and a commitment to end that oppression’ (????:45).

Inasmuch as Feminism differs geographically, so also should the focus of the current feminist approach to gender equity. Where the emasculation of men and the inclusion of MAD (Men And Development) have entered the policymaking arena in More Economically Developed Countries (MEDCs), the Less Economically Developed State remains consistently unfocused on the inclusion of women, often accused of simply dismissing the cross-cutting issue of gender as nothing more than a donor-driven whim. Further to this, the State continues to be directly involved in the subjugation of women through the implementation of gendered policies (where gendered involves considering only the interests of men) that continuously place woman in a position of dependency in comparison to men; in terms of inheritance, economic and political rights, a woman’s civil liberties continue to be determined by her relationship to a man. The attempt, therefore, by civil society to promote the inclusion of women in the development policy-making process, can only achieve so much when the main constraint on the progress of gender equity is the gendered state itself.

One attempt to tackle the gendered state is through advocating the inclusion of women in public institutions in order to create a greater gender balance within state administrative bodies. Goetz certainly advocates this as a practical step towards gender equity and, while I firmly support such positive, practical steps to challenge the gender makeup of state power players, I do so asking, is this enough?

With women indoctrinated within a male-gendered society to conform to their subservient social role, what use is it to place them in representative structures without challenging their concepts of gender equality first?

In comment of ‘Mainstreaming Gender Equity to National Development Planning’ by Anne Marie Goetz