User:Quentin.Ncs/sandbox
Wikipedia Article Proposal: Gender and Economic Development
[[Education Program:Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies/Gender and
International Affairs (Fall 2013)|IA 039 Gender and International Affairs]]
21 October 2013
Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies
This proposal aims to outline a plan to comprehensively improve the existing article of the Gender and Development in Wikipedia. We identify three key fallacies and omissions that the current version of the section suffers.
First, the current article talks exclusively about GAD (gender and development) approach that emerged as a response to other approaches such as WID (women in development) and WAD (women and development). The article explains minimally about the approach and does not locate its argument into a broader theoretical framework of gender and development in general, while not extensively referring to relevant topics in development economics.
Second, the current article entirely lacks considerations of relevant institutions that implement policies of gender and development. Although the World Bank remains as a key champion of the mainstream neoliberalism, the article writes nothing about it. Further, the recent efforts to incorporate gender approaches into the framework of neoliberalism (such as Smart Economics proposed by the World Bank) is completely absent from the description.
Third, the current description fails to present a balanced mix of empirical evidence, policy analyses and linkage to other related concepts. For example, the article currently has only two sentences describing the criticism towards GAD approach, while a wide variety of critics exists arguing from different perspectives in feminism.
To ameliorate those fallacies that the current article suffer, a newly edited article of Gender and Development will consists of five subsections while preserving and integrating existent instrumental descriptions (of WID and GAD, while there is not even one Wikipedia article talks about WAD). First subsection of WID Women in Development, led byQuentin Nicaise,explores the emergence of WID in the 1970s and its historical context and its influence, rooted in a time of strong liberal feminism in the United-States and the themes defended by its proponents, such as equal employment opportunities. It will also be relevant to understand the prevailing approaches to women as economic actors within developing countries at the time, which largely overlooked their contributions and importance, to which WID sought to react . This section will in this respect explore how WID discourses further highlight how the importance of women in developing countries was overlooked, by touching upon how colonial and post-colonial agricultural policies further alienated women from developing the sector, and confining them to “traditional” activities. The section will proceed by studying how some WID advocates attempted to linking women’s issues with development, highlighting how such issues acted as impediments to economic growth. The point will be made that such an approach had in some cases the unwanted consequence of depicting women as an unit whose claims are conditional on its productive value, thus hindering their demands for equity and overshadowing questions of social welfare and reproductive concerns. WID also focused very little on power relations between men and women as opposed to addressing the stereotyped expectations entertained by men. The second subsection of Women and Development (WAD), led by Simon Fuerstenberg, explores the origins of WAD (as a theoretical model as well as a practical approach to development), and its emergence into gender-studies scholarship in the mid 1970s. It goes on to outline the points of departure from the previously predominant theory, WID. Finally, it discusses major criticisms of the WAD approach, and the weaknesses that it shares with the WID perspective. It is important to explicate the neo-Marxist derivations of the theory, and investigate the criticisms of the previous approach, for which WAD is meant to correct. These include the explanatory limitations of modernization theory, as well as practical arguments for a development-based approach to women that did not include their integration into a patriarchal social structure, and rather construct development projects for women exclusively. The WAD paradigm stresses the relationship between women, and the work that they perform in their societies as economic agents in both the public and domestic spheres. It also emphasizes the distinctive nature of the roles women play in the maintenance and development of their societies, with the understanding that purely the integration of women into development efforts would serve to reinforce the existing structures of inequality present in societies overrun by patriarchal interests. Some of the common critiques of the WAD approach include concerns that the women-only development projects would struggle, or ultimately fail, due to their scale, and the marginalized status of these women. Furthermore, the WAD perspective suffers from a tendency to view women as a class, and pay little attention to the differences among women, including race and ethnicity, and prescribe development endeavors that may only serve to address the needs of a particular group. While an improvement on WID, WAD fails to fully consider the relationships between patriarchy, modes of production, and the marginalization of women. It also presumes that the position of women around the world will improve when international conditions become more equitable. Third subsection of GAD Gender and Development, led by OpeyemiSamuel Obeexplore the emergence and relevance of GAD in development. To achieve this, emphasis would be drawn to its historical development in the 1980s, which was shaped as a reaction to the Women in Development approach developed in the 1970s. For a proper understanding of the GAD approach, its theoretical underpinnings and basic assumptions would be discussed before drawing out its major criticisms. The GAD concept emerged in the 1980s out of criticism of WID approach. WID and WAD differ in focus and centrality of women in development. The GAD concept inspired new debates in women and development, which has important implications both for theory and practice. Unlike WID, GAD shifted the discussion in women and development discourse from ‘women’ to ‘gender.’ This new gender focus, emphasize power relations between women and men, their relative positions in social economic and political structures and a need for an institutional change within the social-economic and political structure to eliminate inequality. Base on this assumption, it is imperative to study and understand ascribe roles before any meaningful policy could be achieved. Gender and development has been subjected to many criticisms. Through ‘gender’ neutral terminology, women issues have become depoliticized. Also development agencies still advance gender transformation to mean economic betterment on neoliberal economic agenda. Fourth subsection Neoliberal approaches, led by Samuel Rohr, describes current discussions in the literature on the relationship between Neoliberal Economics, Gender and Feminism. Gender issues have increasingly become part of economic development agendas, as examples such as the [World Bank’s] focus on gender show. The World Bank started focusing on gender in 1977 with the appointment of a first Women in Development Advisor[1]. Thirty years later, a Gender Action Plan was launched to underline the importance of the topic within development strategies. In 2012, the World Development Report was the first report of the series examining Gender Equality and Development[2]. The World Bank, together with other institutions, such as the IMF are often understand as “major exponents of the neoliberal agenda”[3] (Makwana 2006) suggesting therefore, that gender issues have become part of the [neoliberal] development agenda. The fact that Gender has become part of the [neoliberal economics] development agenda - in the current understanding involving features such as [privatization] and [deregulation] – is not uniformly conceived as a positive development. Some scholars in the field argue that [feminism], especially during its [second wave], has contributed key ideas to Neoliberalism that, according to these authors, creates new forms of inequality and exploitation[4] (Fraser 2012). In the post-war era, feminist scholars such as [Elizabeth Wilson(Wilson 1977)] criticized [state capitalism] and the [welfare state] as a tool to oppress women. This anti-welfare state thinking arguably led to feminist support for neoliberal ideas embracing on a [macroeconomic policy] level deregulation and a reduced role of the state. The impact of programs of the [Bretton Woods Institutions] and other similar organizations on gender are being monitored by Gender Action, a watchdog group founded in 2002 by [Eliane Zuckerman] who is a former World Bank economist. A current topic in the feminist literature on economic development is the ‘gendering’ of [microfinance], as women have increasingly become the target borrowers for rural [microcredit] lending. This, in turn creates the assumption of a “rational economic woman” which can exacerbate existing social hierarchies (Rankin 2001). Therefore, the critique is that the assumption of economic development through microfinance does not take into account all possible outcomes, especially the ones affecting women.
Fifth subsection of Smart Economics, led by Kazushige Kobayashi,synthesizes how the neoliberal institutions responded to the fierce criticisms by trying to incorporate gender perspectives into their programs. An initial effort came from World Bank. By presenting various quantitative and analytical perspectives on women in international economics, the World Development Report 2012 marshaled the importance of gender mainstreaming on a basis of intrinsic and instrumental values. Establishing a new framework to incorporate gender into its framework, the Bank named a new approach Smart Economics.While the report marked a monumental significance that a chief proponent of neoliberal development emphasizing gender roles in a globalized world, the report also met a series of denouncement and further criticisms from various authors such as Bedford (2012).
Foremost, the criticism of Bedford is based on both ideological and practical grounds. Ideologically, she emphasizes an intrinsic incompatibility between feminism and neoliberalism by casting a doubt if free market system, which generally commoditize human labor and subjugate female workers, can function in a way that champion the interest of women. Practically, she also points out that an apparent absence of the World Bank in the proposed international measures to eradicate gender inequality is a reflection of the bank’s reluctance to go beyond simple rhetoric in making more concrete, tangible actions. As Bedford expressed her grave concern, neoliberalism emphasizes quantitative, liner, and universal features of economic development which does not take any consideration of pluralism and multiple identities. While neoliberal development tends to aggravate and institutionalize the existent socio-economic inequalities, the feminist opponents call for a greater respect on diversity and a more intersectional perspective that is still lacking in the framework of Smart Economics. Although it is recognized that the utility of neoliberalism as an organizing force to accelerate economic development, it is also fallacious to assume that a simple progress of material life would naturally result in ameliorated conditions of gender disparity.