Mainstreaming Gender in Global Public Policy

Efforts to mainstream a gender perspective in global public policy have been prompted by the proliferation of transnational networking among women's movements. Collaboration among feminist researchers, advocates and policymakers is making gender analysis part of the routine practices and institutions of global governance. For feminist scholars of international relations, gender mainstreaming in global public policy opens up an important new area for critical scrutiny. How do feminist ideas about gender get translated into global policy? To what extent is gender mainstreaming transforming policy outcomes and the process of policymaking? Here, I explore the factors that have given rise to gender mainstreaming across nation- states and international organizations. I also consider those factors that currently serve to constrain and weaken the effectiveness of mainstreaming initiatives from a feminist perspective. I conclude that gender mainstreaming is an open-ended and potentially transformative project that depends on what feminist scholars, activists and policymakers collectively make of it. The major question raised by this article is not how feminist scholars and activists can avoid cooptation by powerful institutions, but whether we can afford not to engage with such institutions, when the application of gender analysis in their policymaking is clearly having political effects beyond academic and feminist communities.