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Reforming the gender-blind higher education curriculum is a crucial intervention for an effective implementation of gender mainstreaming across policy areas. This article examines the policy innovation adopted in Catalonia wherein quality assurance processes have been re-gendered and incentives to engage the professoriate in gender curricular reforms have been introduced. In doing so, it unveils the opportunity structures and institutional settings shaping the micro-political strategies deployed by the feminist strategic alliances that have stirred such policy changes and discuss their potential transferability to other contexts. The article also pinpoints the relevance of a feminist reappropration of evaluation processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, Turkey is home to multiple identities and cultures. In following with the critiques of Diversity Mainstreaming approach toward Gender Mainstreaming, this article argues that recognition of identities can be possible if an intersectional approach is adopted. To overcome the particular challenges of Gender Mainstreaming’s implementation in Turkey’s multicultural society, this article introduces a concept that supplements Gender Mainstreaming, called Equity Organizing, which further develops the views on intersectionality and equity that Diversity Mainstreaming proposes. It is different from Diversity Mainstreaming because it seeks to address the challenges to democracy in strong central and authoritarian leaning states. Equity Organizing is committed to the construction of progressive state policies for social justice through the realization of diverse identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Feminist scholars have challenged the neutrality of policymaking processes and the outputs resulting from these processes. However, some elements of policymaking have not been studied as well as others. In this article I explore the concept of evaluation from a gender+ perspective as an essential step for a complete gender mainstreaming strategy, which can help to identify gender issues that should be integrated into the content of evaluated policies and to ensure gender does not get lost in the policymaking process. This exploration is carried out by relying on feminist policy and evaluation studies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article presents a new methodology, Gender Knowledge Contestation Analysis, and uses it to examine the processes under way when transformative gender equality policies, such as gender mainstreaming are implemented. Drawing on data gathered in the European Commission, the findings show the processes linking high-level rhetorical policy statements, strategic policies, and daily working practices. This analysis enables exploration of the mechanisms through which indifference to and nonawareness of gendered policy problems are collectively constituted and methods through which they can be challenged. Findings thus deepen our understanding of barriers to the implementation of gender mainstreaming and the steps required for its effective implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article discusses policymaking from a gender+ equality perspective. It connects the knowledge from various subfields ranging from development planning, to feminist policy studies, to works on gender mainstreaming. By connecting different but convergent feminist subdisciplines, it draws a picture of the field of gender+ and policymaking. Central in this analysis are the questioning of gender+ bias in the policy process and the development of strategies to mainstream gender into policymaking. By delineating the boundaries of research on gender and policymaking, the article addresses existing challenges and reflects on gaps and promising terrains of study that could further develop and establish the field of feminist policy studies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While the gender impact assessment (GIA) system has been expanding in Korea with surprising and impressive speed, its actual influence on policies and programs remains quite uncertain. By conducting in-depth interviews with 16 frontline public officials and by systematically comparing it with environmental impact assessment (EIA) and regulatory impact assessment (RIA), the present study evaluates the current GIA system in Korea and identifies areas and issues for future improvement. Our findings show that an independent law, a separate managing division, clear criteria for selecting target policies and programs, and solid assessment measures are critical requirements for successful GIAs. In addition, we find that one of the most essential tasks is overcoming cultural resistance, especially the low priority gender issues have for male policy decision makers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines gender mainstreaming in European Union (EU) development aid toward the European Neighborhood through quantitative and qualitative research of policy documents. The objective is to evaluate whether a shift has been made from a “Women in Development” paradigm to a “Gender and Development” paradigm. First, documents are examined quantitatively, looking at language, format, and budget. Next, the qualitative analysis embarks on a deeper reading of how gender equality is approached. The data indicate that a shift toward the “Gender and Development” paradigm has not been made. The internal European agenda as well as the limited space for civil society are proposed as explanations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This project examines the extent to which terrorist threat shapes affect assessments of female political leadership and whether these assessments are affected by the characteristics of the evaluated leader. Using experimental and survey data, we find that conditions of terrorist threat increase the expression of certain gender-trait stereotypes and negatively affect evaluations of female Democratic leaders. Our analysis further suggests that Republican women and/or those with strong national security experience may be able to overcome the otherwise negative implications of security threats and gender-trait stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we explore gendered patterns of voting, and whether such patterns appear only after a critical mass of female justices is reached by analyzing the votes of justices in the Supreme Court of Canada. We employ a logistic regression model of the differences in the voting behavior of male versus female justices, using the universe of Supreme Court votes from 1982 through 2007. Our analysis supports the conclusion that women vote more liberally on civil rights, equality, and private economic cases, and more conservatively on criminal cases. However, we find no evidence that indicates a need for a critical mass of women justices for them to vote their sincere preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate gender-associated differences in the attitudes of city leaders regarding local economic development priorities. In so doing, we test the thesis that the economic development priorities of women city leaders will reflect postmaterialist values; in other words, women city leaders will place more of an emphasis on quality-of-life issues than do men. We employ results of a survey of more than 150 city leaders in Texas. Our findings offer support for our postmaterialist thesis and indicate that while women differ little from men in terms of traditional economic development considerations, such as the importance of job creation and revenue generation, women more than men also consider the influence of economic development efforts on a community's environment and aesthetics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on the issue of sexual harassment, I argue that comparative gender studies should go beyond tracking changes to laws that are presumed to be equivalent in meaning across political landscapes. The 'facts' that amount to the harm of sexual harassment are tied to normative frames about sexual difference and discrimination. In Russia, the frames of the woman question and gender symmetry animate how sexual harassment is recognized in law. My analysis shows that current law on sexual harassment will remain silent if the underlying questions of whether to politicize sexual difference and how to recognize discrimination are not addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The German Alliance for Jobs, Education and Competitiveness, a new policy instrument for reducing unemployment, was introduced by the red-green coalition government in 1998. In 2000, this policy instrument was abandoned, largely because business, labor, and government could not find sufficient common ground to continue working together. I argue that this policy instrument had the potential to affect the female workforce positively but that leaders from all sectors failed to incorporate gender considerations. In my view, the German economy will continue to lag behind its competitors unless it adopts gender mainstreaming, increases opportunities for women, and transforms its economy into a more service-oriented economy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Women's increased presence in German government since 1998 testifies to generational change, as well as to the completion of a gender-specific “long march through the institutions.” Securing more than 30% of the Bundestag seats, female lawmakers also reached critical mass in the Red-Green Cabinet, a coalition of the Social Democratic and Green Parties formed in 1998. This study of ministerial feminism, 1998-2002, shows that women are making a difference in Germany; these leaders have initiated paradigm shifts “bigger than the sum of the parts” insofar as national equality policies are reinforced at the European Union level, thanks to gender mainstreaming. Bolstered by new anti-discrimination articles in the Amsterdam Treaty, these women have undertaken strategic reforms in areas of gender and justice; research and technology; family and career; health, welfare and consumer protection; sustainable development, foreign aid, migration and human rights. Women have profited from supranational integration, in part because European Union decision-making builds on an inclusive concept of “power with,” in contrast to the traditional national exercise of “power over.” [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Women's increased presence in German government since 1998 testifies to generational change, as well as to the completion of a gender-specific “long march through the institutions.” Securing more than 30% of the Bundestag seats, female lawmakers also reached critical mass in the Red-Green Cabinet, a coalition of the Social Democratic and Green Parties formed in 1998. This study of ministerial feminism, 1998-2002, shows that women are making a difference in Germany; these leaders have initiated paradigm shifts “bigger than the sum of the parts” insofar as national equality policies are reinforced at the European Union level, thanks to gender mainstreaming. Bolstered by new anti-discrimination articles in the Amsterdam Treaty, these women have undertaken strategic reforms in areas of gender and justice; research and technology; family and career; health, welfare and consumer protection; sustainable development, foreign aid, migration and human rights. Women have profited from supranational integration, in part because European Union decision-making builds on an inclusive concept of “power with,” in contrast to the traditional national exercise of “power over.” [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]