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Introduction In the field of health, numerous frameworks have emerged that advance understandings of the differential impacts of health policies to produce inclusive and socially just health outcomes. In this paper, we present the development of an important contribution to these efforts -- an Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) Framework. Methods Developed over the course of two years in consultation with key stakeholders and drawing on best and promising practices of other equity-informed approaches, this participatory and iterative IBPA Framework provides guidance and direction for researchers, civil society, public health professionals and policy actors seeking to address the challenges of health inequities across diverse populations. Importantly, we present the application of the IBPA Framework in seven priority health-related policy case studies. Results The analysis of each case study is focused on explaining how IBPA: 1) provides an innovative structure for critical policy analysis; 2) captures the different dimensions of policy contexts including history, politics, everyday lived experiences, diverse knowledges and intersecting social locations; and 3) generates transformative insights, knowledge, policy solutions and actions that cannot be gleaned from other equity-focused policy frameworks. Conclusion The aim of this paper is to inspire a range of policy actors to recognize the potential of IBPA to foreground the complex contexts of health and social problems, and ultimately to transform how policy analysis is undertaken. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine how Canadian federal policy discourse on Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) frames the 'problem' of alcohol use and FASD in gendered and colonial ways that marginalize the needs of women. Applying a critical feminist lens to key policy documents, we show how Aboriginal women continue to be constructed as perpetrators of the 'problem' of FASD, while the structural, social, and historical processes (i.e., urbanization, racialization, and colonialism) that give rise to women's health and social inequities are obscured. Our aim is to contribute to the dialogue that feminist, indigenous, and women's health scholars have offered with respect to recognizing and problematizing the assumptions implicit within health policy. This analysis highlights the need to re-contextualize current policy discourses in ways that foreground women's health experiences within intersections of power and ongoing processes of discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]