Pathways
Pathways News - October 2014
This month's update focuses on the Pathways theme of
Building Constituencies for Equality and Justice.
Focus on Voice
Women in Politics: Gender, Power and Development. ed. Mariz Tadros, 2014, Zed Books
In this exciting and pioneering collection, writers from Africa, Latin America and the Middle East are brought together for the first time to talk explicitly about women's participation in the political scene across the global South. Answering such questions as how women can get political apprenticeship opportunities, how these opportunities translate into the pursuit of a political career, and how these pursuits then influence the kind of political platform women advocate once in power, Women in Politics is essential reading for anyone interested in what it means to engage politically.
To give you a taster of the issues covered by the book, by kind permission of Zed Books, Mariz's introduction to the book is available to read from the Pathways website: Engaging Politically: Rethinking Women's Pathways to Power
'What you want is a slave and not a domestic worker!' cried Rosita Acosta, President of the Domestic Workers' Association in Costa Rica in 2007 during parliamentary discussions of a proposed bill aiming to limit domestic workers' working hours.
Mariz Tadros' article on 'Care-less Politics' suggesting that care is a factor in determining which women get into politics leads a debate on unpaid care and women's political leadership in Issue 6 of Contestations. Contributions from Shireen Hassim, Naomi Hossain and Rachael Stokes argue how a lack of focus on care issues impedes women's political participation.
Please join the debate at Contestations.
On the topic of care see also: Images of Caring Men, a photo exhibition, the first of its kind in Bangladesh, depicting images of ordinary men from all over Bangladesh who cook, clean, help their wives, parents, siblings and take care of children or the elderly as an integral part of their everyday lives. The exhibition was organised by the Centre for Gender and Social Transformation in partnership with ActionAid and the Dhaka Art Centre.
Women in Politics: Beyond Numbers
Getting women into politics (and helping them stay there) requires moving beyond just a focus on the numbers but also having a thorough understanding of women's pathways into politics and a broader interpretation of political apprenticeship, argues Jenny Edwards in this blog drawn from findings published in Mariz Tadros (ed.) Women in Politics.
If we take [a] much broader and also bottom-up approach to women's entry into politics, perhaps then we will begin to see a much broader, comprehensive spectrum of society within politics.
Feminists in Development Organizations - Book Launch in Washington DC and New York
Join us for the US launch of this book edited by Rosalind Eyben and Laura Turquet that features case studies written by women in development organisations reflecting on the progress of gender mainstreaming.
Monday 20 October: 14.00-15.30 at the Marvin Center, Room 403, George Washington University, 800 21st Street NW, Washington DC
Tuesday 21 October: 'Feminist Bureaucrats: Contradiction, Co-optation or Political Strategy?', 17.00-19.00, 19th Floor Conference Room, UN Women, 220 East 42nd Street,NY, Chaired by Shahra Razavi (Chief of Research and Data at UN Women).
RSVP: Laura Turquet
Other Recent Publications
Women's Empowerment: What Works and Why?, Andrea Cornwall
A new working paper by Andrea Cornwall for UNU-WIDER revisits foundational feminist work on the concept of empowerment from the 1980s and 1990s. The paper draws on findings from the Pathways programme to explore experiences of positive change in women's lives, in diverse contexts, and to draw together some lessons for policy and practice.
Reflections on Feminist Methodology, eds Sohela Nazneen, Akosua Darkwah, Maheen Sultan
A collection of articles reflecting on Pathways' experience of conducting research on women's empowerment in Bangladesh, Egypt, Ghana, Brazil and Palestine has been published in the Women's Studies International Forum. The research drew on a diversity of methods including; comparative sectoral studies, in-depth ethnographic case studies, large scale surveys, participatory workshops, life history narratives and digital photography.