Gender Equality/Inequality

Citation:

Butt, Myrah Nerine, Saleha Kamal Shah, and Fareeha Ali Yahya. 2020. “Caregivers at the Frontline of Addressing the Climate Crisis.” Gender & Development 28 (3): 479–98.

Authors: Myrah Nerine Butt, Saleha Kamal Shah, Fareeha Ali Yahya

Abstract:

ENGLISH ABSTRACT:
This article draws on Oxfam’s work in Pakistan. It explores the burdens of addressing the climate crisis on the unpaid labour of poverty-stricken women in Badin, Pakistan. A case study methodology has been used to highlight the experiences of four women farmers in Badin and understand the impact of climate change on their care workload. Seawater intrusion and rising temperatures are key stressors leading to acute shortages of water. This is increasing women’s time spent on key care activities like fodder and water collection, and livestock rearing. A severe negative impact has been observed on the drudgery of care work and, in turn, on the health and well-being of the women. In a context where prevalent gender inequality and social norms lead to unequal life chances for women, it has been observed that due to climate change, women have to travel further, work harder, and assume more care responsibilities. It has also been observed that care is primarily seen as a feminine task with residual care responsibilities falling on the shoulders of other women in the household, particularly girls, crippling their life chances. Despite all these challenges, women are organising and raising their voices on key issues around climate change. The article recommends that the four ‘Rs’ framework – recognise, reduce, redistribute, and represent –  developed by feminist economists and care experts, be integrated across mainstream climate policy and programmes to help women in poverty improve their well-being and exercise their social, economic, and political rights.

FRENCH ABSTRACT:
Cet article s’inspire des travaux menés par Oxfam au Pakistan. Il se penche sur le fardeau représenté par les efforts de la lutte contre la crise climatique sur le travail non rémunéré des femmes pauvres de Badin, au Pakistan. Une méthodologie d’étude de cas a été employée pour mettre en relief les expériences de quatre agricultrices de Badin et pour comprendre l’impact du changement climatique sur leur charge de travail liée aux soins. L’intrusion de l’eau de mer et la hausse des températures sont des facteurs de stress clés qui entraînent des pénuries aiguës d’eau. Cela a pour effet d’accroître le temps consacré par les femmes aux activités de soins comme la collecte de fourrage et d’eau, et l’élevage. Un grave impact négatif a été observé en ce qui concerne la pénibilité des activités de soins et, en conséquence, sur la santé et le bien-être des femmes. Dans un contexte où les inégalités existantes entre les sexes et les normes sociales donnent lieu à des chances de réussite inégales pour les femmes, on a observé qu’en raison du changement climatique, les femmes doivent parcourir de plus longues distances, travailler davantage et assumer plus de responsabilités de soins. On a également observé que les soins sont principalement perçus comme une tâche féminine et que les responsabilités résiduelles de soins reposent sur les épaules des autres femmes du foyer, en particulier les filles, ce qui compromet leurs perspectives de réussite. Malgré ces défis, les femmes s’organisent et se font entendre sur des questions clés relatives au changement climatique. Cet article recommande que le cadre des quatre « R » — reconnaître, réduire, redistribuer et représenter — mis au point par les économistes et les experts féministes en matière de soins, soit intégré dans tous les programmes et politiques généraux en matière de climat pour aider les femmes pauvres à améliorer leur bien-être et à faire valoir leurs droits sociaux, économiques et politiques.

SPANISH ABSTRACT:
Partiendo del trabajo realizado por Oxfam en Pakistán, el presente artículo examina la carga que supone para el trabajo no remunerado de las mujeres afectadas por la pobreza en Badin, Pakistán, abordar la crisis climática. Con este propósito se utilizó una metodología de estudio de casos para poner de relieve las experiencias de cuatro agricultoras de Badin, a fin de comprender el impacto del cambio climático en su carga de trabajo vinculada al cuidado. Tanto la filtración de agua de mar como la elevación de temperatura constituyen factores estresantes fundamentales que provocan una grave escasez de agua. Esto determina que las mujeres deban aumentar el tiempo que dedican a actividades clave de cuidado, como la recolección de forraje y agua, y la cría de ganado. Ello ha ocasionado un grave impacto negativo, tanto en el trabajo de cuidado como en la salud y el bienestar de las mujeres. En un contexto en que la desigualdad de género y las normas sociales predominantes dan lugar a desiguales oportunidades en la vida para las mujeres, se ha observado que, debido al cambio climático, las mujeres tienen que viajar más lejos, trabajar más duro y asumir más responsabilidades de cuidado. Además, se ha constatado que el cuidado es considerado sobre todo como una tarea de mujeres y que las responsabilidades residuales del cuidado recaen sobre los hombros de otras mujeres del hogar, en particular las niñas, lo que limita sus oportunidades en la vida. A pesar de todos estos desafíos, las mujeres se están organizando y alzando su voz en cuestiones clave relativas al cambio climático. El artículo recomienda que el marco de las cuatro “R” —reconocer, reducir, redistribuir y representar— desarrollado por economistas feministas y expertos en cuidados, se integre a la política y los programas climáticos principales para ayudar a las mujeres marginadas a mejorar su bienestar y ejercer sus derechos sociales, económicos y políticos.

Keywords: climate, care work, agriculture, Pakistan, water, WE-Care

Topics: Economies, Care Economies, Poverty, Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Girls, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Infrastructure, Water & Sanitation Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: Pakistan

Year: 2020

Citation:

Bee, Beth A., Jennifer Rice, and Amy Trauger. 2015. “A Feminist Approach to Climate Change Governance: Everyday and Intimate Politics.” Geography Compass 9 (6): 339–50.

Authors: Beth A. Bee, Jennifer Rice, Amy Trauger

Abstract:

Neoliberal climate governance, which focuses on shifting responsibility for mitigating climate change onto individuals through their consumption of techno-scientific solutions, ignores and obscures the experience of differently situated subjects. This paper examines the consequences of both framing climate change as a problem of science, and inducing individual behavior changes as a key point of climate policy. We build on climate governance literature and emerging feminist theorizing about climate change to understand how differently situated bodies become positioned as sites of capital accumulation in climate governance. We use the feminist lens of the ‘everyday’, which directs attention to embodiment, difference and inequality. These insights provide points of leverage for feminist scholars of climate science and policy to use to resist and contest the production of neoliberal climate subjects. We argue that a focus on the ‘everyday’ reveals the mundane decision-making in climate governance that affect individuals in varying, embodied ways, and which allows for climate governance to proceed as an ongoing process of capitalist accumulation.

Topics: Environment, Climate Change, Feminisms, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Governance

Year: 2015

Citation:

Andrijevic, Marina, Jesus Crespo Cuaresma, Tabea Lissner, Adelle Thomas, and Carl-Friedrich Schleussner. 2020. “Overcoming Gender Inequality for Climate Resilient Development.” Nature Communications 11 (1).

Authors: Marina Andrijevic, Jesus Crespo Cuaresma, Tabea Lissner, Adelle Thomas, Carl-Friedrich Schleussner

Abstract:

Gender inequalities are reflected in differential vulnerability, and exposure to the hazards posed by climate change and addressing them is key to increase the adaptive capacities of societies. We provide trajectories of the Gender Inequality Index (GII) alongside the Shared-Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), a scenario framework widely used in climate science. Here we find that rapid improvements in gender inequality are possible under a sustainable development scenario already in the near-term. The share of girls growing up in countries with the highest gender inequality could be reduced to about 24% in 2030 compared to about 70% today. Largely overcoming gender inequality as assessed in the GII would be within reach by mid-century. Under less optimistic scenarios, gender inequality may persist throughout the 21st century. Our results highlight the importance of incorporating gender in scenarios assessing future climate impacts and underscore the relevance of addressing gender inequalities in policies aiming to foster climate resilient development.

Topics: Development, Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Girls, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality

Year: 2020

Citation:

Alston, Margaret. 2020. “Gendered Vulnerability and Adaptation to Climate Change.” In Routledge Handbook of Gender and Agriculture, edited by Carolyn E. Sachs, Leif Jensen, Paige Castellanos, and Kathleen Sexsmith, 137-48. Abingdon: Routledge.

Author: Margaret Alston

Abstract:

This chapter challenges the notion of women as either undifferentiated vulnerable victims of climate change events or virtuous defenders of environmental health, arguing the need for a complex attention to the intersectional factors that shape gender vulnerability in the face of climate disasters. Offering a nuanced assessment of vulnerability, adaptation, and resilience, the chapter argues for a commitment to transformative resilience to address the potential for gender inequalities to be cemented by climate-based actions. Noting the widespread dominance of climate denial amongst policy makers and the slow and incremental attention to gender at international climate forums, the chapter notes the need for critical attention to gender. Outlining the gender impacts of health impacts, food and water insecurity, and displacement, the chapter notes that gender, poverty, and rurality are critical elements of vulnerability. Moving forward the chapter calls for attention to the complexity of gender and power relations in climate change policies and practices to give the lie to the simplistic notion of women as vulnerable or virtuous.

Topics: Displacement & Migration, Climate Displacement, Economies, Poverty, Environment, Climate Change, Environmental Disasters, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Health, Intersectionality, Security, Food Security

Year: 2020

Citation:

Borràs, Susana. 2019. “Climate Migration, Gender and Poverty.” In Research Handbook on Global Climate Constitutionalism, edited by Jordi Jaria-Manzano and Susana Borràs, 216–234. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing.

Author: Susana Borràs

Abstract:

This chapter explains that climate migration is a reality in which gender perspective is very important. It reveals both the vulnerabilities and strengths of women – whether in transit or in refugee camps; in their country of origin or at their ultimate destination. Women play a key role in the care, support and reconstruction of their communities. However, the political and legal failure to recognize climate change as a factor of added vulnerability, which is generating poverty and population movements, has increased gender inequality and injustice. This chapter argues the need to approach ‘gender climate migration’ realities from a gender justice and climate justice perspective.

Topics: Displacement & Migration, Climate Displacement, Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Justice

Year: 2019

Citation:

Danielsen, Katrine, and Jennifer Hinton. 2020. “A Social Relations of Gender Analysis of Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining in Africa’s Great Lakes Region.” Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue Canadienne Des Études Africaines 54 (1): 17–36.

Authors: Katrine Danielsen, Jennifer Hinton

Abstract:

Keywords: gender, social relations, women, artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM), Great Lakes Region

Topics: Extractive Industries, Gender, Gender Roles, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality Regions: Africa, Central Africa, East Africa

Year: 2020

Citation:

Stock, Ryan. 2021. “Bright as Night: Illuminating the Antinomies of ‘Gender Positive’ Solar Development.” World Development 138. doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105196.

Author: Ryan Stock

Abstract:

India is undergoing a rapid transition to renewable energy; the Gujarat Solar Park typifies this transition. In addition to mitigating climate change, the Gujarat Solar Park boasts female empowerment through social development schemes. This manuscript is inspired by the following research question: To what extent are ‘gender positive’ processes and projects associated with solar development in India realized on the ground? Utilizing mixed methods fieldwork and drawing on literature from feminist political ecology, this paper demonstrates how the modalities of solar park development represent an antinomy of a nature-society relation. New configurations of labor under the political economy of solar have produced a gendered surplus population of landless peasants who are not absorbed into wage-labor employment in the solar park. Further, associated social development schemes actually disempower women, despite mandates of ‘gender positive’ outcomes by UN-based climate treaties to which this project is beholden. The opportunity to participate in one such scheme for female empowerment was reserved for only women of middle-to-high class status and those of dominant castes, thereby reproducing class and caste-based social power asymmetries. Female (dis)empowerment eclipses ‘gender positive’ guarantees of the solar park. This study highlights some unintended consequences of sustainable energy transitions in the Global South at the local scale. Designing development interventions related to climate change mitigation that boast ‘gender positive’ outcomes must be careful not to exacerbate gender disparities and economic exclusion in rural areas.

Keywords: energy transition, solar park, antinomy, feminist political ecology, gender, intersectionality

Topics: Caste, Class, Development, Environment, Climate Change, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: India

Year: 2021

Citation:

Mohideen, Reihana. 2018. “Energy Technology Innovation in South Asia: Implications for Gender Equality and Social Inclusion.” Working paper, Asian Development Bank, Manila.

Author: Reihana Mohideen

Abstract:

This working paper addresses how energy systems and services in South Asia can improve women’s economic empowerment and well-being. It focuses on integrating gender equity considerations into technology design and on drawing women into this process for equal employment opportunities. South Asia’s low-carbon energy transition has significant implications for gender equality and social inclusion. The rising energy demand and the commitment to mitigate climate change are the driving force in energy technology innovation. This paper is the beginning of an ongoing research project that will also include a pilot program to field test a gender equality and social inclusion reference energy system.

Topics: Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Infrastructure, Energy Regions: Asia, South Asia

Year: 2018

Citation:

Johnson, Oliver W., Jenny Yi-Chen Han, Anne-Louise Knight, Sofie Mortensen, May Thazin Aung, Michael Boyland, and Bernadette P. Resurrección. 2020. “Intersectionality and Energy Transitions: A Review of Gender, Social Equity and Low-Carbon Energy.” Energy Research & Social Science 70. doi: 10.1016/j.erss.2020.101774.

Authors: Oliver W. Johnson, Jenny Yi-Chen Han, Anne-Louise Knight, Sofie Mortensen, May Thazin Aung, Michael Boyland, Bernadette P. Resurrección

Abstract:

Transitions to low-carbon energy systems are essential to meeting global commitments to climate change mitigation. Yet “greening” energy systems may not make them any fairer, inclusive or just. In this paper, we review the academic literature to understand the state of knowledge on how diffusion of low-carbon technologies impacts gender and social equity in intersectional ways. Our findings indicate that renewable energy projects alone cannot achieve gender and social equity, as energy interventions do not automatically tackle the structural dynamics embedded within socio-cultural and socio-economic contexts. If existing power asymmetries related to access and resource distribution are not addressed early on, the same structural inequalities will simply be replicated and transferred over into new energy regimes.

Keywords: energy transitions, low-carbon energy, climate change, renewable energy, social equity, gender equality

Topics: Gender, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Gender Equity, Infrastructure, Energy, Intersectionality

Year: 2020

Citation:

Clancy, Joy, Gül Özerol, Nthabiseng Mohlakoana, Mariëlle Feenstra, and Lillian Sol Cueva, eds. 2020. Engendering the Energy Transition. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Authors: Joy Clancy, Gül Özerol, Nthabiseng Mohlakoana, Mariëlle Feenstra, Lillian Sol Cueva

Keywords: gender and energy, energy transition, gender and development, sustainable development, gender and energy poverty, gender equality, sustainable energy for all, climate change mitigation, ecofeminism, energy poverty, feminist political ecology, neoliberalism

Annotation:

Summary:
This book brings together diverse contributions exploring the integration of gender equality in current national energy policies and international energy frameworks across the Global South and North. Taking a multi-disciplinary approach, this collection contributes to building a body of independent empirical evidence about the impacts of the energy transition on socio-economic outcomes, with a focus on gender differentiated choices of energy forms.

The book includes short reflections in each chapter allowing the reader to explore the content from an alternative perspective. The common thread enabling the book to actively contribute to engendering the energy transition is its approach to the topic from a primarily ‘gender’ driven perspective. The book draws many useful lessons from practice and shares gender mainstreaming tools for use across the Global South and the North. Such an approach brings novel insights from theoretical, methodological and practical perspectives, which further promotes cross-disciplinary learning and will be of interest to researchers and practitioners from across the Energy and Gender disciplines. (Summary from Springer)
 

Table of Contents:

1. Engendering the Energy Transition: Setting the Scene
Joy Clancy, Gül Özerol, Nthabiseng Mohlakoana, Mariëlle Feenstra, Lillian Sol Cueva

2. Energy Transition and Gender in the Informal Street Food Sector in Africa
Maïmouna Diouf, Nthabiseng Mohlakoana, Secou Sarr, Bacary Seydi

3. Gender, Firewood and Health: The Potential of Ethnography to Inform Policy and Practice
Margaret Matinga, Joy Clancy

4. Gender-Sensitive Analysis of Water Governance: Insights for Engendering Energy Transitions
Gül Özerol, Leila M. Harris

5. Bargaining Climate Adaptation through a Gender Lens: An Inquirty into Decision-Making Processes in Tanzanian Farm Households
Katrien Van Aelst, Nathalie Holvoet

6. On the Possibility and Politics of Feminist Energy Analytics in University Campus Spaces
Ingrid L. Nelson

7. How Gender Equality Principles Are Integrated in National Energy Polices and Frameworks
Ana Rojas, Maria Prebble

8. A View from the North: Gender and Energy Poverty in the European Union
Mariëlle Feenstra, Joy Clancy

9. Climate Finance Allocation Practices to Support Gender Responsive Energy Transitions: GCF Case-Study
Svetlana Frenova

10. Reflection on “Energy Transition and Gender in the Informal Street Food Sector in Africa”
Henny A. Romijn

11. Reflection on “Gender, Firewood and Health”
María Cristina Osorio Vázquez

12. Reflection on “Gender-Sensitive Analysis of Water Governance: Insights for Engendering Energy Transitions”
Morag Goodwin

13. Reflection on “Bargaining Climate Adaptation through a Gender Lens: An Inquirty into Decision-Making Processes in Tanzanian Farm Households”
Charlotte Ray

14. Why a Feminist Political Ecology Approach Is Relevant for Assessing Energy Access in Developing Countries
Annemarije Kooijman

15. Reflection on “How Gender Equality Principles Are Integrated in National Energy Polices and Frameworks”
Maryse Helbert

16. Reflection on “A View from the North: Gender and Energy Poverty in the European Union”
Mariama Williams

17. Reflection on “Climate Finance Allocation Practices to Support Gender Responsive Energy Transitions: GCF Case-Study"
Andrea Rodriguez Osuna

18. Reflections on Kick-Starting Lasting Change: From Policy to Practice and Beyond
Charlotte Taylor

19. Reflections from a Feminist Political Ecology Perspective
Wendy Harcourt

20. Reflection on Gender Research Informing Development Policy on Energy and Climate
Frank van der Vleuten

21. Reflection on Engendering the Energy Transition
Joy Clancy

Topics: Gender, Gender Mainstreaming, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Infrastructure, Energy

Year: 2020