Globalization

Citation:

Griffin, Penny. 2009. Gendering the World Bank: Neoliberalism and the Gendered Foundations of Global Governance. Basingstoke [England]: Palgrave Macmillan.

Author: Penny Griffin

Annotation:

Topics: Development, Economies, Globalization, International Financial Institutions

Year: 2009

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Ringrose, Jessica. 2007. “Successful Girls? Complicating Post-Feminist, Neoliberal Discourses of Educational Achievement and Gender Equality.” Gender & Education 19 (4): 471–89.

Author: Jessica Ringrose

Abstract:

This paper examines how an ongoing educational panic over failing boys has contributed to a new celebratory discourse about successful girls. Rather than conceive of this shift as an anti-feminist feminist backlash, the paper examines how the successful girl discourse is postfeminist, and how liberal feminist theory has contributed to narrowly conceived, divisive educational debates and policies where boys' disadvantage/success are pitted against girls' disadvantage/success. The paper illustrates that gender-only and gender binary conceptions of educational achievement are easily recuperated into individualizing neo-liberal discourses of educational equality, and consistently conceal how issues of achievement in school are related to issues of class, race, ethnicity, religion, citizenship and location. Some recent media examples that illustrate the intensification of the successful girl discourse are examined. It is argued that the gender and achievement debate fuels a seductive postfeminist discourse of girl power, possibility and choice with massive reach, where girls' educational performance is used as evidence that individual success is attainable and educational policies are working in contexts of globalization, marketization and economic insecurity. The new contradictory work of 'doing' successful femininity, which requires balancing traditional feminine and masculine qualities, is also considered. (Abstract from original)

Topics: Education, Feminisms, Gender, Masculinity/ies, Femininity/ies, Globalization, Privatization

Year: 2007

Citation:

Griffin, Penny. 2010. “Gender, Governance and the Global Political Economy.” Australian Journal of International Affairs 64 (1): 86–104.

Author: Penny Griffin

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This article considers a range of governance actors (including also the role of political enquiry into the global political economy in and of itself) to analyze how neo-liberal governance strategies seek to socialize human bodies (female, male or otherwise) into a global system of neo-liberal economic productivity. Contemporary mechanisms of global governance, it is suggested, seek to engineer a capitalist ‘market society’ while claiming to ‘empower’ poor people. In recent years, ‘empowerment’ rhetoric in global governance has increasingly depended on measuring the ‘economic’ role(s) of women in developing countries, judging their contributions productive only where they can be gauged to directly contribute to ‘formal economy’ growth. Reinforcing the assumption that ‘formal’ contributions are the only contributions worth measuring, such rhetoric simultaneously eradicates all other (non-competitive and/or non-entrepreneurial) behavioral possibilities for women, while clearly excluding all those who are not ‘women’. Against the instrumentalization of gender (as a category pertaining only to women and studies of women), this article argues that gender in global governance means much more than simply describing whether people are male or female and quantifying their productive capacities accordingly. As a broad and complex category of analysis, gender enriches the dynamism both of our studies of and practices in the global political economy. To ignore gender's role in the global political economy is to fail to see the power that gender (as a composite part of the relations of power that drive systems of economic development and growth) brings to our everyday understandings, and especially to our understandings of economic ‘common sense.’ (Abstract from original)

Topics: Globalization, International Financial Institutions, Political Economies

Year: 2010

Citation:

Connell, R. W. 1998. “Masculinities and Globalization.” Men and Masculinities 1 (1): 3–23.

Author: R.W. Connell

Abstract:

Recent social science research has made important changes in our understanding of masculinities and men's gender practices, emphasizing the plurality and hierarchy of masculinities, and their collective and dynamic character. These gains have been achieved mainly by close-focus research methods. But in a globalizing world, we must pay attention also to very large scale structures. An understanding of the world gender order is a necessary basis for thinking about men and masculinities globally. We can trace the emergence of globalizing masculinities at different stages of the history of the world gender order. Hegemony in the contemporary gender order is connected with patterns of trade, investment, and communication dominated by the North. A transnational business masculinity, institutionally based in multinational corporations and global finance markets, is arguably the emerging dominant form on a world scale. (Abstract from original)

Topics: Gender, Masculinity/ies, Globalization, Multi-National Corporations

Year: 1998

Citation:

Chant, Sylvia. 2016. "Galvanizing girls for development? Critiquing the Shift From 'Smart to 'Smarter' Economics." Progress in Development Studies 16 (4): 314-328.

Author: Sylvia Chant

Abstract:

This paper traces the mounting interest in, and visibility of, girls and young women in development policy, especially since the turn of the 21st century when a ‘Smart Economics’ rationale for promoting gender equality and female empowerment has become ever more prominent and explicit. ‘Smart Economics’, which is strongly associated with an increased influence of corporate stakeholders, frequently through public-private partnerships, stresses a ‘business case’ for investing in women for developmental (read economic) efficiency, with investment in younger generations of women being touted as more efficient still. The latter is encapsulated in the term ‘Smarter Economics’, with the Nike Foundation’s ‘Girl Effect’ being a showcase example.  In this, and similar, initiatives linked with neoliberal development, ‘investing in girls’ appears to be driven not only by imperatives of ‘female empowerment’, but also to realize more general dividends for future economic growth and poverty alleviation.  Yet while it may well be that girls and young women have benefited from their rapid relocation from the sidelines towards the center of development discourse and planning, major questions remain as to whose voices are prioritized, and whose agendas are primarily served by the current shift from ‘Smart’ to ‘Smarter Economics. (Abstract from original)

Keywords: smart economics, girls in development policy, gender inequality, 'Girl Effect', corporate stakeholders, neoliberal development

Topics: Development, Globalization, International Financial Institutions, Multi-National Corporations

Year: 2016

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Calkin, Sydney. 2016. “Globalizing ‘Girl Power’: Corporate Social Responsibility and Transnational Business Initiatives for Gender Equality.” Globalizations 13 (2): 158-72.

Author: Sydney Calkin

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The recent emergence of ‘transnational business feminism’ [Roberts, A. (2014). The political economy of ‘transnational business feminism’. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 17(2), 209–231] accompanied by numerous ‘transnational business initiatives for the governance of gender’ [Prügl, E., & True, J. (2014). Equality means business? Governing gender through transnational public–private partnerships. Review of International Political Economy, 21(6), 1137–1169] constitutes a significant area of debate in the feminist political economy literature. In this paper I focus on the confluence of the corporate social responsibility (CSR) agenda with the visibility of gender issues in development and the resultant corporate agenda for the promotion of women and girls’ empowerment. The paper draws on two gender-focused World Bank collaborations with private sector actors: the Global Private Sector Leaders Forum and the Girl Effect campaign. The paper argues that the dominant model of corporate citizenship inscribed within the discourse of transnational business initiatives is framed in terms of capitalizing on the potential power of girls and women, achieving an easy convergence between gender equality and corporate profit. I suggest that the construction of an unproblematic synergy between these goals serves to moralize corporate-led development interventions and therefore does not challenge corporate power in the development process, but instead allows corporations to subscribe to voluntary, non-binding codes and cultivate a socially conscious brand image. (Abstract from original)

Keywords: corporate social responsibility, gender equality, women's empowerment, World Bank, Nike

Topics: Development, Globalization, International Financial Institutions, Multi-National Corporations, Privatization

Year: 2016

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Bacchi, Carol, and Joan Eveline. 2003. “Mainstreaming and Neoliberalism: A Contested Relationship.” Policy and Society 22 (2): 98–118.

Authors: Carol Bacchi, Joan Eveline

Abstract:

The paper offers a comparative analysis of dominant mainstreaming and gender analysis frameworks to consider the nature of the relationship between these equality initiatives and neoliberalism. We challenge the portrayal of mainstreaming as necessarily resistant to neoliberalism, and show how dominant forms of mainstreaming illustrate characteristics congruent with neoliberal premises and policy agendas. Our particular concern is the extent to which some forms of mainstreaming and gender analysis are unable to put in question neoliberal premises because of their ex post character. For this reason we describe the relationship as contested. Our goal is to identify ways to strengthen the potential of mainstreaming initiatives to step outside of and critique neoliberalism's strategic norms. To advance this objective we offer some first steps towards producing gender analysis as an ex ante intervention. Significantly, we suggest that effective implementation requires a focus on policy's creative (active) role in constructing “problems” and in shaping gender relations.

Topics: Gender Mainstreaming, Globalization, Privatization

Year: 2003

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Aslanbeigui, Nahid, and Gale Summerfield. 2000. "The Asian Crisis, Gender, and the International Financial Architecture." Feminist Economics 6 (3): 81-103.

Authors: Nahid Aslanbeigui, Gale Summerfield

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This paper begins with an account of the Asian crisis, its creation and management by international financial institutions (the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank), and the gender impact of their stabilization and structural adjustment programs. Next we consider the new debate on reforming the IMF and the World Bank and restructuring the international financial architecture to prevent crises and manage them more effectively. Finally, we consider the gender ramifications of these changes. Since feminists have been absent from this debate, we examine issues essential to the formation of a gender-conscious international financial structure. (Abstract from original). 

Keywords: international financial architecture, international financial institutions, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, structural adjustment, Asian Crisis, debt crisis, gender impact of the Asian Crisis

Topics: Globalization, International Financial Institutions, International Organizations Regions: Asia

Year: 2000

Citation:

Williams, Mariama. 2017. “Climate Finance: Why Does It Matter for Women?” In Financing for Gender Equality: Realising Women’s Rights through Gender Responsive Budgeting, edited by Zohra Khan and Nalini Burn, 273-311. Medford, MA: Springer Publishing.

Author: Mariama Williams

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Topics: Civil Society, Class, Development, Economic Inequality, Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Globalization, Indigenous, International Financial Institutions

Year: 2017

Citation:

Archambault, Caroline, and Annelies Zoomers, eds. 2015. Global Trends in Land Tenure Reform: Gender Impacts. London and New York: Routledge. 

Authors: Caroline Archambault, Annelies Zoomers

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This book explores the gendered dimensions of recent land governance transformations across the globe in the wake of unprecedented pressures on land and natural resources. These complex contemporary forces are reconfiguring livelihoods and impacting women’s positions, their tenure security and well-being, and that of their families.

Bringing together fourteen empirical community case studies from around the world, the book examines governance transformations of land and land-based resources resulting from four major processes of tenure change: commercial land based investments, the formalization of customary tenure, the privatization of communal lands, and post-conflict resettlement and redistribution reforms. Each contribution carefully analyses the gendered dimensions of these transformations, exploring both the gender impact of the land tenure reforms and the social and political economy within which these reforms materialize. The cases provide important insights for decision makers to better promote and design an effective gender lens into land tenure reforms and natural resource management policies. (Summary from Taylor & Francis eBooks)

Topics: Agriculture, Armed Conflict, Displacement & Migration, Gender, Gender Analysis, Globalization, Governance, Indigenous, Land Grabbing, Land Tenure, Political Economies, Post-Conflict, Privatization, Rights, Land Rights

Year: 2015