Public Service College Of Oromia

Department of Governance and Development

Management

GENDER AND DEVELOPMENT MODULE

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Module Introduction

Dear student, well come to the module of the course “Gender and Development”. This course
addresses issues relating to gender and development. The emphasis is on theories and practices
that adders the interference between the material and discursive dimension of gender inequality
and transformative politics, historical development of feminism, and its impacts, social
formation of masculinities and felinities and their intersection with class, ethnicity, and other
structural hierarchies and significance of gender different ion and interrelationship in social
intervention. The main issues that the course raises include; conceptualizing gender and sex,
gender mainstreaming, feminist movement, women and economic issues , such as power relation
and violence, women’s assertiveness and political participation, social exclusion of women and
development, feminist alternatives to development international initiatives and national polices
on women affairs. Also the course will review social and structural factors contributing for
gender differentiation, such as social values, position in hierarchies of control, access to paid
employment, resources, and gender inequality issues with the development of a given society.

Learning objectives

Up on completion of the course, students will be able to:

 Define the concept of gender and other gender related concepts.

 Discuss the historical development and the concept of feminism theory.

 Identify major theoretical perspectives on gender and development.

 Discuss the social formation of masculinities and femininities.

 Explain the underline causes for gender different ion.

 Explain the harmful traditional practice in Ethiopia,

 Analyze international and national policies and practice on women affaires.

 Describe and analyze the interrelationship between gender and development.

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  Explain the multifaceted socioeconomic and cultural aspects that affect women
productivity in the past.

 Describe the triple role of women.

 Describe the concepts of gender analysis, gender empowerment and gender

mainstreaming as well as their interrelationships.

 Believe in equality of gender.

 Demonstrate the required provisional skills in advocating participatory

approaches to development.

Contents of the Module

Chapter.1. The Concept of Gender and Sex

Chapter.2. Gender and Development

[Link] Stereotype and Gender Discrimination

Chapter.4. Economic and Social Participation of Women

[Link] Approach to Women in Development

[Link] Concept of Gender and Sex

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1.1. Gender Socialization and Gender Based Role

1.1.1. Gender Concepts

What do you think is the difference between gender and sex?

?
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Sex and gender are sometimes wrongly used as synonymous by some people. But they do have
different meanings. Sex identifies the biological differences between women and men. It is a
biological or natural attribute of being male or female. The attribute owes to the presence of
responsible hormones for the creation of genitals and associated reproductive organs. Hence,
androgen hormone for male sex related organs and estrogen hormone for female sex related
organs.

Gender is the culturally specified set of characteristics that identifies the social behavior of
women and men and the relationship between them. Gender, therefore, refers not simply to
women or men, but to the relationship between them, and the way it is socially constructed. It
also indicates the roles, behavior, attitudes and activities that society assigns to men and women.
The concept portrays culturally constructed roles than biologically/naturally determined ones like
sex. Because it is a relational term, gender must include women and men. Like the concepts of
class, race and ethnicity, gender is an analytical tool for understanding social processes. Among
the various differences between gender and sex, the following are the major ones.

Sex

 Fact of human biology

 In-born (born with it)
 Is being born as male or female
 Universal through culture, space and time
 Mostly permanent (unless removed through sophisticated surgery)
 Natural and its ultimate agent is nature

Gender

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  Result of social construction
 Happens post birth
 Is relation between male and female
 Culture, time and geographically variable
 Subject to change due to socio-cultural, economic and political dynamics
 Learned (results from socialization) through agents like parents, teachers, peers,
cultural/traditional settings

Examples of their attributes

 only women can give birth

 only men can impregnate
 Women and men can work as teachers, development actors
 Women and men can care of children, cook food, etc

Activity -1: Answer the following questions

a).Are sex and Gender the same? Why? Or Why not?

b).Because it is a relational term, gender must include women and men. True/
False

[Link] Socialization and Sources

Socialization is the process, through which the child becomes an individual respecting his or her
environment, laws, norms and customs. Gender socialization is a more focused form of
socialization, it is how children of different sexes are socialized into their gender roles and taught
what it means to be male or female.

Gender socialization begins the moment we are born, from the simple question “is it a boy or a
girl?” We learn our gender roles by agencies of socialization, which are the “teachers” of society.
The main agencies in Western society are the family, peer groups, schools and the media. These

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are also discussed below in a better detail. In respect with gender socialization, each of the
agencies could reinforce the gender stereotypes.

Gender differences result from the socialization process, especially during our childhood and
adolescence. The classical example of gender socialization is the experiment done with babies
that were introduced as males to half of the study subjects and as females to the other half. The
results are interesting and quite disturbing at the same time. The participants behave differently
according to the sex they had been told. These findings show that other people contribute a lot to
how we see ourselves only on the basis of gender.

The socialization process is an all encompassing educational process from which values, goals,
beliefs, attitudes, and sex-roles are acquired. Socialization is nothing more than the educational
process by which we learn everything. It is the most complex, demanding, and all-involving role
that a member of society must learn to play is that of male or female. From infancy through early
childhood and beyond, children learn what is expected of boys and girls, and they learn to
behave according to those expectations.

Girls and boys are perceived and treated differently from the moment of birth. Parents describe
newborn daughters as tiny, soft, and delicate, and sons as strong and; and they interact differently
with newborn daughters and sons.

How parents treat their children may be the most important factor in the creation of sex
stereotypes. When one compares the life of the young girl to that of the young boy, a critical
difference emerges:

 She is treated more protectively and she is subjected to more restrictions and controls;
 He receives greater achievement demands and higher expectations.
 Girl infants are talked to more.
 Girls are the objects of more physical contact such as holding, rocking, caressing, and
kissing.

1.2. Factors that Affects the Gender role

Dear learner! What factors affects the gender role in your local community? Please list them in
the space provided and compare them with description given

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below_________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________

In all societies, males and females are expected to behave in ways that are very different. They
are socialized from early childhood to conform to masculine and feminine roles and norms. They
have to dress differently, play different kinds of games, be interested in different issues and
subjects and have different emotional responses to situations. There is a tacit perception that
what males do is better and more valuable than what females do.

The impact of socially constructed gender roles is felt significantly in the area of sexuality and
sexual behavior. Women are expected to make themselves attractive to men, but be more
passive, guarding their virginity, never initiating sexual activity, and taking care to protect
themselves from the uncontrolled sexual desires of men. In some societies this is because women
are held to have lesser sexual drive than men. In other societies the ways women are controlled
are based on the idea that women have uncontrollable sexual desires. Men are often expected to
be virile and have sexual desires that are uncontrollable once aroused, to take the initiative in
sexual activity, and to be, by nature, incapable of being monogamous.

Several factors come into play in an individual’s growth. Every individual is nurtured either
consciously or unconsciously into an acceptable part of his/her society. Socialization is thus
governed by socializing agents and socializing forces.

Socializing Agents
 Parents (the family)
 Teachers
 Peers

Socializing Forces/social Forces

 The media
 The church
 Traditional institutions
 School
 Art

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  Language
 Music
 Songs
[Link] of socializing agents and forces in transmitting sex role stereotypes
Socializing agents
Parents/family
The family plays an enormous role in creating and perpetuating sex role stereotypes in an
individual’s life. This may include:
 Training children to play different roles according to their perceived gender;
 Training girls and boys how behave differently;
 Differential physical identities e.g. piercing ears, plaiting hair etc.;
 Parents acting as role models (girls should imitate their mothers and boys their
fathers); and,
 Training boys and girls to dress differently.
Teachers
 Teachers often encourage differential behaviour. They encourage males to score high or
perform better than girls in certain subjects which are considered ‘hard’ subjects. (These
include generally science subjects.) The teachers usually consider it normal for girls not
to score high in these subjects. Sometimes when girls score highly in science or
Mathematics, teachers do not give encouraging remarks to them; when boys underscore
in these subjects, they are often castigated. In addition, boys are often not rewarded or
encouraged for excelling in ‘soft subjects’ e.g. art, history or literature. As a result of this,
children are discouraged from pursuing the so called ‘soft subjects’.
 Teachers are the models therefore children tend to look up to them.
 Teachers assign different chores/duties to females and males.

Peers
There is usually a lot of peer influence and pressure among peer groups. Peers teach each other
how to behave like men and women e.g. little girls wearing make up, walking in a certain
manner, exhibiting certain mannerism [Link] learn to smoke, drink beer, take drugs, harass

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girls etc. Between ages 12 and 19, children tend to respond more to peer pressure than to any
other influence.
Socializing forces
Language
This is the medium we use to organize and transport ideas and stereotypes are also transmitted in
the process.
Images of women and men
Language can be used to create or destroy and to portray images of men and women. Women
and men are portrayed positively or negatively through four main ways, namely Ignoring,
Labeling, Deprecating, and using stereotypes.
Ignoring
This is done through the use of the masculine gender to refer to human beings e.g. Chairman,
mankind, policeman e.g.
 She is the best man for the job.
 He is the best woman on the job.
 The working man.
 Career woman.
Other examples include man, he, countryman, man-centered ideology, man-centered society etc.
Usage of the masculine gender often portrays males as the norm and females as the exception. In
many instances, males are portrayed as more important than females. Females do not matter and
society learns and accepts these views of the sexes.

Labeling
 Language usage ordinarily defines women by labeling them in ways that show they are
exceptions to the rule e.g. lady or woman doctor, career girl, female lawyer, woman
sergeant, female truck-driver. This reinforces occupational stereotypes and shows that
women are not expected to be doctors, lawyers etc.
 Women are defined by the order in which they are usually referred to e.g. men and
women, boys and girls, or he/she. This clearly shows how females are given second
place.

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  Labeling also occurs when women are referred to by relationships e.g. Mr. and Mrs. John
Phiri. (Where is the woman?) Women tend to lose their identity when they get
married and yet men maintain their identities whether they are married or single.

Deprecating (Disproval)
The third sexist aspect of language is one involving deprecating or disapproving of women. This
is done through:
Trivializing women e.g. women are addressed as poetess instead of poet, manageress, actress,
(Head) mistress. In other settings, women are addressed as ‘girl’.
Insulting women
There are over 220 terms used for a sexually promiscuous woman compared with 22 for men.
Most proverbs are often also used to insult women.
Media
Television, radio (electronic media), newspapers, books, magazines, songs, and art (print media)
all constitute a medium of communication. These communicate messages about women and
men, their gender roles, as well as sex role stereotypes. These tend to portray men and women in
a stereotypic way.
Portrayal of women and men in the media
Television
This is done through advertising/commercials, films, drama, news, documentaries, shows or
special programmes.
Advertising
Women are depicted as being predominantly concerned with their looks or appearances which
men are not. As an extension to this, women are used to advertise beauty products such as bath
soap, skin creams, perfumes etc.
They are shown to be predominantly concerned with house work as well as being predominantly
responsible for family warfare.
Films
Soap operas and other types of films reinforce sex stereotypes through portraying women as
weak sex objects whereas men are given roles that represent courage, intelligence etc.

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News, documentaries, shows or special programmes in many of these programmes, women are
rarely considered as news makers. Men are portrayed as prime movers, sales agents, and
business managers.
[Link] do teachers influence gender roles? Explain in context of your experience?

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1.3. Feminism Theories of Gender

1.3.1. Historical Development and Concept of Feminism Theory

We may have heard about feminism and have you noticed that it is a diverse collection of social
theories, political movements, and moral philosophies, largely motivated by or concerning the
experiences of women, especially in terms of their social, political, and economic situation. As a
social movement, feminism largely focuses on limiting or eradicating gender inequality and
promoting women’s rights, interests, and issues in society. It also incorporates concern about the
effect of gender roles on men, and encouragement for men to change and transcend traditional
male roles and norms of masculinity.

Within academia, some feminists focus on documenting gender inequalities that oppress women
and on changes in the social positions and representation of women. Others argue that gender,
and even sex, are social construct, and research the construction of gender and sexuality, and
develop alternate models for studying social relations.

Some feminist scholars, in echoes of anarchist feminists like Emma Goldman, have posited that
the hierarchies in businesses and government and all organizations need to be replaced with a
decentralized ultra-democracy. Some argue that having any central leader in any organization is
derived from the andocentric family structure (and therefore needs reform and replacement), and
thus such scholars see the essence of feminism as beyond the surface issues of sex and gender.

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Feminist political activists commonly campaign on issues such as reproductive rights (including
but not limited to the right to choose an abortion, the elimination of legal restriction on abortion,
and access to contraception), violence within a domestic partnership, maternity leave, equal pay,
sexual harassment, street harassment, discrimination, and sexual violence. Themes explored in
feminism include patriarchy, stereotyping, sexual objectification, and oppression.

In the 1960s and 1970s, much of feminism and feminist theory represented, and was concerned
with; problems faced by western, white, middle-class women while claiming to represent all
women. Since then, many feminist theorists have challenged the assumption that “women”
constitute a homogeneous group of individuals with identical interests. Feminist activists
emerged from within diverse communities, and feminist theorists began to focus on the
intersection of gender and sexuality with other social identities, such as race and class. Many
feminists today argue that feminism is a grass-roots movement that seeks to cross boundaries
based on social class, race, culture, and religion; is culturally specific and addresses issues
relevant to the women of that society (for example female genital cutting in Africa or the glass
ceiling in developed economies); and debate the extent to which certain issues, such as rape,
incest, and mothering, are universal.

Feminism as a philosophy and movement in the modern sense may be usefully dated to The
Enlightenment with such thinkers as Lady Mary Wortley, Montague and the Marquis de
Condorcet championing women’s education. The first scientific society for women was founded
in Middleburg, a city in the south of the Dutch republic, in 1785. Journals for women, which
focused on issues like science, become popular during this period as well. Mary Wollstonecraft’s
A vindication of the Rights of woman (1972) is one of the first works that can unambiguously be
called feminist.

Feminism became an organized movement in the 19th century as people increasingly came to
believe that women were being treated unfairly. The feminist movement was rooted in the
progressive movement and especially in the reform movement of the 19th century. The utopian
socialist Charles Fourier coined the word feminism in 1837; as early as 1808, he had argued that
extension of women’s rights was the general principle of all social progress. The organized
movement was dated from the first women rights convention at Seneca Falls, New York, in
1848. In 1869, John Stuart Mill published the “Subjection of Women” to demonstrate that “the

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legal subordination of one sex to the other is wrong… and ….one of the chief hindrances to
human improvement.

Many countries began to grant women the vote in the early years of the 20th century, especially
in the final years of the First World War and the first years hence. The reasons varied, but they
included a desire to recognize the contribution of women during the war, and were also
influenced by rhetoric used by both sides at the time to justify their war efforts. For example,
since Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points recognized self-determination as vital to society, the
hypocrisy of denying half the population of modern nations the vote became difficult for men to
ignore.

Activity.3. Discuss the basic concepts and historical development of feminism theory?

_______________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________

[Link] of Feminism

Some forms of feminist theory question basic assumptions about gender, gender difference, and
sexuality, including the category of “women” itself as a holistic concept, further some are
interested in questioning the male/female binary completely (offering instead a multiplicity of
genders). Other forms of feminist theory take for granted the concept of “women” and provide
specific analyses and critiques of gender inequality, and most feminist social movements
promote women’s rights, interests, and issues. Feminism is not a single ideology. Over-time
several sub-types of feminist ideology have developed. Early feminists and primary feminist
movements are often called the first-wave feminists and feminists after about 1960 the second-
wave feminists and more recently, a new generation of feminists have started third-wave
feminism. Moreover, some commentators have asserted that the silent majority of modern
feminists have more in common ideologically with the first-wave feminists than the second-
wave. For example, many of the ideas arising from Radical feminism and Gender feminism
(prominent second-wave movements) have yet to gain traction within the broader community
and outside of gender studies department within the academy.

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In her book, “A Fearful Freedom: Women’s Flight from Equality”, Wendy Kaminer identifies
another conflict between forms of feminism, the conflict between what she calls “egalitarian”
and “protectionist” feminism. In her characterization, egalitarian feminists focus on promoting
equality between women and men, and giving women and men equal rights. Protectionist
feminists prefer to focus on legal protections for women, such as employment laws that
specially protect female workers and divorce laws that seem to favor women, sometimes
advocating restricting rights for men, such as free speech (specifically, the right to produce and
consume pornography). Though the book predates third-wave feminism, Kaminer identities both
protectionist and egalitarian currents within first-wave feminism and second-wave feminism.

Some radical feminists advocate separatism-a complete separation of male and female in society
and culture while others question not only the relationship between men and women, but the very
meaning of “man” and “woman” as well. Some argue that gender roles, gender identity, and
sexuality are themselves social constructs. For these feminists, is a primary means to human
liberation (i.e., the liberation of men as well as women).

Other feminists believe that there may be social problems separate from or prior to patriarchy
(e.g., racism or class divisions); they see feminism as one movement of liberation among many,
each affecting the others.

The various types of feminism include:

 Egalitarian forms: Equity feminism , Individualist feminism and Liberal feminism

 Gynocentric forms: Cultural feminism, Gender feminism and Radical feminism
 Belief in oppression by patriarchy: Anarcha-feminism, French feminism and Radical
feminism
 Belief in oppression by capitalism: Socialist feminism and Marxist feminism

Differences are solely or mostly cultural, not biological:

 Amazon feminism and Psychoanalytic feminism

 Segregation list: Lesbian feminism (Lesbian separatism) and Separatist feminism
 African- American: Black Feminism and Womanism

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  Non- Western: Third –world feminism, Post-colonial feminism and Pro-sex feminism
(also known as sexually liberal feminism, sex positive feminism.

Although many leaders of feminism have been women, not all feminists are women. Some
feminists argue that men should not take positions of leadership in the movement, because men,
having been socialized to aggressively seek positions of power or direct the agendas within a
leadership hierarchy, would apply this tendency to feminist organizations; or that women, having
been socialized to deter to men, would be hindered in developing or expressing their own self-
leadership in working too closely with men. However, some feminists do believe that men
should be accepted as leaders in the movement (pro-feminism, humanism, masculism).

Today, some young women associate “feminism” with radical and gender feminism, and this has
put off some of these women from being active in feminism, spurring a move away from second-
wave labels. However, the basic values of feminism (women’s rights and gender equality for
women) have become so integrated into western culture as to be accepted overwhelmingly as
valid, and non-conformity to those values characterized as unacceptable, by the same men and
women who reject the label “feminist”.

It is believed that feminists made a great change in human life and some feminists would argue
that there is still much to be done on these fronts, while others would disagree and claim that the
battle has basically been won.

Feminism has affected many changes in western society, including women’s suffrage; broad
employment for women at more equitable wages; the right to initiate divorce proceedings and the
introduction of “no fault” divorce; the right to obtain contraception and safe abortion; and the
right to be allowed admittance into university in the U.S.

Feminism is largely a pro-choice movement, although there are some exceptions. The national
organization of Feminist for Life (http: //www. feminists for life. Org/), is so common is because
women do not have access to alternate resources and information. Feminists for Life also suggest
that what they refer to as the “abortion industry” is part of a system which allows the abuse of
women and women’s rights.

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English- Speaking feminists are often proponents of what they consider to be non-sexist
language, using “Ms.” to refer to both married and unmarried women, for example, and the
ironic use of the term “history” instead of “history”. Feminist are also often proponents of using
gender-inclusive language, such as “humanity” instead of “mankind”, or “he or she” (or other
gender-neutral pronouns) in place of “he” where the gender is unknown. Feminists in most cases
advance their desired use of language either to promote what they claim is an equal and
respectful treatment of women or to affect the tone of political discourse. This can be seen as a
movement to change language which has been viewed by some feminists as imbued with sexism,
providing for example the case in the English language in which the word for the general
pronoun is “he” or “his” (The child should have his paper and pencils), which is the same as the
masculine pronoun (the boy and his truck). These feminists argue that language then directly
affects perception of reality. However, to take a postcolonial analysis of this point, many
languages may not be as important to some feminists as others. Yet, English is becoming more
and more universal, and the issue of language may be seen to be of growing importance.

On the other hand, quite a different tendency can be seen in French. Gender, as a grammatical
concept, is much more pervasive in French than in English, and as a result, it has been virtually
impossible to create inclusive language. Instead, nouns that originally had only a masculine form
have had feminine counterparts created for them. “Professor” (“teacher”), once always,
masculine regardless of the teacher’s sex, now has a parallel feminine form “professeure”. In
cases where separate masculine and feminine forms have always existed, it was once standard
practice for a group containing both men and women to be referred to using the masculine plural.

[Link] Views on Gender Roles

Most feminists argue that traditional gender roles are oppressive for women. They assume that
the female role was constructed as an opposite to an ideal male role and helps to perpetuate
patriarchy.

For approximately the last 100 year, women have been fighting for equality and they were able
to make changes to the traditionally accepted feminine gender role. However, most feminists
today say there is still work to be done, though the situation for women has improved during the

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last century discrimination of women in workplace, in associations, in education and in
household is still widespread.

Since as we have seen Feminism is a brand concept and we have many forms to detail them we
take only three types of feminism and discuss their view on Gender roles.

How do you think liberal feminism views the gender roles and inequality in a given society?
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[Link] Feminism

Liberal feminists are egalitarian forms of feminism fighting for equality of both male and female.
According to Liberal feminists’ gender is the social and cultural difference between male and
female, and all the cultural ideas, behaviors, roles and expectations about gender are ideology –
supporting patriarchy.

The entire gender role are constructed and formed by males to justify patriarchy. Feminists
describe feminism, as ideology that directly opposes sexism, i.e. discrimination of people, based
on sex; they support gender equality by portraying men and women as equal.

The core point for liberal feminism is avoiding gender inequality by equally assigning roles and
responsibilities to both male and female.

Domestic activities especially child rearing activities are arbitrary assigned to female, so this
domestic activity have to be shared equally between male and female.

They also focus on achieving equal right and economic opportunities. They even identify two
major types of spheres as public spheres and domestic spheres. They say the domestic sphere is
located to women’s while the public sphere is located to males. Furthermore the domestic sphere
is undervalued and assumed as mindless jobs in this case they lack recognition in a society.

The first consideration of liberal feminists is equality by giving female equal opportunities in
education, politics, work places, giving them status, providing them food etc.

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In certain society people give delicious foods for their sons and care much about the health of
their sons than their daughters; in this case they are creating gabs between male and female.
Reverting on over the other from this and many other problems, Liberal feminists ask equality
for women’s without challenging the basic masculine strength. They say men work on true
rewarding tasks because they have access to money, power, status etc. The social system termed
as patriarchy restrict women to domestic work and men to public spheres. From this the first aim
of Liberal feminists is challenging patriarchy as social system and they claim even unless
patriarchy is removed no way women’s can have equal opportunity with males.

Do you think that there are differences in views of the liberal feminists and the socialist
feminists? If so try to mention some and indicate how inequality and gender roles are perceived
by the socialist feminists?

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______________________________________________________________________________

1.3.5. Socialist Feminism

This is purely the Synthesis of both Marxist and Radical Feminists. Marxist Feminism focus on
women’s oppression by capitalism while Radical Feminism focus on women’s oppression by
patriarchy. The Marxist idea is widely used in socialist feminism while radical feminism has
secondary importance. The Marxist thought describes women’s oppression in society based on
class and economy. They say the capitalist oppression which is best described as class
oppression is the cause for other forms of societal oppression including patriarchy.

The important characteristics of socialist feminist is that it describes all forms of social
oppression, which may be forms of race, ethnicity, age, sexual preference, location and so forth.
For socialist feminists the primary analysis is oppression of women, they say women’s location
and experience of the world serves as the essential point of domination. They are always located
in domestic activities and are not allowed to go out of home in economic activities they are taken
as less important in Economic activities.

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The strategy of analysis of socialist feminist is called as historical materialisms. This is the basic
concept in Marxian social theory and refers to the material condition of human life, which is
money, land etc.

The idea is that the resources and properties of human kind is owned by male, from this
personalities, experiences and social arrangements develop and change from time to time, this
situation is recorded in history and known as historical materialism.

Marxist used this historical materialism to understand economic dynamics of the society.
Socialist feminists also apply the same method to understand how material factors influence the
group life of people (male and female).

Generally Socialist feminists focus on three basic areas of oppression of women, which are:

The human body and their involvement in sexuality:-socialist feminists blame the female
sexual (Reproductive) organ, which lead them to bearing children and caring for them in house
hold.

The home maintenance with its unpaid and invisible rounds of domestic duties: –Women’s
are undertaking this bulky workload without recognition and payment as remuneration and this
degrade status of women in the society.

Emotional sustenance for children and husbands: - The Expressive role of women is devalued
in society so it has a number of useful results.

You have seen the differences between the liberal and socialist feminists try to think and
relate them with the radical feminism and differentiate the peculiarities of the views in the later.

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1.3.5. Radical Feminism

This includes the arguments by both the Marxian and Psychoanalytic feminists (which include
both class oppression and dynamic emotional personality). The principal focus of radical
feminists lies on violence against women in the society. They say patriarchy as a system rests on

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the practice of violence against women in society. The radical feminists say the society is
characterized by oppression between the classes, race ethnicity, religions groups; age and gender
category. Of all these they focus on gender oppression. They say the fundamental structure of
oppression is gender oppression and system of patriarchy.

Patriarchy as a system is not only the first structure of domination and subordination but it
continues to be the enduring system of inequality, and it is also the societal modes for all forms
of domination.

Through patriarchy men hold other human being group women, who are considered as object of
patriarchy, and as having subjective feeling, they practice violence against women and in this
way the males justify their position of patriarchy. The control of motherhood and chastity is
assumed to be the result of patriarchy. If the female fail, to give birth after marriage the society
violet against women even thought she is not the cause. Exploitation of women at work places in
the form of unpaid and underpaid is also the result of patriarchy.

Radical feminists say that it is men who create and maintain patriarchy and violence is nothing
but the control that men exert over females in their own interest. According to Radical feminists,
abolishing patriarchy and gender based division of labor is the only way to restore women’s
equality in society.

According to extreme Radical feminists males need women for three purposes. These are: for
satisfying sexual needs, for reproduction (production of Children) and for labor forces, because
of their domestic work use.

These activities present Females as objects and radical feminists fever the isolationist view that
favor the division of world into male world and female world, and in which case males become
homosexuals and Females Lesbians.

What do you think is the origin of black feminism?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

19
1.3.7. Black Feminism

The Black Feminist Movement grew out of, and in response to, the Black Liberation Movement
and the Women's Movement. In an effort to meet the needs of black women who felt they were
being racially oppressed in the Women's Movement and sexually oppressed in the Black
Liberation Movement, the Black Feminist Movement was formed. All too often, "black" was
equated with black men and "woman" was equated with white women. As a result, black women
were an invisible group whose existence and needs were ignored. The purpose of the movement
was to develop theory which could adequately address the way race, gender, and class were
interconnected in their lives and to take action to stop racist, sexist, and classist discrimination.

[Link] the focus areas of socialist feminism?

________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________

[Link] Formation of Masculinity and Femininity

Dear learner! How society will decide masculinity and femininity in society you are living?
Guess your answer in the space provided and compare your answer with discussion given under
this sub-topic.

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

[Link] Concepts on Social Formation of Masculinity and Femininity

Spence (1985) refers to the degree to which persons see themselves as masculine or feminine
given what it means to be a man or woman in society. Femininity and masculinity are rooted in
the social (one's gender) rather than the biological (one's sex). Societal members decide what
being male or female means (e.g., dominant or passive, brave or emotional), and males will
generally respond by defining themselves as masculine while females will generally define

20
themselves as feminine. Because these are social definitions, however, it is possible for one to be
female and see herself as masculine or male and see himself as feminine.

It is important to distinguish gender identity, as presented above, from other gender-related

concepts such as gender roles which are shared expectations of behavior given one's gender. For
example, gender roles might include women investing in the domestic role and men investing in
the worker role (Eagly 1987). The concept of gender identity is also different from
genderstereotypes which are shared views of personality traits often tied to one's gender such as
instrumentality in men and expressiveness in women (Spence and Helmreich 1978). And, gender
identity is different from gender attitudes that are the views of others or situations commonly
associated with one's gender such as men thinking in terms of justice and women thinking in
terms of care (Gilligan 1982). Although gender roles, gender stereotypes and gender attitudes
influence one's gender identity, they are not the same as gender identity (Katz 1986; Spence and
Sawin 1985).

From a sociological perspective, gender identity involves all the meanings that are applied to
oneself on the basis of one's gender identification. In turn, these self-meanings are a source of
motivation for gender-related behavior (Burke 1980). A person with a more masculine identity
should act more masculine, that is, engage in behaviors whose meanings are more masculine
such as behaving in a more dominant, competitive, and autonomous manner (Ashmore, Del
Boca, and Wohlers 1986). It is not the behaviors themselves that are important, but the meanings
implied by those behaviors.

Beginning at birth, the self-meanings regarding one's gender are formed in social situations,
stemming from ongoing interaction with significant others such as parents, peers, and educators
(Katz 1986). While individuals draw upon the shared cultural conceptions of what it means to
bemale or female in society which are transmitted through institutions such as religion or the
educational system, they may come to see themselves as departing from the masculine or
feminine cultural model. A person may label herself female, but instead of seeing herself in a
stereotypical female manner such as being expressive, warm, and submissive (Ashmore,
DelBoca, and Wohlers 1986), she may view herself in a somewhat stereotypically masculine
fashion such as being somewhat instrumental, rational, and dominant. The point is that people
have views of themselves along a feminine-masculine dimension of meaning, some being more

21
feminine, some more masculine, and some perhaps a mixture of the two. It is this meaning along
the feminine-masculine dimension that is their gender identity, and it is this that guides their
behavior.

1.4.2. The Roots of Femininity/Masculinity

In western culture, stereotypically, men are aggressive, competitive and instrumentally oriented
while women are passive, cooperative and expressive. Early thinking often assumed that this
division was based on underlying innate differences in traits, characteristics and temperaments of
males and females. In this older context, measures of femininity/masculinity were often used to
diagnose what were understood as problems of basic gender identification, for example, feminine
males or masculine females (cf. Terman and Miles 1936).

We now understand that femininity and masculinity are not innate but are based upon social and
cultural conditions. Anthropologist Margaret Mead addressed the issue of differences in
temperament for males and females in Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies (1935).

This early study led to the conclusion that there are no necessary differences in traits or
temperaments between the sexes. Observed differences in temperament between men and
women were not a function of their biological differences. Rather, they resulted from differences
in socialization and the cultural expectations held for each sex.

One is led to this conclusion because the three societies studied by Mead showed patterns of
temperament which were quite varied compared with our own. Among the Arapesh, both males
and females displayed what we would consider a "feminine" temperament (passive, cooperative
and expressive). Among the Mundugamor, both males and females displayed what we would
consider a "masculine" temperament (active, competitive and instrumental). Finally, among the
Tchambuli, men and women displayed temperaments that were different from each other, but
opposite to our own pattern. In that society, men were emotional, and expressive while women
were active and instrumental.

Mead's study caused people to rethink the nature of femininity/masculinity. Different gender-
related traits, temperaments, roles and identities could no longer be inextricably tied to biological

22
sex. Since Mead's study, the nature/nurture issue has been examined extensively, and with much
controversy, but no firm conclusions are yet clear (Maccoby and Jacklin 1974).

While there may be small sex differences in temperament at birth (and the evidence on this is not
consistent), there is far more variability within each sex group (Spence and Helmreich 1978).

Further, the pressures of socialization and learning far outweigh the impact of possible innate sex
differences in temperament.

Dear learner! What do you think is the root of masculinity and femininity in your locality?

______________________________________________________________________________

[Link] Development of Femininity and Masculinity

There are at least three major theories that explain the development of femininity and
masculinity: psychoanalytic theory (Freud 1927), cognitive-developmental theory
(Kohlberg1966) and learning theories that emphasize direct reinforcement (Weitzman 1979) and
modeling (Mischel 1970). In all of these theories, a two-part process is involved. In the first part,
the child comes to know that she or he is female or male. In the second part, the child comes to
know what being female or male means in terms of femininity or masculinity

According to psychoanalytic theory, one's gender identity develops through identification with
the same-sex parent. This identification emerges out of the conflict inherent in the oedipal stage
of psychosexual development. By about age 3, a child develops a strong sexual attachment to the
opposite-sex parent. Simultaneously, negative feelings emerge for the same-sex parent that is
rooted in resentment and jealousy. By age 6, the child resolves the psychic conflict by
relinquishing desires for the opposite-sex parent and identifying with the same-sex parent. Thus,
boys come to learn masculinity from their fathers and girls learn femininity from their mothers.

A more recent formulation of psychoanalytic theory suggests that mothers play an important role
in gender identity development (Chodorow 1978). According to Chodorow, mothers are more
likely to relate to their sons as different and separate because they are not of the same sex.

At the same time, they experience a sense of oneness and continuity with their daughters because
they are of the same sex. As a consequence, mothers will bond with their daughters thereby

23
fostering femininity in girls. Simultaneously, mothers distance themselves from their sons who
respond by shifting their attention away from their mother and toward their father. Through
identification with their father, boys learn masculinity.

Cognitive-developmental theory is another psychological theory on gender identity development

(Kohlberg 1966). As in psychoanalytic theory, this theory suggests there are critical events that
have a lasting effect on gender identity development, but they are cognitive rather than
psychosexual in origin. Unlike psychoanalytic theory and learning theory that is next discussed,
the development of a gender identity comes before rather than follows from identification with
the same-sex parent. Once a child's gender identity becomes established, the self is then
motivated to display gender-congruent attitudes and behaviors, well before same-sex modeling
takes hold. Same-sex modeling simply moves the process along.

Kohlberg identifies two crucial stages of gender identity development: 1) acquiring a fixed
gender identity, and 2) establishing gender identity constancy. The first stage begins with the
child's identification as male or female when hearing the labels "boy" or "girl" applied to the self.

By about age 3, the child can apply the appropriate gender label to the self. This is when gender
identity becomes fixed. By about age 4, these gender labels are appropriately applied to others.

Within a year or two, the child reaches the second critical phase of gender constancy. This is the
child's recognition that her gender will not change despite her change in outward appearance or
age. The most social of the theories of gender identity development are the learning theories. In
these theories it is the social environment of the child, such as parents and teachers that shapes
the gender identity of a child. Here, the parent or teacher instructs the child on femininity and
masculinity directly through rewards and punishments, or indirectly through acting as models
that are imitated. Direct rewards or punishments are often given for outward appearance as in
what to wear (girls in dresses and boys in pants), object choice such as toy preferences (dolls for
girl and trucks for boys), and behavior (passivity and dependence in girls and aggressiveness and
independence in boys). Through rewards and punishments, children learn appropriate appearance
and behavior. Indirect learning of one's gender identity emerges from modeling same-sex
parents, teachers, peers, or same-sex models in the media. A child imitates a rewarded model's

24
thoughts, feelings, or behavior because it anticipates that it will receive the same rewards that the
model received.

Summary

Gender is the culturally specified set of characteristics that identifies the social behavior of
women and men and the relationship between them. Gender, therefore, refers not simply to
women or men, but to the relationship between them, and the way it is socially constructed. It
also indicates the roles, behavior, attitudes and activities that society assigns to men and women

Socialization is the process, through which the child becomes an individual respecting his or her
environment laws, norms and customs. Gender socialization is a more focused form of
socialization, it is how children of different sexes are socialized into their gender roles and taught
what it means to be male or female. The socialization process is an all-encompassing educational
process from which values, goals, beliefs, attitudes, and sex-roles are acquired. Socialization is
nothing more than the educational process by which we learn everything.

As a social movement, feminism largely focuses on limiting or eradicating gender inequality and
promoting women’s rights, interests, and issues in society. It also incorporates concern about the
effect of gender roles on men, and encouragement for men to change and transcend traditional
male roles and norms of masculinity.

Femininity and masculinity are rooted in the social (one's gender) rather than the biological
(one's sex). Societal members decide what being male or female means (e.g., dominant or
passive, brave or emotional), and males will generally respond by defining themselves as
masculine while females will generally define themselves as feminine. There are various types of
feminist movement.

Because these are social definitions, however, it is possible for one to be female and see herself
as masculine or male and see himself as feminine. We now understand that femininity and
masculinity are not innate but are based upon social and cultural conditions. There are at least
three major theories that explain the development of femininity and masculinity: psychoanalytic
theory (Freud 1927), cognitive-developmental theory (Kohlberg1966) and learning theories that
emphasize direct reinforcement (Weitzman 1979) and modeling (Mischel 1970).

25
 Checklist

Dear student, below are some of the important points which includes the objectives of this
chapter which you have already gone through. Mark () to say "Yes" or No" in the box below
and evaluate yourself about the topics discussed in the unit. If you tick "No" to most of the
topics, it means that you need to understand more until you achieve the objectives set at the
beginning of the unit. In this case you should go back to the discussion part and read very
carefully until you master all the topics.

Topics of Discussion Yes No

 I can clearly explain the important concepts in gender

 I am able to differentiate between sex and gender
 I can clearly explain gender division of labour and gender role
 I can elaborate feminism theory of gender
 I can explain issues related to masculinity &femininity

Self-Assessment Questions
Try to answer the following different types of questions to evaluate yourself
concerning the unit you have completed studying.
1. 1. Briefly explain the common issues on which feminist political activist
campaigned.
2. What are the different types of feminists? Briefly explain the major
ones.
3. Discuss black feminism very briefly.
4. Discuss the concept of socialization
5. Discuss the difference between gender identity and gender role

26
 [Link] and Development
2.1. Rational for Gender and Development Approach

2.1.1. Gender as a social concept

For centuries, people held the belief that women’s and men’s characteristics were natural and
unalterable, determined by differences that were biological or divinely decreed. Those
characteristics included the ideas and values considered to be feminine or masculine (women are
emotional, men rational), and a set of behaviours, aptitudes, and practices (women do the dishes,
men work with machines).

Well before the U.N. Decade for Women, intercultural research demonstrated that these
characteristics are engendered and created by society rather than being determined or natural. In
gender and development, the term gender is used to describe characteristics determined by
society, while the term sex is used to describe characteristics that are biologically determined
(primarily, men’s capacity to impregnate women and women’s capacity to give birth to children
[CCCI, MATCH, AQOCI, 1991: 16]).

However, as Maureen Mackintosh noted in 1984, there is nothing in the fact that women bear
children that implies that they alone must care for them throughout childhood, any more than that
they must feed and take care of adults, care for the sick, perform certain agricultural tasks, or
work in a factory producing electronic parts. A society in which women and men were equal
would not rely on arbitrary sex differences to determine individuals’ possibilities and restrict
their economic activities. It is important to realize that gender relationships and identities are not
universal, but vary across cultures and sometimes from community to community. They are
dynamic and change over time.

2.1.2 Gender inequality

Around the world women, as a group, earn less than men, receive fewer benefits, and work
longer hours every day. Their work and their opinions are deprecated. In general, women have
more onerous family responsibilities and are frequently threatened with violence. They are also

27
under-represented at the decision-making level and face many obstacles when they aspire to
positions of authority.

According to United Nations statistics, world-wide:

• Women put in 67% of all working hours;

• They earn 10% of all the income in the world;

• Two-thirds of the illiterates in the world are women;

• Women own less than 1% of property in the world.

There is no hope of solving development problems if this reality is not taken into account.

THREE OBSERVATIONS ARE CENTRAL TO THE GENDER AND DEVELOPMENT

(GAD) APPROACH:

• The fact that in every society, women form a disadvantaged group compared to menin terms of
well-being (education, health care, income, etc.), in terms of access to and control of means of
production, and in terms of power;

• The fact that in every society, women and men have different needs, given their distinct roles
and responsibilities, and given their unequal access to and control of resources;

• The fact that this situation of inferiority is a barrier to development, limiting the chances and
opportunities of one-half of the population.

2.1.3 What is the gender and development approach?

The GAD approach emerged in the 1980s from feminist critiques of successful development
models put forward by the major development agencies. The following features are typical of
this approach:

• A strategy that is designed to enable gender concerns to be built into the analysis, planning, and
organization of development policies, programs, and projects.

28
• An approach that seeks to promote equality between the sexes through the empowerment of
women and men in the population and in development activities.

• An approach that values equality in all areas in which there are major gaps between men and
women, notably in:

- The division of labour;

- Access to services and resources;

- Control of resources and benefits;

- Decision-making power.

• An approach that does not focus solely on women or on men, but rather on transforming the
relationships between the genders in a more egalitarian sense.

• An approach that does not attempt to marginalize men, but tries to broaden women’s
participation at every level.

• An approach that is not designed to turn women into men, but rather to make sure that access to
resources is not tied to belonging to one sex or the other.

WHY IS GENDER EQUALITY SO IMPORTANT?

• Gender equality is directly linked to sustainable development.

• It is an essential aspect of achieving human rights for all.
• It gives women and men an opportunity to enjoy the same opportunities, rights, and
obligations in every sphere of their daily lives.
• It gives women and men equal access to education, financial independence, shared
family responsibilities, and freedom from all forms of coercion, intimidation, and
violence.
• It puts both women and men in a position to make decisions that will have a positive
impact on their own and their family’s health and safety.

How does Gender Affect men?

29
 • The establishment of more equitable relationships between men and women requires a
redefinition of the rights and responsibilities we all have in every sphere of daily life.
• Men’s lives are markedly influenced by gender. Cultural and social norms related to
masculinity confine men to certain social roles (e.g. leader, husband, son, pusher), which
sometimes prevent them from achieving their full human potential in other areas.
• Therefore, seeing things from a gender perspective is important for men, since they also
suffer the disadvantages of the way they have been socialized.

HOW CAN MEN CONTRIBUTE TO THE GAD APPROACH?

Dear learner do you think men contribute to gender and development?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

Women are not the only ones affected by the gender and development approach. Men can also
make an active contribution to promoting equality between the sexes in many ways, such as:

• Sharing domestic duties and responsibility for raising children;

• Sharing resources and the family income;
• Confronting other men’s sexist behaviour;
• Protesting when certain decisions or distribution of responsibilities in the workplace
appear to be unequal;
• Objecting to the imposition of gender-based limitations in the socialization of children

2.2. The Link between Gender Issues and Development

Dear learner! Do you think that gender issues are linked with development? Would you
illustrate any development case that linked with development in your localities?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

30
2.1.1. Gender as a Development Issue

“Development is a process that should involve all members of society (women or men) to the
same extent and according to their individual needs”.(Source: Brett April. Why is gender a
development issue? The Oxfam Gender Training manual 1994).

Approaching gender in development

Development is about people working to improve their lives. Development work should
therefore use local notions of gender if it is to be meaningful and fruitful. To understand gender
relations in the home, t is important to go beyond the house as a unit of analysis and break it into
smaller components. The most effective and practical way to incorporate gender analysis into
development is to consult with and listen to women. Projects/programmes must aim at:
 reducing the burden of women for example in agriculture;
 including provision of support for female agricultural tasks as well as those carried out by
men;
 seriously considering women’s needs for better equipment, improved seeds and advice;
 in terms of health, particular concerns of women should be resourced from their priorities
by ensuring that women’s health needs are assessed and addressed;
 in the home, projects can aim at alienating the drudgery and heavy demands of women’s
work by providing more efficient grinders or stoves and improving women’s access to
water;
 whether working with women alone or within the community the primary objective
should be to enable women perform their existing roles better;
 in order to address the inequalities between men and women there is need to work
towards changing the laws that discriminate against women, increasing women’s access
to land, giving women decision making power etc.
[Link] and Theory

The gender and development approach points to the clear link between the problem and the
subordination of women, which is maintained and reinforced in all societies by structures and
values supporting a dynamic of social relationships that prevent women from being full-fledged
31
participants in and beneficiaries of the development process. For proponents of the GAD
approach, the solution lies in power and equality - in other words, the transformation of social
relationships founded on patriarchy.

[Link]. Conceptual tools

The conceptual tools that guide the gender and development approach include the following:

1. Gender-based division of labour

2. Three types of labour

3. Access to and control over resources and benefits

4. Influencing factors

5. The condition and the situation

6. Practical needs and strategic interests

7. Participation levels

8. Possibilities for transformation

9. The concept of empowerment

The first four tools on the list are used to analyze gender relationships in a community at
the development program/project planning stage, while the last five are used to define
development work.

⇒TOOL NO. 1: GENDER-BASED DIVISION OF LABOUR

The division of work by gender is found in every culture and every era. Since it may vary from
community to community, it is important to start by finding out how work is organized in
communities involved in a project. The Harvard Framework is a useful tool for gathering
relevant gender-based data.

Basic questions:

32
•What work do women and girls do (paid and unpaid)?

•What work do men and boys do (paid and unpaid)?

•What repercussions does this division of labour have on achieving the objectives of the program
or project?

• Does the project generally confirm or call into question the current division of labour?

⇒TOOL NO. 2: THREE TYPES OF LABOUR

Gender-based analysis distinguishes among three types of labour: work related to the
production of goods or services (agriculture, fishing, employment, and unpaid work), work
related to reproduction (including housework and home maintenance and caring for members
of the household), and work related to the community (including organization of collective
activities: ceremonies, feasts, political representation, and participation in groups and
organizations).

Women and men, girls and boys can all engage in activities related to any of the three categories,
but most of the time their responsibilities are different. Any intervention in one domain will have
effects on other domains. For example, women’s workload may prevent them from participating
in development projects or cause an overload in other domains. Therefore, it is important to fully
define the division of labour and the type of work each gender does so that these factors can be
reflected in project or program planning.

Basic questions:

• What type of work do women and men, girls and boys do?

• How will a program or project influence women’s and men’s work related to production,
reproduction, and the community, and what consequences will the project have on the various
types of work?

Dear learner would you explain existing gender division of labor in your local community and
its impact on development?

33
______________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________

⇒TOOL NO. 3: ACCESS TO AND CONTROL OVER RESOURCES AND BENEFITS

At the planning stage, it is important to understand what resources (economic, political, and
other) and benefits (food, shelter, money, etc.) each gender has access to, and that each gender
controls, i.e. can use as they see fit.

Basic questions:

• What resources related to production do women and men have access to?

• What resources related to production does each gender have control over?

• How can a project contribute to giving women greater access to resources and more control
over those resources?

• What benefits do women and men each derive from work related to production, reproduction,
and the community?

• What benefits does each gender have control over?

• What repercussions’ does this have on program or project activities?

• How can we give women greater access to benefits and control over those benefits?

⇒TOOL NO. 4: INFLUENCING FACTORS

The division of labour between men and women, the type of work done by each gender, access
to and control over resources and benefits by gender are not static or immutable data in any
society. Various factors are interwoven, influencing and changing these social relationships.
Under the GAD approach, it is therefore important to identify these factors in order to develop
strategies designed to transform these relationships, give women more power, and promote
gender equality.

Influencing factors include the following:

34
• Socio-cultural factors, such as evolving traditional lifestyles;

• Economic factors, such as structural adjustment policies;

• Political factors, such as new policies, changes in government, war, etc.;

• Environmental factors, such as drought;

• Demographic factors, such as the migration of men, urbanization, and the rural exodus;

• Legal factors, such as amendments to legislation on ownership and the right to vote;

• Factors relating to education, such as the new expectations of educated girls;

• International factors, such as the influence of Western culture;

• Religious factors, such as the rise of fundamentalism.

Basic questions:

• What key factors have repercussions on and change gender relationships, the division of labour,
access to resources, and control over those resources?

• What constraints and possibilities do these factors impose in the promotion of gender equality
and giving women greater power?

[Link] basic questions raised in gender and development regarding access to

and control over resource and benefits?

_______________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________

⇒TOOL NO. 5: THE CONDITION AND THE SITUATION

From the GAD viewpoint, there is a distinction between women’s living conditions, which
affect their material status in their daily lives, and their social situation, which is related to their
political, economic, and social situation compared to those of men in the same society.

35
According to this approach, it is not enough to improve women’s living conditions. It is essential
to target the improvement of their social position as well if we want women to be able to benefit
equally from development initiatives.

In any household or community, women, men, and children may share the same conditions of
poverty. However, women and men experience these conditions and needs in a different way.
Given their separate work and responsibilities, women may consider access to water and fuel, a
higher income, and better health-care services to be higher priorities for their household.

Men may consider the need to acquire more land, more technology, and more agricultural tools
to be higher priorities. Therefore, when it comes to identifying needs for a community, it is
important to ensure that women are included right from the start so that their needs are not
ignored when planning projects and programs.

Development programs or projects have different repercussions on the living conditions of

women and men. For example, a water supply project may greatly improve conditions for
women while having little impact on men’s living conditions. In agricultural projects, the
opposite may occur, with negative repercussions for women. The use of fertilizer, for instance,
may complicate women’s lives by requiring more weeding, a task generally performed by
women.

Development programs or projects may have negative repercussions on women’s situation

if the sectors in which women are active are depreciated or eliminated or positive repercussions
if women are included as agents of change. For example, a water supply project may have very
different impacts if women are simply considered to be beneficiaries and pump users or if they
are included as members of managing committees and trained to provide pump maintenance and
take care of health-care education.

Basic questions:

• How and to what extent do organizations’ programs or projects and policies contribute to
improving the condition of women and men?

• How and to what extent do they contribute to improving women’s status in society?

36
⇒TOOL NO. 6: PRACTICAL NEEDS AND STRATEGIC INTERESTS

Dear learner do you know the practical and strategic need of women? Which need is critical
in addressing issues related with development?

______________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________

The GAD approach distinguishes between women’s practical needs and strategic interests,
which are respectively connected to their living conditions and their situation. Generally, projects
that are purely designed to meet practical needs and improve women’s living conditions maintain
and reinforce traditional relationships between women and men.

Women’s strategic interests as a group include the following:

• Being less vulnerable to violence and exploitation;

• Having more economic security and independence, and more choices and possibilities;

• Sharing responsibilities with men and the government when it comes to work related to
reproduction;

• Being able to organize with other women to gain more clout and promote solidarity and action;

• Gaining more political power;

• Having more ability to improve their children’s lives and future.

Basic questions:

• How and in which program or project activities and organizational policies are the practical
needs of women and men taken into account?

• How and to what extent do they take into account the strategic interests of the community in
general and women in particular?

⇒TOOL NO. 7: PARTICIPATION LEVELS

37
One of the basic premises of GAD analysis is that people should be the agents of their own
development. This approach targets the fullest possible participation of women and men in all
development activities.

According to this approach, it is necessary to promote the concept of women as agents of change
and as planners, managers, organizers, and committee members in all development projects – not
only those that focus solely on women. The participation of women as active agents of change
who acquire skills is an important part of the empowerment process.

GAD analysis distinguishes four participation levels, at which people:

1. are passive recipients of aid, material resources, or services without having any control over
the continuity of such assistance;

2. act in ways prescribed by others, for example by contributing to their work or using a co-
operative;

3. are consulted on problems and needs, but not necessarily on solutions, which do not
translate concretely into the project or services offered;

4. acquire the power to organize to meet their own needs, propose solutions for solving their
problems, and take responsibility for development measures.

Basic questions:

• What type of participation do women and men have in the program or project and in the
organization?

• To what extent are the women active agents at each stage of the program or project and in the
development and implementation of policies?

⇒TOOL NO. 8: POSSIBILITIES FOR TRANSFORMATION

According to the GAD approach, it is important to realize that women’s state of subordination is
not static and is not experienced in the same way by all women. It is not necessarily passively
accepted by women or aggressively imposed by men. Throughout history and around the world,
women have raised the issue of inequality between women and men and have demanded their

38
rights. Major progress has been made, and will continue to be made, thanks to women’s
struggles, sometimes supported by men.

Kate Young, a pioneer of this approach, believes that it is easier to develop strategies for change
by adopting the concept of “possibilities for transformation” that let us see which needs and
which methods can bring about a change in women’s situation. Does the project contain the
seeds of change? Do participants acquire the confidence and skills they will find useful for other
activities? Does the project support participants’’ efforts to organize themselves and attack
related issues? Is there potential for forming alliances and coalitions with other groups?

It is important to realize that social change cannot be produced without conflict, without a
struggle, without losses or costs. Women and men whose lives are transformed experience the
consequences and understand the risks involved. It is up to us to make sure that populations in
general and women in particular are able to identify and define their own aims and processes for
change.

Basic questions:

• How does or will the program/project contribute to transforming gender relationships?

• How does or will it contribute to transforming relationships between disadvantaged people and
those who have more resources?

⇒TOOL NO. 9: THE CONCEPT OF EMPOWERMENT

During the 1960s and 1970s, the solution to women’s subordination was thought to be gaining
greater economic power. It was said that financial independence would give women more clout.
Since money is an important indicator of social status (particularly in the North), women with
more money would have more prestige. In the South, income-generating projects became
popular, while in the North projects that involved professional training were in favor.

It was also believed that if there were more women in positions of authority (in business, the
professions, legislative assemblies, the courts, and the universities), women as a group would be
better represented and would exercise more power. Women in many countries organized (or
were organized) to exert pressure, campaign for laws to end discrimination, raise public

39
awareness, form unions, and demonstrate for or against access to family planning and abortion.
There has been progress on all these fronts over the past few decades: more women are now part
of the paid workforce, legislation is more equitable, and women are mobilizing more and are
better organized. However, with the globalization of markets and despite economic growth,
women are still growing poorer and are still subject to many forms of violence. One of the key
elements to explain this situation lies in the way we understand power.

Most of the strategies designed to promote change have failed to reflect the diversity of women’s
experiences of subordination – experiences that vary according to class, race, sexual orientation,
and age. That diversity of experiences influences the degree of importance women ascribe to the
problem of subordination. For example, gender may be less important than class (women in
positions of authority may exploit working-class women and men), more important than race (a
white south African woman compared to her black housemaid), or more important than age (the
first wife in a polygamous marriage compared to the other wives, children, and spouses).
Domination relationships are multifaceted and interrelated. The hypothesis that all women
always share a single interest is false.

GAD analysis distinguishes among several types of power, including the following:

• Power over someone: generally based on threats of violence or intimidation sanctioned by

society, this is an invitation to passive and active resistance and requires constant vigilance to be
maintained.

• The power (to do something) is a creative power that gives individuals the capacity to
accomplish things. This is the very essence of the individual aspect of power (or empowerment).
Most of us have experienced this form of power, for example when we succeed in solving a
problem, understanding how something works, or acquiring new skills.

• The power that goes hand in hand with the feeling that the sum is greater than the parts, a
sense that is felt especially when several people attack a problem together. Collectively, people
feel that they have power when they get organized and unite in pursuit of a common aim, or
when they share a common vision.

40
• Internal power (power that is exercised internally) refers to the spiritual strength and unique
character all of us possess – what makes us truly human. This is based on self-acceptance and
self-respect, and respecting and accepting others as equals.

Other authors (including Marie-Rose Nyandwi, 2000) make a distinction among three
dimensions of empowerment:

• individual: developing a sense of autonomy, confidence, and the ability to shed the effects of
internalized oppression;

• relationship-based: developing the ability to negotiate and influence the nature of a

relationship and the decisions made in that relationship;

• collective: when individuals work together to achieve a greater goal than each of them would
be able to achieve individually. This involves commitment to political structures, but may also
cover collective action based on cooperation rather than competition (local, formal, or informal).

In the gender context, women and men are socialized in different ways and frequently operate in
different spheres of the community, although there is some overlap and interdependence between
the two. As a result, women and men have different life experiences, knowledge, perspectives,
and priorities. Neither can necessarily represent the interests of the other, and neither can
fully represent the community.

Strategically, we need to change our understanding of what power is, and find creative ways
of resisting power that is exerted “over” someone else. Non-violent resistance, as advocated
by Gandhi, is a remarkable example of this. We need to study the concepts of “the power (to
do something),” “power that goes hand in hand,” and “internal power,” and see how they
are all interrelated. In terms of our development efforts, this means that we must acquire more
capacities to solve problems and conflicts and consolidate organizations; we also need to boost
our individual and collective abilities and foster a greater sense of solidarity.

[Link] the concept of “possibilities of transformation” in gender and

development?

______________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
41
⇒GENDER INDICATORS

Gender indicators are a key tool in ensuring that development programs do in fact take into
account the roles and specific needs of both women and men. They may be quantitative or
qualitative measures that show change across time, especially before and after a project.

• They have an important function – signaling changes in relationships between women and men,
changes in living conditions, changes in the roles of women and men over time.

• They are designed to measure advances, if any, toward full equity between men and women.

• These indicators provide important data for the planning, execution, and evaluation of
development projects in urban and rural settings.

To sum up, these are signals or signs that help us to “take the pulse” of equity between women
and men in a particular place. They serve as permanent observers or “goal posts” so that we can
see whether we are progressing or moving backwards on the playing field of gender equity.

What are gender indicators used for?

• To make the invisible visible.

• To see whether there are inequities or inequalities between women and men in the community,
and in what sectors, and whether this has changed over time.

• To compare the inequitable situation with other communities and other regions.

• To see how far the situation is tending to change.

• To measure the impact of policies, programs, or projects that have been implemented with the
aim of checking whether they are contributing to equity.

42
2.1.3. Link between Gender and MDG

Dear learner do you know MDG? List MGD’s that address gender issues?

______________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________

I. Greater education and employment opportunities for women (MDG 3) will help in
alleviating poverty and hunger (MDG 1).

While children who receive more education are likely to earn more, girls typically benefit from
extra education more than boys (Psacharapoulos, 2002) . In many developing countries, this
benefit seems stronger for secondary and tertiary education than primary education. Women will
also receive higher wages from entering the formal sector over the agricultural sector, implying
that the expansion of these opportunities for women will further alleviate poverty (Kingdon and
Soderbom, 2007). Differences in gender equality are also closely related to differences in
childhood nutrition: it is estimated that increasing gender equality in South Asia would reduce
the under 3 underweight rate by 13 percentage points Smith et al (2003).

2. More educated women, as well as those in employment, are more likely to use maternal
health care and antenatal health care services, thus reducing child mortality rates (MDG 4).

It is estimated that under-5 mortality rates could be as much as 15 per 1000 higher on average in
countries that fail to reach their MDG 3 targets (Abu-Ghadia and Klasen, 2004).

3. Progress on maternal health and improving access to family planning (MDG 5) will also
have spillover benefits to the other MDGs, most clearly, through helping to substantially
reduce child mortality rates (MDG 4).

Children whose mothers die in childbirth are much less likely to survive themselves. It is
estimated that that 30 to 58 per cent of neonatal deaths are due to obstetric complications (Lawn
et al., 2005). Likewise ensuring that there is no unmet need for family planning services would
also have a significant impact on child mortality: it is estimated that as many as 9 per cent of
under 5 deaths in the developing world could be averted by increasing inter-birth intervals.
Increasing provision of maternal care services and improving access to family planning are both

43
‘highly cost effective interventions’ using thresholds developed by the World Health
Organisation (WHO) (Singh et al., 2009).

4. Lowering fertility rates would have a range of further development benefits.

Although causality is sometimes contested, studies have suggested that smaller family sizes can
help reduce household poverty (MDG 1) (Eastwood and Lipton, 1999). It can help ensure that
children attendschool rather than looking after younger siblings (MDG 2) (Foster and Roy,
1997). Reducing populationpressure may also promote environmental sustainability (MDG 7)
(IPCC, 2000, Hunter, 2001).

[Link] Socio-political Position of Women Relative to Men

Dear learner how do you see sociopolitical position of women relative to men in your
community?

__________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________

Status of women is their position or rank in relation to others, usually compared with that of
men; measured in terms of educational attainment, employment and remuneration, occupational
type, access to services and benefits, opportunities to participate in decision making and politics.
In general, it indicates the place of women in a society to enjoy certain privileges, rights, duties,
roles, power and authority.

The right to control the number and spacing of their children is not enjoyed by the majority of
Ethiopian women. Ethiopian women’s status is low where they: (a) are generally poorer than
men because they earn less; (b) are less educated; (c) are increasingly becoming heads of
households, with no resources to support their dependents; (d) do not enjoy due acknowledgment
for their labor contribution, particularly in agriculture, and (e) do not have decision making
power. Ethiopia is a patriarchal society that keeps women at a subordinate position, using
religion and culture as an excuse. These excuses have for many years been supported by laws
and legislation that uphold patriarchy and women’s subordination. This has brought about and
44
maintained disparities between men and women, in division of labor, share of benefits, in law
and state, in how households are organized, and how these are interrelated. In most instances,
globally women form half or a little more than half of the population.

The relative status of men and women

On a global level, relative to men, women’s lives are more centered in the home, a fact which is
immediately related to observed gender biases. In less developed nations, this domestic
specialization effectively excludes women and girls from society at large. The exclusion can be
externally-imposed, as in some developing or Arabic countries, or internally by the women’s
own choices. Societal norms and rules may exclude women from particular types of paid
employment or leadership positions. On the other hand men may be excluded from child care
and the home sphere, which is considered the woman’s territory. This traditional division of
labor within the household makes some of the stylized facts that follow understandable.

Son preference

The lesser valuation of females can be observed at birth, manifested in the prevalence of son
preference. It appears strikingly in the statistics of newborns in China, India and South Korea. In
these countries, for every 100 girls born at least 9 are “missing” – never born or somehow
disposed of shortly after birth. Part of this is due to modern technology that allows prenatal sex
determination and consequent abortion of a fetus of the unwanted sex, an option apparently used
with frequency in India and China. In modeling son preference and marriage patterns Edlund
(1999) simply assumes that the parents’ utility from a male child is higher than from a girl child.
Dahl and Moretti (2004) report surprisingly strong evidence for gender bias even in the US
census data, although this bias has decreased over time. They find that couples with girl children
divorce more often than couples with boys. These studies measure son preference by observing
the prevalence of couples having another child based on the sex of the couples’ existing children.
Preference for sons or daughters is measured by looking at the incidence of couples choosing to
have another child when they already have two or three children of one sex: Son preference is
indicated when a couple is more likely to have another child when they already have two or three
daughters instead of the same number of sons. They also find that women who have ultrasound
examinations and discover that they are carrying a girl are 0.37 percentage points less likely to

45
be married at the time of the delivery than are women who learned they are carrying a boy.
Andersson et al. (2004) report gender biases even in Nordic countries, which are considered to
be among the most gender equal in the world. They find the regular son preference in Finland,
while other Nordic countries have reported a daughter preference since mid 1980s. This suggests
that son preference may turn into daughter preference as societal gender systems change.

Education

Over the past four decades there have been large and successful efforts to extend primary
education to all children, including girls. In the developing countries as a whole, the average
school years for girls (boys) has increased from 1.4 (2.6) years in 1960 to 4.3 (5.9) years in 2000
(Barro and Lee, 2001). In the countries that the United Nation Development Program classifies
as having low human development, female literacy rate ranges between 10-85% with a typical
gender gap (the difference between the percentage of literate men and the percentage of literate
women) of around 20.

The higher the national income and development the smaller the gender gap. Between 1970 and
1998, this gap has been reduced by more than five percent, with the greatest reduction occurring
in low-income countries. Universities in all countries excluded women nearly until the turn of
the twentieth century. The first female student was admitted into the University of Helsinki in
1870, after receiving a special exception of gender. A year later the Massachusetts Institute for
Technology admitted its first female student “as an experiment” (source: Univ. of Helsinki and
the MIT web pages). The success of this experiment can be seen in current university enrollment
figures both in Finland, most other EU countries and the United States. Institutions of higher
education in these countries enroll more female than male students (See Eurostat, 2001 and US
Census). However, gender equity in higher education is far less common in developing countries
(Barro and Lee, 2001).

Employment and total work

Women have become an increasing part of the labor force over the past 30 years . According to
the World Bank statistics women’s labor force participation as a ratio of men’s has increased
from about 50 percent to about 80 percent in the high-income countries. In the low-income

46
countries this ratio has also increased, from 60 to 70 percent, while remaining stable at about 60
percent in middle-income countries.

Women’s pay relative to men’s in full time employment is reported in some European
countries. This ratio varies between 70 and 90 percent with a general increase from 1995 to 1997
in all the reported countries (France, Denmark, UK, Finland and Germany). The extreme gender
segregation in the EU labor markets is portrayed in figure 5. Women comprise about 80% of the
total employment in the service sector but less than 20% of the industrial sectors in all of these
countries.

When women do work for pay, they earn about 80% of the pay that men receive when working
full time. These data will be discussed in more detail later. Additionally, women work part time
more frequently than do men, which also show in their earnings. It is difficult to get comparable
data for developing countries, but there is no doubt that women’s earning status relative to men’s
is even lower there.

In terms of total working hours, including both the market and the household work, there is a
widespread belief that women work more than men in the most developed countries. Burda,
Hamermesh and Weil (2007) however show this belief to be untrue. They use detailed time use
data in richer, middle income, Southern European and some African countries respectively. Total
working time of men and women is found to be on average almost identical in the richer
countries. There is large variation across cultures, subgroups, or overtime, but it is not based on
gender. However, women do work more than men in Africa and in the Southern European
countries. Economic development seems to be associated with more equal sharing of working
time, even if the earnings gap has not equalized even in the richer countries.

Decision making power

Dear learner! Is there a significant gap between women and men in decision making power
in our region? List the reasons for such gap in your own words?

______________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________

47
Until relatively recently, women have been afforded less decision making power and fewer legal
rights than men in all social arenas. In developing countries laws of inheritance and ownership
generally disfavor women more than in developed countries, which may be a significant factor
affecting the financial resources women have at their disposal. At the political level women also
have less voice. A hundred years ago, women were without the right to vote anywhere in the
world. In the US, the struggle for women’s suffrage started in the mid 1800’s by Susan B.
Anthony and several other women1 who joined forces with black men – the latter gaining the
right to vote before the white women, who achieved their goal only in 1920. One of the first
countries in the world to introduce universal suffrage was Finland in the 1906 Parliament Act
(Source: [Link]).

In most developed countries women hold 5-15 % of the higher positions. Finland and Sweden
are exceptions, with about third of the ministerial positions held by women. In developing
countries women frequently hold less than five percent of the higher ranking positions in the
society. Most recent data on women’s share in parliaments (lower or single House) reveals a
steady increase in women’s share globally. In the past 10 years, the number of countries in which
women’s share is more than 20 percent has increased from 20to 50 (Source:
[Link]

Another important area of decision making with economic implications concerns a woman’s
control over her own sexuality and the number of children she bears. In developing countries in
particular, customs and norms tend to restrict the choices women are able to make in this respect.
High fertility is associated with less education for women, less frequent labor market
participation outside the home and fewer economic opportunities. In 1980, the total fertility rate
(births per woman) was twice as high globally as in the high-income countries. There has been
considerable convergence in fertility between the rich and the poor over the past 20 years,
however. By 1998 the number of children per woman in low income countries had fallen from
about six to just above four (excluding China and India). Including China and India, which
account for 40% of the world’s population, the average number of children per woman in low-
income countries was three, while the figure for high-income countries was less than two (see
figure 8). Poor and agriculturally-based countries continue to have high birthrates, although rates

48
have fallen there as well. In Uganda, for example, the average woman bears seven children
today, the same as 40 years ago (World Bank, 2004).

Summary

Development is about people working to improve their lives. Development work should
therefore use local notions of gender if it is to be meaningful and fruitful. To understand gender
relations in the home, t is important to go beyond the house as a unit of analysis and break it into
smaller components. The most effective and practical way to incorporate gender analysis into
development is to consult with and listen to women. The link between gender and development
should be critically scrutinized in all intervention projects because development endeavors that
overlook the need and interests of women will not be sustainable.

Status of women is their position or rank in relation to others, usually compared with that of
men; measured in terms of educational attainment, employment and remuneration, occupational
type, access to services and benefits, opportunities to participate in decision making and politics.
In general, it indicates the place of women in a society to enjoy certain privileges, rights, duties,
roles, power and authority. The right to control the number and spacing of their children is not
enjoyed by the majority of Ethiopian women

Checklist

Dear student, below are some of the important points which includes the objectives of this
chapter which you have already gone through. Mark () to say "Yes" or No" in the box below
and evaluate yourself about the topics discussed in the unit. If you tick "No" to most of the
topics, it means that you need to understand more until you achieve the objectives set at the
beginning of the unit. In this case you should go back to the discussion part and read very
carefully until you master all the topics.

Topics of Discussion Yes No

49
  I can clearly explain gender as development issue

 I am able to explain the link between gender&development

 I can clearly explain socio political position of women

 I can explain the concepts and theory of gender & development

Self-Assessment Questions

[Link]/False

1. Development is about people working to improve their lives.

2. The most effective and practical ways to incorporate gender analysis in to development is to
listen but not to consult with women.

3. The right to control the number and spacing of their children is enjoyed by the majority of
Ethiopian women.

4. Socio-political position of women indicates the place of women in a society to enjoy certain
privileges, rights, duties, roles, power and authority

[Link] Answer Questions

Discuss the relative status of men and women globally?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________

50
[Link] Stereotype and Gender Discrimination

3.1. Gender Stereotype

Dear learner can you explain the reflections of gender stereotype?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

Stereotypes: a generalized set of traits and characteristics attributed to a specific ethnic, national,
cultural or racial group which gives rise to false expectations that individual members of the
group will conform to these traits. Stereotypes are representative of a society’s collective
knowledge of customs, myths, ideas, religions, and sciences. It is within this knowledge that an
individual develops a stereotype or a belief about a certain group. Social psychologists feel that
the stereotype is one part of an individual’s social knowledge. As a result of their knowledge, or
lack of knowledge, the stereotype has an effect on their social behavior.

Stereotypic behavior can be linked to the way that the stereotype is learned, transmitted, and
changed and this is part of the socialization process as well. The culture of an individual
influences stereotypes through information that is received from indirect sources, such as
parents, peers, teachers, political and religious leaders, and the mass media

In order to understand stereotyping, an individual must first be made knowledgeable about the
definition of a stereotype. Stereotyping is how we perceive each other, especially individuals
outside our group. What we believe to be “normal” is associated with who we are hanging out
with, which are usually our friends and social networks.

Gender stereotypes are related to cognitive processes because we have different expectations for
female and male behavior and the traditional gender roles help to sustain gender stereotypes,

51
such as that males are supposed to be adventurous, assertive aggressive, independent and task-
oriented, whereas females are seen as more sensitive, gentle, dependent, emotional and people-
oriented.

Here we will deal with the opposite male dominance and feeling superior to women. Of course,
not all men have power and arrogantly dominate women; indeed, many men are dominated by
“the system” and considered disposable. Also, women are given certain advantages and
“protected” in many ways that men do not enjoy. Clearly, each sex has and utilizes power in
certain ways and we are getting more equal, but, clearly, the sexes aren't equal yet. The most
recent suggestion to solve this problem is to completely disassociate gender from all personality
traits. Within the two career families of today, the women-are inferior attitude is muted and
concealed, but the archaic sex role expectations are still subtly there. The old rules still serve to
“put down women and keep them in their place.”

By nature, men and women have some biological differences, but it is life experience that
reinforces or contradicts those differences. The truth lies in differential socialization, which
claims that males and females are taught different appropriate behaviors for their gender.

In general, gender stereotype refers to traditional, and in most cases false representation of a
person based on his/her sex; such stereotypes are often based on socially accepted gender roles
and viewed as normal. A gender stereotype is a “psychological make-up” about male and female.

Stereotype about female include: dependent, needful, passive, matronly nurturing, emotional,
weak, delicate, affectionate, irrational, appreciative etc. Stereotype about male is more or less
opposite to that of females. To this end, it include: independent, aggressive, assertive, strong,
courage, ambitious, enterprising adventurous, daring self confident, self-reliant, rational, and etc.

What roles do you think the different members of the community play in the process of a
child’s becoming a man and playing a male gender role?

______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

[Link] Discrimination

52
Gender discrimination is the systematic, unfavorable treatment of individuals on the basis of
their gender, which denies their rights, opportunities or resources. Across the world, women are
treated unequally and less value is placed on their lives because of their gender. Women’s
differential access to power and control of resources is central to this discrimination in all
institutional spheres, i.e. the household, community, market, and state.

Within the household, women and girls can face discrimination in the sharing out of household
resources including food, sometimes leading to higher malnutrition and mortality indicators for
women. (See Intra-household Resource Distribution). At its most extreme, gender discrimination
can lead to son preference, expressed in sex selective abortion or female feticide. In the labour
market, unequal pay, occupational exclusion or segregation into low skill and low paid work
limit women’s earnings in comparison to those of men of similar education levels. Women’s lack
of representation and voice in decision making bodies in the community and the state perpetuates
discrimination, in terms of access to public services, such as schooling and health care or
discriminatory laws.

The law is assumed to be gender-neutral when in fact it may perpetuate gender discrimination,
being a product of a culture with oppressive gender ideologies. Even where constitutional or
national legal provisions uphold gender equality principles, religious or other customary laws
that privilege men may take precedence in practice. However, the law, when reformed with
women’s input, can be a potent tool for challenging discrimination, if combined with other
strategies, including capacity-building to overcome barriers to claiming rights.

The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) in
1979 brought into international focus the rights of women as human rights, including the right to
be free from discrimination. Women activists regard this convention as a key tool to support their
struggle against discrimination in all spheres, pushing governments towards attaining these
internationally recognized minimum standards.

Activities- 1

Consult your classmates and or colleagues and find out the different types of gender stereotypes
in the community you live.

_____________________________________________________________________________
53
_____________________________________________________________________
[Link] Access and Control over Resources in Ethiopia

Dear learner do you think women and men have equal access and control to resource in
our country?____________________________________________________________

The Ethiopian government has recognized the need for establishing special program and
affirmative action to improve the economic status of women in Ethiopia. Major policy changes
have been made to integrate gender dimension in development intervention affirmative action
has been taken to enhance women's access and control over productive resources such as the
revision of credit rules and the establishment of rural credit systems to reach marginalized
grassroots women. The formulation of gender indicators in development projects and programs
are some of the examples of gender sensitive intervention. On the other hand the
institutionalization of gender in all government development programs eventually allows women
to benefit from development interventions at all levels.

To improve the economic status of women and their access and control over economic resources
grassroots women have received training on income generation skills and have been provided
credit. To establish income generating activities both the government and the private sector have
been able to give special focus to women's economic needs through the revision and adoption of
the existing credit system to enable women to have improved access to credits, hence the
establishment of special fund promotion institute to facilitate the establishment of micro credit
enterprise is a major step towards women's economic empowerment.

Considering women's employment as statistics show many women are employed in the informal
sector and in the non-clerical, non skilled areas. Women Employed in the professional areas are
very few. There is a trend now that women who are qualified and who meet the required criteria
enter into these professions and in the positions that have primarily been held by men. The

54
Second Global Trade faire of women Entrepreneurs will be held in Addis. The Ethiopian Women
Entrepreneurs is playing major role with the African Federation. The Establishment of women
activity centers in five regions with the World Bank IDF grant is believed to facilitate market
outlets for poor women.

Women in Decision Making

Although the number of women in decision making is still low the visibility of women in the
public area has been enhanced by the representation of women in parliament and the
appointment of a number of women to high public places previously dominated by men. These
areas of women representations include women parliamentarians, women ministers, women
bureau heads, women department heads and other such positions. This visibility has contributed
to creating awareness in the population on gender issues and move particularly aspirations to
young girls. These women also play a role in the public arena and become role models to other
women in different sectors. Women in decision making positions in government and legislative
bodies contribute to redefining priorities, placing items on the agenda that reflect and address
gender specific concerns and experiences and provide new perspective on mainstreaming.

Specific Policy Changes and Outcome

Since the beginning of Beijing Conference, the government has formulated a number of policies,
and legislative frame works and gender concerns are integrated in most of the newly formulated
policies and laws.

The national constitution has been developed to protect the fundamental rights of women and
their interest of access and control over resource, about equality among women and men in
marriage. It recognizes the history of inequality and discrimination suffered by women in
Ethiopia. Ethiopian women are entitled to remedial and affirmative measures to enable them to
compete and participate on the basis of equality with men in political, economic and social life.
Women have the right to protection by the state from harmful customs and practices that press
them or cause bodily or mental harm. They have equal right to employment, promotion,

55
affirmative action is undertaken to improve the employment status of women through the
revision of the civil service codes and existing labour laws.

Women's access to and control over productive resources including access to farm land, water
and forest resources, new policies and program have been formulated and adopted with increased
gender consideration and equity. Thus as regard to property and land rights the constitution states
that women shall acquire, administer control, use and transfer of property. With respect to use,
transfer, administration and control of land women have as equal access as men to benefit this.
Employment, promotion and transfer of pension are explicitly put in the constitution.

Access to family planning education information and capacity building activities are provided in
order to prevent harm during pregnancy and child birth and safe guard the mother health.

Concerning maternity leave the constitution also affirms that maternity leave will be provided
with full pay and the duration is determined taking into account the nature of the work, the health
of the mother and the well-being of the child and family.

Impact of Micro Economic Policies

Structural adjustment program and micro economic policies have shown different impact on
women and men. Women's burden in addressing their family needs has increased as a result of
the structural adjustment program. The Ethiopian government has taken special focus and
affirmative action to address women's specific needs in structural adjustment programs. Women
have been fully integrated in this program with the provision of credit and training to establish
alternative employment opportunities for women. The women affairs sector at the prime
minister’s office, and sectional and regional women's affairs department and bureau have been
critically involved in following up the status of displaced women and their integration in to the
major intervention programs.

[Link] the concept of women access to and control over resources?

_________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________

3.3. Gender Division of Labour and Gender Roles in Ethiopia

56
[Link] Division of Labour

The term gender division of labor describes the allocation of tasks to a particular gender. All
society exhibit gender division of labor and it entails different roles and responsibilities in
society to particular genders some tasks are allocated predominantly or explicitly to women,
others to men and some tasks are performed by both sexes.

Both women and men have multiple work roles. These include: production, reproduction,
essential household and community services, and community management and political
activities.

There is gender division of labor in all spheres of wage work, in the market place and in public
institutions. For instance, in most organization males are the managers and administrators while
women are the secretaries, cleaners and waitress. Because of this gender division of labor, which
gives women the lower status in work spheres, women have no or few opportunities of better
payment, promotion and reward

In community tasks like “idir’’ in Ethiopia women are responsible for cooking the food, fetching
water and fuel wood and washing cooking utensils while men participate in the management and
administration tasks, mainly financial management, record keeping and have the bigger share of
entertainment

The Gender division of labor is determined by culture. Due to the subordination of women to
men and the way these relations work remain the domestic sphere.

In third world country, in general and in Ethiopia in particular, women undertake triple role
(productive, reproductive and community) but they do not benefit from their labor as the result of
which they live under twin shadow of poverty and inequality. They depend on traditional and
backward technology in their work environment; their life is shaped by patriarchal nature of the
social system that dictates the male to be head of the family.

History indicates that women were the leading breadwinners in the past. In due course of
time,they were snatched their roles and status and now they are considered as subordinate to
males. The social implication is that women are treated as consumers than producers; moreover
one can say society feels, the proper role of women is to be good mothers and stay at home with

57
her children, This can be the result of patriarchal social system and gender division of labor, as
fathers and mother of gender inequality and proposed two things as imperative steps in
improving women’s life in society. These are either abolition of sexual/gender division of labor
or upgrading of what are called women’s job in the society

[Link] the impact of gender division of labour on women?

__________________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________

3.3.2 Gender Role in Ethiopia

Gender refers to the socially constructed roles and relationships between women and men. These
are learned, change over time, and vary within and between countries and cultures according to
social, religious, historical and economic factors. Gender contrasts with sex, which describes a
set of biological differences between men and women. Gender roles and responsibilities affect
women’s and men’s ability and incentive to participate in development activities, and lead to
different project impacts for men and women.

Roles are expected behavior from an individual, which is assigned to him or her from the society.
Based on this, gender roles are roles played by both men and women which are determined by
the socio-economic and cultural environment or situation but not by biological factors. Starting
from the childhood, both boys and girls are taught about their respective gender roles. For
instance, girls are expected to be feminine whereas on the other hand boys are expected to be
masculine. Boys are expected to be aggressive, courageous, and help their fathers in hunting,
farming, cattle herding etc. In this case they enjoy their rights fully and more family resources
are devoted towards their welfare. Girls are expected to play an important role in supporting their
mothers in household tasks like cleaning, washing, cooking, fetching water, collecting firewood
and going to the market. Because of expectation of feminine personality, girls are taught to be
shy, soft-spoken, submissive, obedient, honest, care-givers etc. For these reasons girls do not
have opportunities to speak about their feeling in the public.

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Gender roles are systematically constructed, maintained, justified and perpetuated in a systematic
process from the household, the church, the workplace, and the media. Gender roles vary widely
from one culture to the other and even within the same culture. To mention an example, in parts
of Africa and Latin America unskilled construction work is regarded as men’s work, where as in
India it is regarded as women’s work. The Same is true in Ethiopia that house constructions are
done by male in the northern part and the same activity is dome by females in pastorals society
(Afar and Borana).

Because of the different gender roles, opportunities and expectations, there is a preference for
one sex over the other. For instance, in south Ethiopia there is a preference for girls over boy
child because of dowry. In Northern Ethiopia male children are preferred because first they are
considered as an important agricultural labor resource and are entitled to inheritance and second
boys are considered an important safeguarded against enemies.

As culture is dynamic and socio-economic conditions change over time so do gender patterns
and gender roles. For example, twenty years ago Borana Women’s were not allowed to go to the
market, and those who did were severely beaten by their husbands, but this has changed, because
of economic problems and women participation in income generation activities, as well as the
impact of feeding and caring for their children.

Women’s work/ role in Ethiopia include the following:

 Productive,
 Reproductive and
 Household and Community Services
 Community Management and Political Activities

Productive Role

Productive activities include all tasks which contribute to the income and economic welfare and
advancement of the household and community. Both women and men perform a range of
productive roles. Women’s productive roles can include cash and subsistence farming (whether
or not they control any income from their labor), fishing, foraging in forests, care of livestock,

59
marketing and transporting, food processing for sale, cottage or home-based industries (micro-
enterprises), and waged/formal sector employment.

These are activities in the areas of agriculture, industry, marketing etc that are related to the
production or creation of goods and services with a market value. Productive roles are roles
played by both sex, but while males involve in formal economic activities women involve in
informal economic activities are less valued and less waged in the society.

In case of Ethiopia almost all women are engaged in some form of productive roles, In rural
areas they engaged in different forms of farming activities, in livestock raising etch in urban
centers, they take wage employment like their fellow men. They predominate in what is known
as the informal sector, doing activities such as petty trade making and selling injera, bread,
arekie, tella and the like.

The view that men are breadwinners while women are homemakers hides women’s involvement
in the above-mentioned productive activities alongside their fellow counterpart men.

Culturally, women’s involvement and contribution in productive sphere is not given due
recognition and considered as invisible labor force. Little importance is attached to the type of
activities women do in agriculture or other spheres, I.e. their work tends to be devalued.
Nevertheless, this attitude has just started to change at least among the educated. One possible
reason for such a change of attitude could be the fact that, in the urban areas, more and more
women are coming to wage employment and few of the, are seen on some managerial positions,
although the huge percent of employed women are in lower jobs like secretary, cleaners, nurses
etc.

This could partly be attributed to the affirmative action’s or measures taken by the society and
other national and international NGOs to increase the status of women.

Reproductive Role

Reproductive activities are those activities carried out to reproduce and care for the household.
Responsibility for contraception and decision making about reproduction may be in the hands of
women or men, depending on the cultural context. Child rearing is generally primarily women’s

60
responsibility, although in most societies men also play some role. Women’s other reproductive
roles include pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding.

Women undertake the biological and social reproduction tasks of bearing and nurturing children
providing initial education and ensuring the well-being of the family and the entire society. The
reproductive activities of women is also known as the domestic roles and include all the burdens
involved in procreation, bearing and rearing children and also in replenishing the labor force,
which means processing and preparing food, cleaning, fetching water from far places, gathering
fuel wood and animal dung caring for sick family members, olds and so on.

Richard Pankhurst in his publication in 1996 said most Ethiopian women’s as in other countries
in former time spent the greater part of their time in domestic pursuits which for many includes
carrying of water and fire wood often from great distance as well as grinding of corn.

When we carefully examine women’s reproductive work we find it hard to identify some of their
activities as only reproductive or productive, Generally, reproductive roles are considered the
responsibility of women and early socialization tells both male and female that they are
responsive for certain activities. The fact that women take care of such activities or roles creates
the necessary condition for men to involve themselves in activities that are self enhancing better
relaxing and materially rewarding.

However some men in rural areas occasionally assist in fetching water and fuel wood and similar
tasks. In urban areas, many men get their children to and from schools and help them with their
studies. Some do shopping and assist in housework, especially if there are no female children or
other women that can take over the responsibility of the wife /mother in the few days following
child birth during her illness and similar situations.

Household and Community Services

Essential household and community services are those which must be carried out daily to meet
the family’s and community’s basic needs, such as fuel and water collection, provision of shelter
and clothing, cleaning, education, health care, care of the elderly and food processing and
preparation. While females carry major responsibility for these services in most societies, men
and boys generally also undertake some of these tasks.

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Community Management and Political Activities

This refers to the management and conservation of resources for collective community
consumption (such as fuel, forests and water), as well as participation in cultural and religious
ceremonies, formal and informal political activities, and involvement in development
organizations, such as non-government organizations or women’s groups. In community affairs,
men in many societies are often more likely to predominate at regional and national political
levels. However, women also have their own formal and informal structures for involvement in
community affairs and decision making at a village or neighborhood level, and increasingly also
at regional and national levels through women’s organizations and networks.

Community roles are assumed to be the extension of women’s reproductive work which is best
described as child bearing, raring and domestic tasks. The best examples for this community role
in Ethiopia are idir, ikub, wanfel, mahber and dabo/jigi, weddings and so on. As everybody
knows women participate in idir and even some of them hold positions of leadership though it is
hold by males most of the time. They also participate in Ekub with males or they can have their
own ikub. The role of women in wanfel, dabo and jigi which are now teamwork in Ethiopia is
unreserved because these activities require food usually in large amount and this is prepared by
women.

[Link] the domestic role of women?

__________________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________

3.4. The Triple Role Framework of Women

[Link]

One of the most popularly used frameworks is that developed by Caroline Moser. It is based on
her concepts of gender roles and gender needs, and policy approaches to gender and
development planning. Moser categorizes the main policy approaches to women and
development as follows:

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Policy approaches to low-income Third World women have shifted over the past decade,
mirroring shifts in macro-economic development policies. Five different policy approaches can
be identified, each categorized in terms of the roles of women on which they focus and the
practical and strategic needs they meet.

• Welfare: Earliest approach, 1950-70. Its purpose is to bring women into development as better
mothers. Women are seen as passive beneficiaries of development. It recognizes the reproductive
role of women and seeks to meet practical gender needs (PGNs) associated with that role through
top-down handouts of food aid and measures against malnutrition and family planning. It is non-
challenging and, therefore, still widely popular.

• Equity: The original WID approach, used in the 1976-85 UN Women’s Decade, its purpose is
to gain equity for women, who are seen as active participants in development. It recognizes
women’s triple role (productive, reproductive and community-based) and seeks to meet strategic
gender needs (SGNs) through direct state intervention giving political and economic autonomy,
and reducing inequality with men. It challenges women’s subordinate position. Criticized as
Western feminism, equity is considered threatening, and is unpopular with governments.

• Anti-poverty: The second WID approach, a toned-down version of equity, adopted from the
1970s onward. Its purpose is to ensure that poor women increase their productivity. Women’s
poverty is seen as a problem of underdevelopment, not of subordination. It recognizes the
productive role of women, and seeks to meet the PGN to earn an income, particularly in small-
scale income-generating projects. It is most popular with NGOs.

• Efficiency: The third, and now predominant, WID approach, adopted particularly since the
1980s debt crisis. Its purpose is to ensure that development is more efficient and effective
through women’s economic contribution, with participation often equated with equity. It seeks to
meet PGNs while relying on all three roles and an elastic concept of women’s time. Women are
seen entirely in terms of their capacity to compensate for declining social services by extending
their working day, a very popular approach.

• Empowerment: The most recent approach, articulated by Third World women. Its purpose is
to empower women through greater self-reliance. Women’s subordination is experienced not
only because of male oppression but also because of colonial and neo-colonial oppression. It

63
recognizes the triple role and seeks to meet SGNs indirectly through bottom-up mobilization of
PGNs. Empowerment is potentially challenging, although its avoidance of Western feminism
makes it unpopular except with Third World women’s NGOs.

Uses of the framework:

• For planning at all levels from policies to projects;

• In conjunction with Harvard framework

Strengths of Moser’s framework:

• Moves beyond technical elements of planning, recognizing its political elements and assuming
conflict of interests in the planning process. Recognizes the transformative potential of gender
planning;

• Conceptualizes planning as aiming to challenge unequal gender relations and support women’s
empowerment;

• Makes all work visible and valuable to planners through the concept of triple roles;

• Distinguishes between types of gender needs: those that relate to women’s daily lives but
maintain existing gender relations (practical gender needs) and those that potentially transform
existing gender subordination (strategic gender needs);

• Categorizes policy approaches.

Potential limitations:

• The idea of gender roles obscures the notion of gender relationships and can give the false
impression of natural order and equality;

• The framework does not mention other forms of inequality, such as class, race or ethnicity;

• The framework is static and does not examine change over time as a variable;

• The policy approaches should not be seen as mutually exclusive; they may often overlap each
other in practice.

64
Moser's categorization is useful, first, in that it makes women's work visible and emphasizes the
diversity of their domestic, commercial and communal responsibilities. The workload of women
is often underestimated due to the tendency of considering only the salaried work to be 'real'
work. Second, the concept of the triple role of women demonstrates the banality of the common
perception 'male breadwinner' and 'female home-maker'. LiseØstergaard (1992: 5) states that it is
a false stereotype to believe that housekeeping and domestic activities are 'natural' extension of
women's biological role as child-bearers. This stereotype is used to legitimize the fact that some
duties are allocated predominantly, when not exclusively, to women, and others to men. This
fact, which is referred to as 'sexual division of labor', is considered to be rigid and
[Link], the division of tasks and duties differs first, from culture to culture, and
second, as a result of socioeconomic changes. As Moser (1993: 28) argues, "there is no reason
why gender should be an organizing principle of the social division of labor, except the physical
process of childbearing."

[Link] limitations do you observed from Moses’ triple role frame work?

__________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________

3.5. Gender Based Violence

Dear learner what types of gender based violence are prevalent in your community?
_________________________________________________________

 What do we mean when we say “gender-based violence”?

3.5.1. Gender-Based Violence (GBV)

Gender-based violence (GBV) is an umbrella terminology for any harm that is perpetrated
against a person’s will and that has a negative impact on the physical or psychological health,
development, and identity of the person. GBV may be physical, sexual, psychological, economic
violence or socio-cultural.

65
3.5.2. Types of Gender-based violence

Dear learner which types/forms of Gender-based violence do exist?How many of them do you
know?

1. Physical violence: physical assault; murder, physical harassment in public; attempted murder;
denied access to medical treatment;, harmful traditional.

2. Sexual violence: Forced marriage; child marriage; forced engagement; forced prostitution;
rape; forced sexual intercourse with husband; incest; sexual assault and Female Genital
Mutilation (FGM).

3. Psychological/emotional violence: denial of food or basic needs; prevention of education,

refusal to communicate; preventing maternal contact with children; using children as threats;
physical threats to other family members; verbal insulting; threats to kill; intimidation;
restrictions on movement outside the home i.e. to visit own family, talk to neighbours, etc;
forced to divorce/ separate; abandoned to own parents.

4. Other types of violence: Other traditional and cultural practices i.e. honour killings;
kidnapping; attempted kidnapping, trafficking

3.5.3. Gender-based violence and the violation of women‘s human rights

Power

 Perpetrators can have “real” or “perceived” power. Some examples of different types of
power and powerful people:

 Social – peer pressure, leaders, teachers, parents, etc.

 Economic – the perpetrator controls money or access to goods/services/money/favours;

sometimes husband or father.

 Political – elected leaders, discriminatory laws.

 Physical – strength, use of weapons, controlling access or security; soldiers, local

commanders, police, robbers, gangs, mafia, etc.

66
  Gender-based (social) – males are usually in a more powerful position than females.

 Age-related – often, in traditional societies status/power is granted with age.

 Power is directly related to choice. The more power one has, there are more choices
available.

 Physical – strength, use of weapons, controlling access or security; soldiers, local

commanders, police, robbers, gangs, mafia, etc.

 Gender-based (social) – males are usually in a more powerful position than females.

 Age-related – often, in traditional societies status/power is granted with age.

 Power is directly related to choice. The more power one has, there are more choices
available.

Which form of power is prevalent in your local community?

3.5.4. Violence - use of force

1. “Force” might be physical, emotional, social or economic in nature. It may also involve
coercion or pressure. Force also includes intimidation, threats, persecution, or other forms of
psychological or social pressure. Target of such violence is compelled to behave as expected or
to do what is being requested, for fear of real and harmful consequences

2. Violence consists of the use of physical force or other means of coercion such as threat,
inducement or promise of a benefit to obtain something from a weaker or more vulnerable
person.

3. Using violence involves forcing someone to do something against her/his will - use of force.

3.5.5. Consent

1. Consent means saying “yes,” agreeing to something. Informed consent means making an
informed choice freely and voluntarily by persons in an equal power relationship.

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2. Acts of gender-based violence occur without informed consent. Even if she says “yes,” this is
not true consent because it was said under pressure - the perpetrator(s) used some kind of force
to get her to say yes.

3. Children (under age 18) in most countries are deemed unable to give informed consent for acts
such as marriage, sexual relations, etc.

3.5.6. What are the differences between root causes and contributing factors of Gender-
based violence?

Root causes and contributing factors of Gender-based violence

 Contributing factors are those that perpetuate GBV/SGBV or increase risk of GBV
(family, community and state violence).

 Contributing factors do not cause GBV although they are associated with some acts of
GBV. Some examples:

 Alcohol/drug abuse is a contributing factor - but not all drunks/drug addicts beat their
wives or rape women.

 War, displacement, and the presence of armed combatants are all contributing factors,
but not all soldiers rape civilian women.

 Poverty is a contributing factor, but not all poor women are victimized by forced
prostitution or sexual exploitation.

 Many contributing factors can be eliminated or significantly reduced through preventive

activities.

Activity.6. Discuss the concept of informal consent?

________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________

3.6. Consequences of Violence

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 Dear learner! Have you ever been observed consequences of gender based violence in your
local community? Please, mention some of them?

______________________________________________________________________________

The consequences of GBV can be scattered into four main aspects:

1. Health

2. Emotional, social and psychological

3. Community and physical safety and security

4. Legal/justice system

[Link]:

Individual consequences to the survivor:

 Depression, leading to chronic physical complaints and illnesses.

 FGM, resulting in shock, infection, excessive bleeding or death, and longer-term affects
such as emotional damage, including anger, fear, self-hate and confusion.

 Loss of desire for sex and painful sexual intercourse.

 Difficult pregnancy and labour, chronic pain and infection, infertility.

 Injury, disability, or death. STIs and HIV/AIDS.

 Injury to the reproductive system including menstrual disorders, infections, miscarriages,

unwanted pregnancies, unsafe abortions.

 Impact on wider society:Strain on medical system.

[Link]/Psychological:

Individual consequences to the survivor:

69
  Emotional damage including anger, fear and self-hate. Shame, insecurity, loss of ability
to function and carry out daily activities.

 Feelings of depression and isolation.

 Problems sleeping and eating.

 Mental illness and thoughts of hopelessness and suicide.

 Judgments made about the survivor.

 Blaming the survivor.

 Treating the survivor as a social outcast

Impact on wider society:

 Expensive, drain on community resources; family, friends, schools, community leaders,

social service agencies, etc.

 Survivor unable to continue as contributing member of society; unable to keep up with

child care, unable to earn an income.

 If perpetrators not arrested, this sends a strong message that the behaviour is somehow
acceptable, leading to further incidents of violence.

[Link], Physical Environment of the Community

 Survivor feels insecure, threatened, afraid, Climate of fear and insecurity impacting
women’s freedom and perception of personal safety.

 Lack of female participation in the community life. Fear of going to school and work.

The Impact of GBV on children in the family

It is important to understand the impact on children who witness violence against their mothers
and women in their extended family, and interventions need to be in place to stop the cycle of
violence from becoming an inter-generational problem. Children, who repeatedly witness

70
violence directed towards their mothers and other female members, learn and internalize
perceptions such as:

 Mothers/girl child are not deserving of respect.

 Those who love you also hit and abuse you.

 It is socially, culturally, traditionally and morally acceptable to use violence against

female members of the family for control and compliance purposes.

 Violence is an acceptable conflict resolution [Link] is important to recognize that

there are gender differences in the way children internalise the violence they witness.

 Boys will learn behaviour in adult relationships that the use of violence is acceptable.

 Girls as adults will tolerate the abuse because her mother and other female members did.

 Children respond in different ways to the violence experienced in their family

environment.

 Possible emotional and behaviour effects could be:

 Loss of self esteem and self confidence.

 Insecurity, fear and vulnerability

 Being unable to openly discuss frustrations and problems.

 Poor anger management skills.

 Difficulty in trusting people.

 They may use violence to cope with their own stresses.

 They may suffer from depression.

 They may have school and other social difficulties i.e. poor concretion, unable to learn.

 They may suffer from guilt, believing that they are the cause of the violence.

71
 Physical symptoms – bed wetting, acting out, eating disorders, self harm/mutilation.

 Children who have lived in abusive family environments are often poor achievers in
school and have related learning difficulties.

Do you see similarities in the way how women and children react or respond to violence?

How can/would you support children in such situations?

Discussion Point

 Although violence takes many different forms, gender- inequality is the root cause.

 Although culture is often used to justify the use of violence towards women, the right to
be free from abuse is a fundamental and universal.

 Violence/assault need not always to be present. Threats and coercion are also forms of
violence.

3.6.4. Legal/Justice System

 Lack of access to legal system.

 Lack of knowledge of existing laws.

 Confusion regarding the most appropriate channels i.e. criminal, traditional etc.

 Survivors reluctant to report due to heavy stigma attached to sexual abuse.

 Strain on police/court resources already challenged and overburdened.

 Lack of sensitivity to the issues expressed by judges and polices forces.

 Costs incurred by the survivor.

Summary

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The Ethiopian government has recognized the need for establishing special program and
affirmative action to improve the economic status of women in Ethiopia. Major policy changes
have been made to integrate gender dimension in development intervention affirmative action
has been taken to enhance women's access and control over productive resources such as the
revision of credit rules and the establishment of rural credit systems to reach marginalized
grassroots women.

In third world country, in general and in Ethiopia in particular, women undertake triple role
(productive, reproductive and community) but they do not benefit from their labor as the result of
which they live under twin shadow of poverty and inequality. They depend on traditional and
backward technology in their work environment; their life is shaped by patriarchal nature of the
social system that dictates the male to be head of the family.

Gender-based violence (GBV) is an umbrella terminology for any harm that is perpetrated
against a person’s will and that has a negative impact on the physical or psychological health,
development, and identity of the person. GBV may be physical, sexual, psychological, economic
violence or socio-cultural.

Checklist

Mark () to say "Yes" or No" in the box below and evaluate yourself about the topics discussed
in the unit

Topics of Discussion Yes No

 I can clearly explain gender stereotype

 I can describe concept of gender discrimination

 I can clearly explain gender division of labour and gender role

 I can elaborate women access and control over resource

 I can explain issues of gender division of labour and roles

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  I can explain gender based violence and its consequences

Self-Assessment Questions

[Link]/False

[Link] are representatives of society’s collective knowledge of customs, myths, ideas,

religious and science.
[Link] government has made major policy changes to integrate gender dimensions in
development interventions.
[Link] national constitution of Ethiopia has overlooked about women access to and control over
resource.
[Link] Ethiopian government has taken special focus and affirmative action to address women’s
specific need in structural adjustment program.
[Link] societies ,except Ethiopians, exhibit gender division of labour.

[Link] Answer Questions

[Link] the productive, reproductive and community service roles of women in context of your

own community?

[Link] and Social Participation of Women

4.1. Economic Participation of the Women in Developing Countries

In the last two decades, there has been much progress in gender equality. In most developing
countries MDGs show narrowing gaps, with rapid increases in girls’ primary school enrollment,
and significant increases in female life expectancy. Significant gains have also been made
globally with respect to women’s economic participation, although there are variations in nature
and degree.

Despite the progress, gender gaps remain. Women continue to be disadvantaged in terms of
labour market outcomes and sustainable livelihood options. World Economic Forum data

74
indicates that while health and education gaps are closing, only 59 per cent of the economic
outcomes gap has closed. Women are disproportionally engaged in vulnerable forms of informal
employment, earn substantially less, and their economic contribution has largely remained
under-valued. This section discusses various elements of women’s participation, illustrating that
gender continues to remain a form of ‘durable inequality’, cutting across other dimensions of
socio-economic stratification, but also evolving over time.

First, globally, female labour force participation rates have increased, from 50 per cent in
1980 to 52 per cent in 2008, while rates for men continue to be higher but declined from 82 to 78
per cent. Regional and cross-country differences in female labour force participation rates
continue to be very large: there are just 35 to 42 women per 100 men in the labour force in South
Asia and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, compared to 70-79 in East Asia,
Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa.

Second, more women than men are unemployed: their unemployment rates were higher than
those of men in 113 out of 152 countries for which data is available. Women are far more likely
than men to be in vulnerable employment worldwide: in North Africa 55 per cent versus 32 per
cent, the Middle East 42 per cent versus 27 per cent and sub-Saharan Africa nearly 85 per cent
versus 70 per cent.

Third, women have been moving out of agriculture and into services and manufacturing,
although at a different pace in different regions. Agriculture continues to account for 70 per cent
of women’s employment in South Asia compared to 40 per cent of men’s; in sub-Saharan Africa
agriculture forms 60 per cent of both male and female employment. Much of the global rise in
female employment has been in the service sector, accounting for 47 per cent of female and 40
per cent of male employment in 2008. Manufacturing accounted for just 16 per cent of female
employment globally in 2008 compared to 26 per cent of men’s.

Fourth, migration can have varied impact on women. For example, differences in female labour
force participation among migrants can continue to reflect the differences in the country of
origin. But migration can also be a positive force for gender equality. For example, in
Mozambique, women left behind as a result of male migration to South African mines in the

75
south of the country acquired increasing responsibilities and workloads in agriculture. Many
migrated to local urban centers to take up new opportunities in the cashew industry.

Fifth, the movement out of agriculture has not necessarily signified a movement into the
kind of ‘decent work and productive employment’ highlighted within MDG1. A large
proportion of working women are working as unpaid labour in family enterprises with no access
to an income of their own. Women continue to be concentrated in occupations with lower pay,
worse prospects for advancement, and poorer working conditions. Evidence from a wide range
of developing countries shows widespread entry by women into work on a temporary, casual,
seasonal or part-time basis, often in home-based activities or subcontracted by intermediaries as
part of global value chains. Working women are disproportionally engaged in the informal
economy. The informal economy is heterogeneous and stratified, and there is a close association
between the quality of jobs and gender – with men dominating the upper echelons of the
hierarchy and women over-represented in the lower echelons – along with other markers of
social inequality, like caste, ethnicity, race, and legal status.

Sixth, gender disparities in earnings are common and persistent. According to ILO’s global
estimates, women’s earnings fell short of men’s by 23 per cent in 2008-09. This was an
improvement from the shortfall of 26 per cent in 1995, but at this rate it would take 75 years to
achieve the principle of equal pay for work of equal value. In Latin America, women’s earnings
in the informal economy were about 53 per cent of men’s in 1998. Case studies show gender
gaps in earnings in, for example, North East rural Ghana, rural Benin, Costa Rica, and Egypt.

Seventh, there is growing evidence on gender differences in entrepreneurship, measured in

standard economic variables, as well as subjective variables, including motivation to start an
enterprise, and ‘entrepreneurial personality’ (attitudes to risk, trust, locus of control), which are
predictors of the likelihood of success.

Eighth, various forms of technology have contributed to improving women’s links to

markets and services. There is an emerging literature on the impact of mobile phones on
poverty and livelihoods. In rural labour markets in South Africa, characterized by low wages and
high rates of under- and unemployment and high job search costs, expansion of mobile phone

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coverage was associated with a 15 per cent increase in employment and diversification out of
agriculture, mostly for women.

Finally, women’s increasing entry into paid work has not been accompanied by a
commensurate change in the gender division of unpaid labour in the care economy. By and
large, women remain responsible for a great deal of the unpaid work that ensures the survival
and care of their families over time.26 Such unpaid work encompasses the care of children, the
elderly, and the sick; domestic activities such as preparation of food and collection of fuel and
water along with expenditure saving activities such as food production, livestock care,
homestead farming and so on. As women tend to retain responsibility for these activities even if
they take up paid employment, they tend to work longer hours each day than working men,
giving rise to the phenomenon of ‘time poverty’, which is likely to have an impact on the type of
market activity women tend to or can gravitate towards.

The resilience of the gender division of unpaid domestic labour introduces considerable
variations in women’s labour force participation over their life course, with much lower rates of
participation in their reproductive years. This introduces life course variations in the kinds of
work women do. Review of the empirical literature from a variety of different contexts indicates
that women with young children are more likely to be self-employed, often in household-based
activities, than single women or women without children. This pattern is likely to depend on
income status. Research shows that better-off women in salaried forms of work that provide
maternity leave and child care support can also afford to pay for help with child care and
domestic chores and are more likely to have access to time-saving infrastructure (electricity,
running water, sanitation). Very poor women with children, particularly those who are household
heads and primary earners, take up waged work (either because it offers higher returns than the
forms of self-employment available to them or because they lack start-up capital, skills and
networks to run their own enterprise) and have to manage child care responsibilities in ways that
can have adverse consequences for themselves and their children.

[Link] the impact of migration on women’s economic participation?

_____________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
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Constraints to Economic Participation of Women

To understand women’s economic empowerment, and interventions to reduce gender-based

constraints and enhance more equal participation, it is critical to analyze the multi-
dimensionality of these constraints. These can exist in three spheres

First, women’s position in the household is impacted by a myriad of factors. These may include,
varying in different contexts, and often over-lapping: rights to property; inheritance and divorce;
access to family planning and child care; social and cultural norms related to childcare and paid
and unpaid care work; social and cultural norms related to work; value placed on girls’
education; intra-household dynamics and bargaining power; and burdens of unpaid productive or
care work.

Second, in the wider society and economy, women’s work may be constrained by discriminatory
legal and regulatory barriers, limited access to financial and physical assets and market
information, fewer social networks and business connections, limited access to education and
skills development, and weaker bargaining power in labour markets. Along with formalized
gender discrimination, attitudes and behavior on the part of actors in the public arena can further
curtail women’s capacity to take advantage of economic opportunities. Research shows, for
example, that employers can express preferences for male workers on the grounds that women
were seen to have a weaker attachment to the labour market, with higher rates of absenteeism
and turnover, or preferences for women (particularly in highly competitive, labour-intensive
export sectors) because they made less trouble, or because they could be paid less on the grounds
that they were secondary earners or merely ‘working for lipstick’.

Third, preferences and individual choice can be influenced by psychological attributes, such as
altruism, reciprocity and flexibility. Attitudes to competition, risk taking and aversion,
motivation, etc., may vary between men and women (as well as across groups of women),
though the literature provides different views on whether these differences are caused by choice
or by gender-related norms and constraints, and whether it is possible to disentangle the two.

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There is limited knowledge about which interventions work best to remove the barriers, in what
contexts they work best, and for whom. What works in one setting, does not necessarily work
elsewhere or with a different group of women and girls, interventions need to be tested out in
several contexts to inform investments elsewhere, and new interventions need piloting with
robust evaluations. Available evidence provides some pointers, but the picture is far from being
clear:

There is some evidence on the effectiveness of jobs and skills training for women from Latin
America, particularly when paired with childcare provision and transport. Evidence is mixed on
the impact of business training for female owned/managed businesses. Some studies indicate an
overall positive impact only when business training is accompanied by other initiatives such as
access to credit. Other studies find that such interventions may be more effective for new owners
than for existing businesses.

Evidence is mixed on how to assist women's transitions to wage employment. There is a small
but growing literature on the gender gap in access to financial services. Little is known about
how to remove credit constraints for women entrepreneurs, or how to address multiple
constraints such as women’s bargaining power in the home, alongside lifting credit constraints,
to increase profits.

Research in Ethiopia showed that reforms of family law (eg. giving women authority to work
outside the home without permission from their spouses) was associated with an increase in
women’s share in paid work in Ethiopia.

Interventions that help reduce women's time in home production can have a positive impact. For
example, an electrification program in South Africa led to a 9.5% increase in female
employment, but had no change in male employment.40

Evidence on why female labour force participation tends to be lower than men’s, and why
women are over-represented in some sectors or in self-employment, remains limited. While
studies suggest that women opt for informal work because it accommodated their household
chores, more information is required to understand the determinants of the local structure of
opportunities, the relative returns to wage and self-employment, and specific attributes and

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preferences of women and their households, and how these factors vary across countries and
regions.

Wage labour opportunities vary from ‘bad’ jobs (poorly paid, highly exploitative, and
demeaning) to ‘good jobs’, characterized by formality of contract, decent working conditions,
regularity of pay, social and legal protection. The empowerment potential of wage labour is
likely to be closely associated with these characteristics, but there is little evidence on the
barriers and options for women to access better opportunities. Restrictions on women’s mobility
in the public domain severely limit functioning of labour markets. Gender-related constraints on
women’s ability to take up waged labour, and greater costs of job search, may increase
transaction costs of their wage labour to such an extent that the market for female labour
becomes irrelevant to certain households.

Research on gender differences in agricultural productivity indicates how inequities in access to

agricultural inputs and technology negatively impact on women's productivity. But much less is
known about productivity differences in the non-agricultural sector. The limited evidence that we
have suggests that constraints women face in developing business are complex and often not
easily recorded. Similarly, while it is known that women’s enterprises are predominantly located
at the survival-oriented informal end of the enterprise spectrum, there is very little evidence of
active choice, and what could be done to promote their transition to the growth-oriented and
more formal end. This is not only a question about what differentiates male and female
entrepreneurs, but also about the heterogeneity amongst female entrepreneurs. Where women’s
entrepreneurial activities are dictated by considerations other than profitability, chances of
accumulation are likely to be limited, and better understanding of the entrepreneurial skills, the
requisite social connections, and legal and familial barriers, are all needed.

To addressing the above critical knowledge gaps in different low-income contexts:

 the forms of employment and entrepreneurship that are empowering for women, increase
their productivity, and close earnings gaps;
 the constraints and choices that position women on a continuum of self-employment,
wage employment and entrepreneurship;

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  the near-universal gendered silo of paid and unpaid care work, where innovation
regarding care, including childcare, has been very limited;
 constraints that relate to women’s position in the household, wider society and economy,
which influence individual choices;
 under-researched Interventions for women’s economic empowerment, including to: free
up women’s time by reducing women’s burden of childcare and other unpaid work (e.g.
work-place childcare; time-saving technology; IT), increase the quality and fairness of
women’s work in the informal economy. increase women’s access to finance (e.g. credit
information), close gender gaps in access to assets and inputs (e.g., land and ownership
rights), increase women’s productivity in the non-agricultural sector, help small women-
run businesses increase their profits, and discrimination in labour markets (e.g. labour
laws and regulations; affirmative action for training placements; female networks).

4.2. Gender Equality and Development

Various researches finds critical evidence linking improving gender equality to many key
factors for economic growth, drawn from a huge literature on the links between gender and
development objectives. Gender equality can contribute significantly to economic growth
through increasing the stock of human capital, physical capital, market competitiveness and
agricultural productivity.

1. Gender equality will enhance human capital

More educated women can undertake and encourage higher value economic activity. Countries
are rarely wealthy if they have poor gender equality in education. With the exceptions of
resource-rich Oman, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, no country has achieved both GDP per capita of
over $10,000 and a ratio of girls to boys in primary education of less than 90 per cent. Economic
growth since 1960 would probably have been appreciably higher in Sub-Saharan Africa, Middle
East and North Africa and Latin America had those regions matched levels of gender equality in
education in East Asia and the Pacific. Estimates of the loss of growth due to gender inequality
in education range from 0.38 per cent per annum in Sub-Saharan Africa to 0.81 per cent per
annum in South Asia. This accounts for between 11 and 41 per cent of the growth difference
between these regions and East Asia and the Pacific (Klasen and Lamanna, 2008).
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Economic growth, with increasing demand for skilled labour, can also have a positive effect on
gender equality, including educational opportunities. In the right circumstances, virtuous circles
can be created i.e. less gender inequality in education can lead to economic growth than can lead
to less gender inequality. But improving gender equality in education will only be effective in
promoting growth in countries with social and cultural institutions allow women to take
advantage of being more educated.

More educated girls and women are likely to have fewer children. The fertility decline associated
with greater gender equality can have profound economic impacts. A fall in fertility leads to a
lower dependency ratio and tends to increase per capita output, providing a ‘demographic
dividend’. This may have accounted for as much as one third of the strong economic growth rate
in East Asia since the late 1970s. However, a decline in fertility will typically only materialize
where lower fertility is desired and where cultural and informational barriers to family planning
are navigable. Further a ‘demographic dividend’ will only follow a fertility decline if other
conditions for growth are in place. Declines in fertility in Latin America failed to lead to a
‘demographic dividend’, due to growth being hindered by macroeconomic and political
instability and by lack of follow-up in raising educational standards.

2. Gender equality fosters higher labour productivity

Improving gender equality can make labour markets more competitive. Gender inequality in
education has fallen in most developing regions. Yet, as gaps in inequality in education have
narrowed, the importance of gender inequality in employment has increased. Narrowing the
education gap further will not bring benefits if the additional educated women are not able to
access productive employment. The loss of economic growth in Middle East and North Africa
(MENA) in the 1990s from gender inequality in employment was around four times as large as
that from inequality in education.

Product markets are more competitive if all would-be entrepreneurs can use their talents.
Discriminatory laws and social norms are a barrier to female entrepreneurship in some
developing countries. Where women are treated differently to men with respect to access to
institutions, property rights, taxation, and access to credit, their ability to start a business is
inhibited. While these barriers to female entrepreneurship and self-employment undoubtedly

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exist, the understanding of how they impede economic development, and how they can be best
removed, could be very much improved.

3. Enhanced gender equality attracts investment in physical capital

The incentive to undertake any investment is determined by the expected rate of return on the
investment. A more productive workforce, through greater equality in employment and
education, increases expected rates of return, which in turn attracts investment and promotes
growth. New investment not only increases growth directly, it is also necessary for economies to
adopt higher-productivity technologies such as those used by manufacturers in East Asia.

In addition, a more equal distribution of income – through improving women’s wage rates – can
lead to higher formal savings, which can be channeled through the financial sector to make
financial capital available for companies to make new investments. In many developing
countries access to international capital markets will be limited making the domestic pool of
savings the most important source of funds for new capital investments. Studies of the ratio of
female to male earnings and the female share of manufacturing employment have identified a
significant positive effect on household savings rates from female income. There is also some
evidence that women make more productive investments than their male counterparts, although
this remains contested.

4. Gender discrimination is inefficient and lowers agricultural productivity

Gender discrimination can act as a barrier to improving agricultural productivity. Unequal

distributions of resources, including credit extension, labour and fertilizer, create inefficiencies
such as significantly lower yields and subsequently lower profits which, evidence suggests,
significantly reduce incomes in some countries. This is especially true for those countries such as
in sub-Saharan Africa where agriculture represents a large proportion of the total economy and
where a high number of women participate in the sector.

Social institutions which prioritize the head of the household mean that plots owned by the
household head are farmed more intensively than similar plots owned by other household
members of both genders. The implication of this is that status within the household rather than
gender specifically is another important factor in the allocation of agricultural resources.

83
5. There are possible linkages between gender and the other key factors for growth, but the
evidence is inconclusive.

Rule of law. Improving gender equality appears to lower the level of corruption. In particular, a
higher share of women in the labour force and as members of parliament may lead to less
corruption. Estimates suggest that an increase of 25 percentage points in the proportion of female
parliamentarians is associated with a one point improvement in an index of corruption (with that
index ranging from 0 to 6); and, an increase of about 13 percentage points in women’s share of
the labour force is associated with a one point improvement in the International Country Risk
Guide (ICRG) corruption rating.

Macroeconomic stability. There is evidence that enhanced female political participation can lead
to a different role for government, with most studies suggesting that extension of female suffrage
leads to the adoption of more redistributive policies and policies with a greater social insurance
element. The links between government adoption of such policies and economic growth remains
contested.

Provision of infrastructure More political representation for women is associated with provision
of a different mix of public goods. Studies undertaken in India have found that female village
council heads invest more in infrastructure that is directly relevant to the needs of their own
gender than their male counterparts. It has yet to be established whether this infrastructure is
typically more or less conducive to promoting economic growth; it is likely to be context
specific.

Openness to trade and investment Trading opportunities will be enhanced by greater human and
physical capital, thus improvements in these characteristics through gender equality will boost
the potential for trade and economic growth. For example, enhancing the productivity of women
through tertiary and secondary schooling will increase business opportunities and this may
encourage foreign direct investment in export oriented sectors. There is also substantial localised
evidence that women face barriers in small scale border trade, but no estimates of the impact of
this on economic growth. These barriers are similar to those vis-a-vis women’s entry into
entrepreneurship: a lack of access to resources such as land or collateral for loans can prevent
women from harnessing profitable trading opportunities.

84
It should be noted that wage inequality may increase competitiveness in labour-intensive export
industries in the short term. In the garment sectors of Cambodia and Bangladesh, for instance,
women are favoured for low-skilled jobs because they will often accept lower wages, are
assumed to have natural predispositions to garment work and tend to be less likely to strike.
However, it is important to bear in mind the wider economic benefits of wage equality, as
outlined above, for instance, through potentially higher savings rates. Greater wage equality can
also have positive impacts on the MDGs given that women are more likely to spend money on
health and education.

4.3. Ethiopian Legislation for Women Right

4.3.1. Legislation
[Link]. The Federal and Regional Constitutions
The Federal Constitution of 1995 has unshaved the age old discriminatory laws and practices.
The constitution in its Article 35 (3) took a historic measure on gender equality in a country
where history vexed with traditions and religious matters made women to suffer due to their sex.
Further this provision has recognized women’s right to affirmative action and provides special
attention to enable competition and participation in all spheres of life as well as exercise their
democratic and human rights on equal grounds with men.
Regional constitutions which by and large resemble and operate within the general framework of
the Federal constitution have also addressed the question of gender equality meticulously.

[Link]. Codes and subsidiary Laws

[Link].1 Family Laws
The revised Federal Family Code enacted on 4 July 2000 (Proc. 213/2000) is a significant legal
document. The Revised Family Code deals with equality between sexes in their interaction
concerning marriage related issues. As provided by the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
(FDRE) constitution, Regional States have their family laws. Thus far, Tigray, Amhara,
Oromiya, and Southern Nations, Nationalities, People (SNNP) regions have issued their own
Family Laws; most of these laws are similar with the federal family code. Both the federal and
regional family codes have made marriage 18 years for both sexes.
The major government policies on gender are constituted in the following:

85
• The 1995 FDRE Constitution,
• The revised Federal Family Code enacted on 4 July 2000 (Proc.213/2000),
• Labor and Public Service proclamations (Labor Law: Proclamation]377/2003: Art. 87);
• Land Use Administration Laws (Art. 5 and 10 of Proc. 89/97) ;
• Laws on Violence against Women enforced since July 2004.

[Link] Labour and Employment Laws

In accordance to Labor and Public Service proclamations, women are not to be discriminated
against as regards employment and payment on the grounds of sex; special protection is accorded
to pregnant women (Labor Law: Proclamation 377/2003: Art. 87); No sex-based discrimination
and female candidates are given preferential treatment to fill vacancies (Public Servants
Proclamation 262/2002: Art. 13); Widow’s and widowers have been given equal status in
pensions (Proc. 190/99) by amending Article 4 of the Public servant law of the 1962 that
discriminated women concerning pension.

[Link] Federal Land Use Administration Laws

Land Use Administration Laws are all enacted in conformity to the constitutional laws (Art. 5
and 10 of Proc. 89/97 of the Federal Land Administration Law) ensured equal rights of women
in respect to the use, administration and control of land with respect to transferring and
bequeathing holding rights.
In accordance to Proclamation of Rural Land No.42/75 which is still enforceable, land is the
property of the People of Ethiopia, where the government representing the people is assuming
ownership of land, and entitled an individual farmer a usufruct right only. Nonetheless, the
incumbent government has promulgated a Federal Rural Land Administration Proclamation No.
89/97, has entitled farmers to use and transfer rural land but not sale it.
Further, to the 1995 Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia Constitution under Article 35 that
has entitled women to have the right to acquire, administer, control, use and transfer of property,
this proclamation has explicitly stated that, women have equal rights with men with respect to
use, transfer, administer and control of land as well as men farmers
The Federal Rural Land Administration Proclamation No.89/97 has provisions for gender
sensitive regarding women’s equal access to land. It states that the land administration law of a

86
Region shall confirm the equal rights of women regarding the use, administration and control of
land as well as in respect of transferring and bequeathing holding rights [(Art. 6(10)]. It also
provides for women’s participation in decisions on land allocations. There are new regional
initiatives that address some of the problems of rural women in terms of access to land. Land
administration laws have been promulgated in Amhara, Oromia, SNNPR, and Tigray paying
attention to women’s equal rights to land (MehariRedae,2003).

In Tigray, the proclamation states that a male with the age of twenty-two and a female with the
age of sixteen are entitled to get rural land at least for purposes of residence (Art.17). In Amhara,
entitlement to land applies to both sexes with the age of 18 years (Art.5). In Oromia, an
inhabitant of the Oromia region of both sex whose age is 18 or above, and whose livelihood
depends on agriculture is entitled to rural land [(Art. 5(1)]. By so doing the legislations have
given women equal rights with men with respect to use, administration and control of land.
Two of the regional states (Amhara and Tigray), have further issued Implementing Regulation
and Directives and have already undertaken land redistribution and re-allocation activities
accordingly (MehariRedae, 2003), while the rest two (SNNPR and Oromia) have not yet issued
implementing regulations and directives. (WAO/PMO, 2005)

[Link]. Laws on Violence against Women

The 1957 Penal Code has been revised to incorporate provisions for violence against women and
improve the existing ones, and is enforced since July [Link] like female genital mutilation is
penalized. Other Harmful Traditional Practices (HTP) are penalized; Domestic Violence is
introduced in the HTP (has attracted attention); Abortion is still illegal but the grounds for a
legally sanctioned abortion is outlined; Rape, sexual abuses, abduction have merited tougher and
graver penalties. Trafficking for prostitution purposes and forced labor is punishable.

4.3.3 Policies and Programs on Women/ Gender

(i) FDRE Constitution
The Constitution stresses on the importance of gender inequality as a basic requirement for the
full realization of all other rights and human freedoms. It has also devoted a separate provision

87
dealing with the rights of women and aiming at addressing the widely prevalent gender biased
attitudes and practices. Related sub-articles of Article 35 with the issue under discussion are;
􀂃 35/1 – equal enjoyment of all constitutional rights and protections
􀂃 35/2 – equal rights in marriage
􀂃 35/3 – entitlement to affirmative action/measures
􀂃 35/4 – protection from harmful traditional practices
􀂃 35/5 – right to maternity leave with full pay
􀂃 35/6 – right to consultation in projects affecting their lives
􀂃 35/7 – property rights (to acquire, administer, control, use and transfer)
􀂃 35/8--right to equality in employment (promotion, pay, pension entitlements)
􀂃 35/9 –right of access to family planning education, information and capacity.
(ii) National Women’s Policy
The National Ethiopian Women’s Policy that was enacted in 1993 has mapped out the problems
of Ethiopian women in all field of development and identified the patriarchal system as the root
cause that exposed women to political, economic and social discrimination which is reinforced
by traditional practices that give credence to cultural/religious norms and values over women’s
human rights.
The policy has indicated the status of women in relation to their roles of sustaining the household
that consequently hampers their access to social services, public affairs, access to and control
over property; the plight of women accrued to harmful traditional practices has been identified as
an area that needs a concerted effort by all stakeholders.
To fight back all discrimination against women and ascertain equality of men and women the
policy has established institutional machineries in all government structures up to the grass root
level.

Summary

Women continue to be disadvantaged in terms of labour market outcomes and sustainable

livelihood options. World Economic Forum data indicates that while health and education gaps
are closing, only 59 per cent of the economic outcomes gap has [Link] understand women’s

88
economic empowerment, and interventions to reduce gender-based constraints and enhance more
equal participation, it is critical to analyze the multi-dimensionality of these constraints. Gender
and development is important because it focuses on connections between gender and
development initiatives and feminists’ perspectives, and deals with issues such as health and
education, decision making and leadership, peace building, violence against women and
economic empowerment. Development cannot be realized without the very significant
component of gender. Countries the world over have proved that exclusion of women in
development has rendered their development efforts futile. Due to this realization, gender parity
has become central to the development process everywhere, in international forums especially.
As the world is focusing on development as a means of alleviating world poverty, removing
particularly gender inequalities will give the world a better chance to develop

Checklist

Dear student, below are some of the important points which includes the objectives of this
chapter which you have already gone through. Mark () to say "Yes" or No" in the box below
and evaluate yourself about the topics discussed in the unit. If you tick "No" to most of the
topics, it means that you need to understand more until you achieve the objectives set at the
beginning of the unit. In this case you should go back to the discussion part and read very
carefully until you master all the topics.

Topics of Discussion Yes No

 I can clearly explain economic participation of women

 I can describe gender equality and development

 I can clearly explain Ethiopian legislation for women rights

Self-Assessment Questions

1. Discuss how gender equality will enhance human capital?

89
2. Discuss provision of federal rural land administration on issues of gender?

3. Describe the relationship between gender equality and development?

Chapter.5. Policy Approach to Women in Development

[Link] World Policy Approach to Women Development

3.1. The Women in Development (WID) Approaches

The term “women in development” was coined in the early 1970s by the Women’s Committee of
the Washington, DC, Chapter of the Society for International Development, a network of female
development professionals. The term was very rapidly adopted by the United States Agency for
International Development (USAID) in their so-called Women in Development (WID) approach,
the underlying rationale of which was that women are an untapped resource who can provide an
economic contribution to development.

The origin of the Women in Development Movement is traced to the milieu of the second wave
of feminism to hit the West; and thus needs to be seen in the context of the vigorous activities of
the women’s movements in the U.S. and in Europe during the 1960s/70s.

Ester Boserup’s influential work “Women’s Role in Economic Development” exposed the
seriously flawed assumptions relating to the work performed by women in the developing
countries. The first sizable drawback recognized by Esther Boserup in 1970, is the fact that
women’s work and their contribution to productivity and the labour force are ‘not seen’ because

90
of the gender blind assumptions of development theorists. Nor are women’s roles and work
consciously ‘looked for’ or ‘looked at’ in development research. Therefore, women’s work in
production was not acknowledged until the entry of the Women in Development school theorists.

Subsequent to Boserup, there was a string of Women in Development theorists including

Boserup herself, whose work centered on analyzing the position of women visa-vis their labour,
and the possibilities of integrating women into the development processes of developing
countries (Moser: 1993:3).

The crucial impetus to the Women in Development movement was provided by the adoption of
WID concepts and methodologies by the United Nations Organizations and other international
development institutions and funding agencies. In particular, the UN dedication of 1975 as the
Year of Women, and the Women’s Decade from 1975 to 1985, propelled women into the
forefront of the development debate. As a result, women were ‘officially recognized’ by the
highest of political and administrative decision-making levels in several countries such as the
United States, Italy, Norway, Denmark, and the Netherlands who brought in legislation to focus
particularly on women and development issues (Anderson: 1992:168).

The idea of women as a potential resource that could be tapped to contribute towards economic
development made rapid headway in the United States, resulting in the 1973 Percy Amendment.
This was instrumental in ensuring that women were specifically included in all bilateral
assistance programs of the United States (cited in USAID: 1982:2). It was stated in the Percy
Amendment and subsequently, in the United States Agency for International Development
(USAID) policy paper on Women in Development that all U.S. bilateral assistance to projects
and programs be administered so as to give particular attention to those programs, projects and
activities which tend to integrate women into national economies of foreign countries, thus
improving their status and assisting the total development effort (ibid.). In a related development,
the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) along with the Harvard
Institute of International Development produced a case study based methodology to identify the
means through which women are left out of development (Moser: 1989:2). In 1980, the British

91
Commonwealth established a ‘Women in Development’ program supported by all member
countries (ibid.).

With the support of global aid and development agencies such as the United Nations and the
World Bank, WID was soon espoused by development organizations within national domains by
local governments. Similarly, with the entry of the non-governmental sectors into development
processes during the 1970s, and the resultant extensive input into regional small and medium-
scale projects and programs, WID concepts and practices also became a vital feature in regional
developmental frameworks.

The approach starts with the basic assumption that economic strategies have frequently had a
negative impact on women. It acknowledges that they must be “brought into” the development
process through access to employment and the market place. It therefore accepts women’s
practical gender need to earn a livelihood. However, the equity approach is also concerned with
fundamental issues of equality (between men and women in the marketplace). It places
considerable emphasis on economic independence as synonymous with equity.

Proponents of this approach argue that women are ignored and excluded from the development
programs. In this approach, it is believed that development is not obtainable in the absence of
women’s integration into development process.

Women were seen as under-utilized resource for development and now they are found and could
be a valuable resource. What kind of development are women to be integrated into. Proponents
of WID see that the results of development will be successful if only women are fully integrated
into the development process. It was aimed at integrating women into the existing development
scheme. However, Esther Boserup’s book Women’s Role in Economic Development addressed
the consequences of economic development on women. This approach contradicts the modernist
approach that the benefits from development will trickle down to women.

The WID approach advocated for the implementation of ‘separate’ or ‘integrated’ projects for
women (the belief was that women had spare time available to undertake these projects).

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Separate or women-only projects were seen as the right solution to address women’s
marginalization.

WID assumed that if women are provided access to resources such as skill training, credits,
small-scale income generating activities and home economics, then they will improve their
situation and women will become full economic partners with men.

What do you think are the key areas of focus for women in development approach?
_________________________________________________________

3.2. Women in Development in Practice

Global aid and development agencies and NGOs often promote and utilize the above mentioned
strands of Women in Development. Those that meet with the greatest amount of success within
the WID parameters are those that fashioned their policies and programs pragmatically, over a
period of time, according to the felt needs and changing perceptions.

One of the central objectives of the Women in Development movement is to make women
visible to development planners and policy makers so as to ensure that material resources as well
as knowledge resources are specifically targeted at women. This required the specific
undertaking of research and data collection about women to portray their specific situations in
societies. It required the re-conceptualization of the concept of work, and of women’s work in
particular. New techniques and data collection methods were formulated so as to convey specific
data about women’s productive, reproductive and community work. Women-centered statistics
were collected; time charts that encompassed women’s work schedules were devised; case
studies were analyzed; and life studies were recorded; giving rise to completely new
methodologies and theoretical paradigms within the overall development movement.

Despite the plurality and differing emphasis of Women in Development, the interventions of
governments and the non-governmental sectors were confined to certain chosen areas of national
activity. The WID sponsored international visibility of women had substantial influence on
larger national activities in the fields of data collection, establishment of executive ministries,
legislative and policy changes, law reforms, and the positioning of alternative state machinery
for the ‘advancement of women’. On the whole, however, the WID focuses at national levels

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have been sporadic and restricted in their span of interventions. At the project level, WID actions
identified and emphasized certain areas of direct interest to women - as identified by WID. The
most palpable areas are noted below.

Land
Land ownership is identified by the Women in Development Movement as a crucial factor that
contributes towards the empowerment of women. Quite early in the Women and Development
analysis it was recognized that women as individuals and as a sex do not generally possess land.
This is due to colonial and other interventions, which served to erase the traditional inheritances
of women (Rogers: 1980:126). WID is instrumental in consciousness-raising with regard to
systems of indigenous matrilineal inheritances, matrilocal descent systems, duel or joint
ownership, control over land resources that are ignored in mainstream development policies
affecting land (ibid.). For example, WID developmental theorists quote specific instances and
raise awareness at national levels of the numerous occasions where modern development projects
suppressed matrilineal descent systems and needlessly alienated women in the redistribution of
land.

Health
Certain strands of Women in Development stress the intrinsic interrelation between women’s
development and their physical and mental health; and contribute towards creating awareness of
the differential health opportunities and hazards of men and women. For example, due to varying
reasons based on cultural specificities, women in certain countries are pregnant most of their
lives. As a result, statistics and indicators of women’s health, particularly in relation to their
reproductive role and health - rates of infertility and fertility, maternal mortality, and maternal
morbidity are accented in status of women reports and other statistical compilations.

Ensuing WID interventions consist of many grassroots-level educational programs which

perceive women as key figures in family healthcare and which incorporate family planning,
prevention of sexually transmitted diseases, child-care, sanitation, nutrition, mother-care, as
subjects for consciousness-raising. Most of these programs decline to view women as individuals

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with diverse health needs but rather, attempt to address the assumed broad-based needs of
women in their roles as reproducers. Thus, family planning in particular, is a key developmental
intervention under many national development schemes as well as in terms of local level action.

Credit
On the basis of the recognition that women, due to their particular gender location, lack access to
and control of material resources, Women in Development initiatives target capital to women via
women’s groups and projects. This most often takes the form of women’s savings and credit
collectives, especially at grassroots, which utilize mechanisms such as revolving funds in the
apportionment of capital. These interventions are usually strengthened with corresponding skill
training and opportunities for income generation activities.

Savings and credit societies are adopted by a large number of women’s groups and NGOs as well
as by local government programs and provide women with access to capital sufficient to
establish a small-scale income generating activity. If taken within this WID principle, these
initiatives are frequently successful, despite rapidly becoming popular as a WID formula
intervention.

Skill Training
During the early stages of WID, most projects were geared around training women to be better at
the very tasks and duties that society had already assigned for them – better mothers, better
housewives, better home-managers, better ‘carers’. The elementary gender division, which
originally conceives of men as engaging in productive work and women as engaging in
household chores, remained unchallenged. As such, women in developing countries were
targeted with courses centered on home economics, maternal / community health, nutrition, food
processing and preservation, sewing, knitting, and needlework based on the ideology of
domesticity as theorized by Rogers (1980:95).

The reality of the lives of rural women in developing countries where a greater part of life is
lived outdoors - in agriculturally productive work, in community work, even in reproductive
work (such as gathering water and fuel) do not always infringe upon the awareness of WID

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program planners and implementers. As such, in practice, the WID approach is weak in
transferring skills that are complementary to women in the context of their locations and their
lifestyles.

Income Generation
However, with the progress in WID theorization and the development of other WID approaches,
a new generation of WID projects was born that claim to incorporate ‘new elements such as
small-stock husbandry, horticulture, and certain income generating activities like handicraft
production, which involve a more useful approach to women’s work’ (Rogers: 1980:87). Yet,
these activities usually involve learning new skills and therefore serve to increase the already
heavy workload of women particularly in rural / agrarian societies as discussed further by Rogers
(ibid.). In addition, the incomes generated by these activities are nominal; and they tend to
further marginalize women into unrecognized, unacknowledged, already-marginalized sectors of
the economy such as handicrafts and small-industries (ibid.). Further, Rogers (ibid.) observes
that the demand for specialized goods produced on a small-scale, devoid of sophisticated
machinery and techniques, such as in small-industries is very low, (especially without
corresponding marketing capabilities).

Technology
New technologies that are developed to lighten workloads in recent times serve to displace
women’s traditional roles in agriculture. This is due to the fact that modern tools and machinery
are usually handed over to the control of men, as technology is perceived as a man’s province. In
agriculture particularly, women who traditionally perform certain agrarian tasks are bypassed,
when these tasks are mechanized through the allocation of modern technologies. Consequently,
small implements such as presses, grinders, and cutters are sold; and even given on credit to
men. Women’s existing space and status in production areas are thus usurped.

While it is noted that these innovations challenge the divisions in productive labour; they do so at
the expense of women’s space in production. Ultimately, modern technologies might not be
allowed to reach women at all. WID theorists and researchers distinguish the manner in which
such actions perpetrate the stereotype that women cannot manage machines. At the same time,

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there are other alternative technologies developed to uplift women’s reproductive responsibilities
in both the rural and urban contexts. Though sympathetic towards the household burden of
women, these equipages do not question the fundamental division of labour nor do they critique
women’s essential role and responsibilities in the domestic sphere.

[Link] Analysis

Dear learner! How gender analysis related with gender mainstreaming? How it affects
development planning?____________________________________________

Gender analysis is a systematic gathering and examination of information on gender differences

and social relations in order to identify, understand, and redress inequities based on gender.
Gender analysis is a valuable descriptive and diagnostic tool for development planners and
crucial to gender mainstreaming efforts. The methodology and components of gender analysis
are shaped by how gender issues are understood in the institution concerned.

During program and project design, gender analysis is the process of assessing the impact that a
development activity may have on females and males, and on gender relations (the economic and
social relationships between males and females which are constructed and reinforced by social
institutions). It can be used to ensure that men and women are not disadvantaged by development
activities, to enhance the sustainability and effectiveness of activities, or to identify priority areas
for action to promote equality between women and men. During implementation, monitoring and
evaluation, gender analysis assists to assess differences in participation, benefits and impacts
between males and females, including progress towards gender equality and changes in gender
relations. Gender analysis can also be used to assess and build capacity and commitment to
gender sensitive planning and programming in donor and partner organizations; and to identify
gender equality issues and strategies at country, sect oral or thematic programming level.

Gender analysis is the collection and examination of information about:

- the different roles of women and men

- the relationship and inequities between them
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 - their different experience, capacities, needs, constraints, rights issues and priorities
- the reasons for these differences
- the need, strategies and opportunities for change

Gender analysis is part of the wider situational analysis required for every project. It is essential
if project teams are to understand the complexities of social and economic relations in
communities where they are trying to bring about change. The analysis of information is used to
design projects in which:

- both women and men participate in, influence and benefit equally from the project
- women become empowered and experience less discrimination in society
- gender-related constraints to poverty reduction are reduced

Gender-analysis, through the systematic study of the differences in the roles, responsibilities, and
access to and control over resources of women and men, represents an attempt to understand the
complex nature of intra-household relations for a variety of reasons - notably to either minimize
the negative consequences of development and improve ‘development’ efficiency or to transform
social relations, empowering those in subordinate positions (principally women).Designed to
help their users to integrate gender analysis into social research and planning, gender-analysis
frameworks have many similarities, but differ in scope and emphasis. The operational need of
development researchers and practitioners to simplify the complex (but not to the extent of being
simplistic) requires the selection of a limited number of factors for analysis; this selection
process is informed by the values, assumptions and ideological preferences of the frameworks’
authors. The level of simplification (in terms of concepts, tools, level of analysis, etc.) represents
a significant difference between gender-analysis frameworks; however, even the more complex
gender-analysis frameworks can only create a crude model of reality, due to the far more
complex nature of real life.

Beyond gender there are potentially numerous (culturally and time specific) axes of difference
within households that affect access to and control over resources, levels of intra-household
poverty, and the effectiveness of development interventions (for example: age, relationship to
household head, illness, disability and incapacity, etc). The critical analysis of these intra-

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household differences (as opposed to descriptive documentation) has largely been ignored. The
following are key selected concepts in gender analysis.

Rationale for Gender Analysis:

 It helps in realistic planning

 Allows identification of constraints, and opportunities
 It provides accurate information about the relations of men and women in different
activities based on people’s own experience.
 It brings gender-based inequalities to the forefront and reveals their causes and effects.
 It can transform the gender attitudes of the parties involved.
 It can prevent planning from giving rise to activities that increase inequalities and weaken
the status of women.
 It helps people make better and more sustainable decisions about the contents of
development cooperation projects.
 It increases the impact and quality of development cooperation in general.

[Link] information is collected and analyzed by gender analysis?

______________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

What can gender analysis tell us?

 An analysis of gender relations can tell us who has access, who has control, who is likely
to benefit from a new initiative, and who is likely to lose.
 Gender analysis asks questions that can lead us in a search for information to understand
why a situation has developed the way it has.
 It can also lead us to explore assumptions about issues such as the distribution of
resources and the impact of culture and traditions.
 It can provide information on the potential direct or indirect benefit of a development
initiative on women and men, on some appropriate entry points for measures that promote
equality within a particular context, and on how a particular development initiative may

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challenge or maintain the existing gender division of labor. With this information measures of
equity can be created to address the disparities and promote equality.
 In the case of primary education, gender analysis can tell us that a gender gap exists in
most countries; that is, there is a gap between girls' and boys' enrolment and retention in school.
In the majority of countries where there is a gender gap, the gap works against girls, but in
others, it works against boys.
When in the process is gender analysis applied?
 Gender analysis takes place throughout the entire development process, throughout
research, to problem definition, planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation.
 By examining basic assumptions each step of the way, the interrelationships between
social context and economic factors can be understood and initiatives that respond to those needs
can be designed.

Who undertakes gender analysis?

 It is the task of analysts, policy-makers and program managers located in both donor and
partner countries, in both government and civil society, to work in partnership with women and
men involved to advance gender equality.
 This participatory process provides the context for the creation, implementation and
evaluation of development initiatives to promote gender equality.
 Individuals, groups and communities affected by development initiatives must be
involved from the beginning of the process in order to determine the gender dimensions of the
issue at hand.
 Without local knowledge and expertise, some of the intricacies of the gender roles and
social relationships may not be easily understood.
Elements of gender analysis
 For a good gender analysis, resources and commitment to implement the results of the
analysis are necessary.
Consider also three important points:
 It requires skilled professionals with adequate resources
 It benefits from the use of local expertise
 The findings must be used to actually shape the design of policies, programs and projects

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 [Link] Mainstreaming

Dear learner! Have you ever been heard the term gender mainstreaming ? Please write
your answer in the space provided and compare your answer with explanation given in this
material________________________________________________________________

Gender mainstreaming means identifying and integrating the different circumstances and
interests of women and men in every project with a social or political dimension, both in advance
of and at regular intervals during its implementation. Individual measures applied in the interests
of gender equality should be accompanied by the objective of removing the need for them in the
long term.

“Mainstreaming a gender perspective is the process of assessing the implications for women and
men of any planned action, including legislation, policies or programs, in any area and at all
levels.

It is a strategy for making women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences an integral
dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of the policies and
programs in all political, economic, and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally,
and inequality is not perpetuated

Gender Mainstreaming gained popularity after it was highlighted as the main strategy or
instrument for achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment at the Fourth World
Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. Since then, most multilateral and bilateral agencies,
as well as governments, have adopted a strategy for mainstreaming gender as the key to
achieving gender-related goals and objectives.

Gender Mainstreaming is the process of ensuring that both women and men have equal access to
and control over resources, decision-making, and benefits at all stages of the development
process and in development projects. Gender Mainstreaming is an instrument and not an end in
itself. Gender Mainstreaming emphasizes getting the overall activity to focus on both men and
women, rather than merely adding a component or section to benefit women at the margin. For
example, the process encourages policy makers or project designers to assess the gender

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dimensions of policy or project impacts. Gender Mainstreaming also integrates measures that
would ensure equitable or equal benefits for both men and women into a policy or project. If any
adverse impact on either men or women is identified, the policy or project should include
measures to mitigate such adverse impacts.

If such policies or projects continue to only benefit women at the margins through an additional
component focused on women, and the ‘mainstream’ policy or activity is designed in a manner
that women may not benefit, achieving gender equality will be a slow process. Gender
Mainstreaming, therefore, is a way to enhance overall development effectiveness and to pay
attention to both men and women’s needs in creating a just and equal society.

Entry points for Gender Mainstreaming exist at different levels—institutional, policy and
program/project levels:

1. Gender Mainstreaming at the Institutional Level

Gender Mainstreaming at the institutional level is the best entry point for Gender Mainstreaming.
If an institution mainstreams gender, then all policies, programs and products emanating from
that institution will be gender-aware. However, making changes at the institutional level can be
complex and difficult. This requires significant management commitment, a clear policy and a
well-defined strategy. The allocation of resources, enhancement of human capacity and
appropriate adaptation of systems are often difficult to achieve. (If the participants are interested
in mainstreaming at an institutional level, then it may be appropriate to discuss the
Mainstreaming Gender into Institutions Learning Case.)

2. Gender Mainstreaming at the Policy Level

Gender Mainstreaming at the policy level is the next best entry point. If gender is mainstreamed
at the policy level, then programs and projects resulting from the policy are bound to address
gender issues. However, gender is a cross-sectoral issue. Often, institutions issue a general
gender policy. A general gender policy by itself is often not effective, unless it can ensure that
gender is integrated into all other institutional and sector policies. Additionally, Gender
Mainstreaming at the policy level requires information and data on gender issues in policy-
related areas. For example, agricultural policy formulators need information on the roles,

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responsibilities, resources, and needs of men and women in agriculture. In addition to relevant
quantitative information, they need a sound qualitative understanding of the links between
different policy aspects and any differentiated gender implications. Such information is widely
available in the health, education and agricultural sectors, but not in several others such as
transport and public sector administration. Thus, policies related to health, education, agriculture,
and not most other sectors, are most likely to be gender-aware. (If the participants are interested
in the policy level, then it may be appropriate to select for example the exercise on Gender and
Agriculture Policy Learning Case.)

3. Gender Mainstreaming at the Program/Project Level:

The most common entry point for Gender Mainstreaming is, therefore, at the project level. Links
between the project activity and any sex-disaggregated impact thereof are easier to identify. It is
also easier to understand the sex-differentiated needs and priorities of both men and women
through participatory assessments and to assess, a priori, any differential impact. Historically,
gender has been most commonly integrated into education, health and agricultural projects, for
which such information is available. As knowledge and data become available in other sectors,
Gender Mainstreaming in other projects is becoming increasingly common.

4. Gender Mainstreaming in Monitoring and Evaluation:

 Monitoring is the systematic measurement of progress toward desired objectives of a

project, program or policy. It involves measuring inputs, activities and outputs, and assessing
whether these are indeed contributing to achieving the project/program/policy’s stated
objectives (outcomes and impacts). It helps ensure that the project, program or policy
achieves its defined objectives within a prescribed time frame and budget. Monitoring
provides feedback on implementation progress and problems faced, and tracks resource
acquisition and allocation, costs, production and delivery of services, and the degree and
quality of stakeholder participation. Monitoring compares performance with existing
program objectives and assesses intended and unintended outcomes of project, program or
policy.

 Evaluation is assessing whether a project, program or policy is achieving its intended

objectives. This may be done periodically by internal managers or by external stakeholders.

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 Evaluation focuses on outcomes and impacts and assesses whether they are contributing to
achieving program goals and objectives.

Monitoring and evaluation involve giving feedback to improve the likelihood that the resources
will meet the desired objectives.

Why is Gender important for Monitoring and Evaluation

Females and males have varying development priorities, needs and constraints, and are affected
differently by development programs. Conventional M&E systems often do not capture gender
differences in access and impacts. This means that project managers or policy makers often
operate in the blind and gender issues remain invisible.

Timely and systematic collection of sex-disaggregated information can help determine whether
the intervention benefits both males and females similarly. It allows for fine-tuning of the project
during implementation to address any deficiencies, as well as helps to enhance the gender
dimensions of design during the next phase of the project.

Continuous monitoring of the adequacy of inputs to achieve the gender-related objectives, and
periodic systematic evaluation of sex-disaggregated or gender-related results (outputs, outcomes
and impacts) determine whether the intervention is achieving or has achieved the desired gender
objectives.

M&E systems became easier to integrate if they are considered at an early stage of
project/program/policy planning. First, to the extent possible, all indicators for each stage of the
project should be measured or disaggregated by sex. Where appropriate or necessary, additional
indicators should be developed for specific gender-related issues. Where it is not practical to use
indicators to capture gender-specific issues such as empowerment or confidence building of
women, separate participatory assessments or other qualitative methods may be necessary.

Gender mainstreaming is an organizational strategy to bring a gender perspective to all aspects of

an institution’s policy and activities, through building gender capacity and accountability.

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Mainstreaming is a process rather than a goal that consists in bringing what can be seen as
marginal into the core business and main decision making process of an organization.

With a mainstreaming strategy, gender concerns are seen as important to all aspects of
development; for all sectors and areas of activity, and a fundamental part of the planning process.
Responsibility for the implementation of gender policy is diffused across the organizational
structure, rather than concentrated in a small central unit.

Such a process of mainstreaming has been seen to take one of two forms. The agenda-setting
approach to mainstreaming seeks to transform the development agenda itself whilst prioritizing
gender concerns. The more politically acceptable integrationist approach brings women’s and
gender concerns into all of the existing policies and programs, focusing on adapting institutional
procedures to achieve this. In both cases, political as well as technical skills are essential to a
mainstreaming strategy.

Any approach to mainstreaming requires sufficient resources, as well as high-level commitment

and authority. A combined strategy can be particularly powerful. This involves the synergy of a
catalytic central gender unit with a cross-sectoral policy oversight and monitoring role, combined
with a web of gender specialists across the institution. The building of alliances both within the
institution and with outside constituencies, such as women’s organizations, is crucial for success.
Mainstreaming tools include gender training, introducing incentive structures which reward
efforts on gender, and the development of gender-specific operational tools such as checklists
and guidelines.

Principles of Gender mainstreaming

Principle 1: Transforming the mainstream is a prerequisite for and an integral element (rather
than a consequence) of the full realization of women’s human rights and gender
equality.

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Principle 2: Women must become empowered and informed decision makers on mainstream
issues. This vision must explicitly recognize the rights of different groups of women
— poor women, indigenous women, disabled women, etc to participate in decision
making on mainstream issues. Mainstreaming approaches on the role of women in
leadership and decision-making have emphasized getting ‘women’s issues’ and a
gender perspective into the mainstream.

Principle 3: Women’s human rights can only be realized through the transformation of gender
power relations at all levels. A rights-based perspective must be explicitly based on
challenging prevailing power relations. This may, and often will, include addressing
unequal power relations among groups of women, as well as between women and
men.

Elements of a Gender Mainstreaming Strategy: A 14-Point Framework

Fourteen elements of a complete gender mainstreaming strategy

While it is of absolute importance not to conflate these three spheres, it is also useful to think of
them as ‘levels’ that a unified organizational gender mainstreaming strategy must encompass. At
each level there are several of the 14 elements to be put in place, including tracking and reporting
mechanisms adapted to the issues relevant to each level.

Level One: Organizational structures, policies, procedures and culture

An organization able to contribute substantively to greater gender equality would have the
following six structures, policies and procedures in place.

Element 1: A clear policy on its commitment to gender equality, supported by the proactive
drive of senior and middle management (political will), and expressed in a written policy or
mission statement.

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Element 2: Time-bound strategies to implement the policy, which are developed in broad
consultation with staff, and include mechanisms to ensure that staff understand the policy and its
implications for their everyday work, and have the competencies and resources required to
implement it effectively.

Element 3: Human resource practices which are sensitive to the gender needs and interests of
both men and women on the organization’s staff, as well as in their constituency. Human
resource strategies have a dual internal/external function in relation to gender mainstreaming:

(a) internally, they advance the organization’s ability to practice and model gender equality
in its own internal functioning, for example to be equitable in its hiring and promotion
practices, and recognize the links between the personal and professional responsibilities
of staff; and
(b) Externally, they enable the organization to contribute more effectively to greater gender
equality in its program and impact, for example by including commitment and
competence to work for gender equality in job descriptions, terms of reference and
performance criteria.

Element 4: Internal tracking and monitoring capability to ensure that strategic milestones are
being reached, and to support both organizational learning and management accountability.
These might include monitoring of staff recruitment and promotion, budgetary allocations,
procurement from companies that implement ILO conventions regarding female employees, and
the performance of managers and supervisors in discussing and following up on gender equality
initiatives.

Element 5: A central gender mainstreaming unit with policy responsibility and a mandate to
guide the overall gender mainstreaming process. Some organizations also have specific units to
support the incorporation of gender issues into their programs, while others combine the policy
and program functions.

Element 6: A recognized network of staff responsible for gender equality issues in their
respective work units, coordinated as a team by the policy unit (often called a Gender Focal
Point Network). Ideally, this network takes the form of a community of practice that is self-

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organizing, knowledge sharing, peer supporting and serves as an acknowledged channel for the
integration of learning on gender equality into the organization’s functioning.

Level Two: The organization’s program

Although gender mainstreaming involves far more than project and program design and
implementation, an organization’s program is the ‘heart’ of gender mainstreaming. It is the arena
in which commitment to gender equality takes concrete form in the community served by the
organization. An effective gender mainstreaming strategy therefore includes at least the
following four programming elements:

Element 7: Systematic ongoing consultation with women, as well as men, to identify their own
priorities, success stories, lessons learned tools, and mechanisms. This is only possible in
organizations that genuinely value consultation and the types of knowledge that it produces and
allocate the necessary staff and budgetary resources. Consultation does not end with the design
phase of the project, but must be undertaken throughout project implementation. This is of
critical importance, because the ultimate impact will be watered down if the project strays from
community concerns, or does not adjust to any changes in these concerns (see also Element 11
below).

Element 8: Project management that is technically proficient, aware of the implications of

gender differences for project outcomes, remains in touch with the constituency, and establishes
positive incentive and accountability mechanisms to ensure consistent results is extremely
important.

Element 9: Effective monitoring and reporting mechanisms capable of reflecting how far the
project is contributing to greater gender equality.

Element 10: Gender analysis (a subset of socioeconomic analysis) that explores the national and
international context in which the concerned communities are operating, clarifies the ways in
which this context impacts differently on women and men and the implications of these
differences for project activity.

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Level Three: The outcomes and impact

The outcomes and impact of effective gender mainstreaming activity in Levels One and Two are
seen in progress towards measurable improvement in meeting women’s practical needs and
strategic interests, and greater gender equality (both formal and substantive) in the communities
served. It is important to show that substantive activity has not simply reached a certain number
of women, but that it has improved equality between women and men.

Element 11: Relevant baseline information, and appropriate milestones and indicators, derived
from gender analysis, so that progress towards greater gender equality can be identified and
described.

Element 12: Consultation with the community concerned to check and compare their
perspectives with the information revealed by formal indicators.

Element 13: Clear reporting mechanisms that can get the word out efficiently.

Element 14: Good relationships with the media, opinion leaders and decision makers both in the
community being served, and in the wider society, so that lessons learned can be effectively out
disseminated, and absorbed into social practice.

[Link] gender mainstreaming tools?

_____________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________

[Link] of Women

[Link] Empowerment

Empowerment is the process of marginalized people - both women and men – gaining resources,
confidence and opportunity to take control over their lives. Empowerment means being able to
negotiate with and influence people and institutions with power. It can be important as an
individual process, but it is most powerful as a collective, social and political process involving

109
solidarity and collective action. Women’s empowerment is essential to end gender discrimination
and reduce poverty. Some indicators of empowerment include:

- self-worth, self-confidence and self-reliance

- solidarity, voice and action with like-minded people to demand rights and needs
- economic independence with control over resources and assets
- leadership and influence over decisions; freedom of mobility and association
- knowledge - and its effective use and communication
- ability to ensure the healthy development of children (girls and boys)
- being listened to and treated with respect within and outside the family freedom from
violence, abuse and exploitation
Clearly, a common thread uniting each of the major international conferences of the 1990's is
women's empowerment. Furthermore, the international community is now accountable to the
world's women for fulfilling the significant commitments it has made to help make
empowerment a reality of women's lives.
Women's empowerment has five components:
 women's sense of self-worth;
 their right to have and to determine choices;
 their right to have access to opportunities and resources;
 their right to have the power to control their own lives, both within and outside the home;
and
 their ability to influence the direction of social change to create a more just social and
economic orders, nationally and internationally.

A ‘bottom-up’ process of transforming gender power relations, through individuals or groups

developing awareness of women’s subordination and building their capacity to challenge it. The
term ‘empowerment’ is now widely used in development agency policy and programme
documents, in general, but also specifically in relation to women. However, the concept is highly
political, and its meaning contested. Thus, there are dangers in the uncritical overuse of the term
in agency rhetoric, particularly where it becomes associated with specific activities, or used in
simplistic ways.

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Central to the concept of women’s empowerment is an understanding of power itself. Women’s
empowerment does not imply women taking over control previously held by men, but rather the
need to transform the nature of power relations. Power may be understood as ‘power within,’ or
self confidence, ‘power with’, or the capacity to organize with others towards a common purpose
and the ‘power to’ effect change and take decisions, rather than ‘power over’ others.

Empowerment is sometimes described as being about the ability to make choices, but it must
also involve being able to shape what choices are on offer. What is seen as empowering in one
context may not be in another.

Empowerment is essentially a bottom-up process rather than something that can be formulated as
a top-down strategy. This means that development agencies cannot claim to 'empower women',
nor can empowerment be defined in terms of specific activities or end results. This is because it
involves a process whereby women, individually and collectively, freely analyze, develop and
voice their needs and interests, without them being pre-defined, or imposed from above. Planners
working towards an empowerment approach must therefore develop ways of enabling women
themselves to critically assess their own situation and shape a transformation in society. The
ultimate goal of women’s empowerment is for women themselves to be the active agents of
change in transforming gender relations.

Whilst empowerment cannot be ‘done to’ women, appropriate external support can be important
to foster and support the process of empowerment. A facilitative rather than directive role is
needed, such as funding women’s organizations that work locally to address the causes of gender
subordination and promoting dialogue between such organizations and those in positions of
power.

Recently, interest has grown among development professionals in approaches to measuring

women’s empowerment, particularly in relation to microcredit programs. A number of
‘indicators of empowerment’ have been developed in different contexts. Again, caution must be

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exercised in assuming that empowerment can be externally defined and objectively assessed, or
that such indicators can be easily transferred.

How is the status of women in the economic sector or in income generation activities? If there
are really observed inequalities in these regard what do you think should be done?
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________

5.4. [Link] Empowerment

Women have the potential to change their own economic status, as well as that of the
communities and countries in which they live. Yet more often than not, women’s economic
contributions go unrecognized, their work undervalued and their promise unnourished.

Unequal opportunities between women and men continue to hamper women’s ability to lift
themselves from poverty and gain more options to improve their lives. Research shows that
inequalities persist in the way paid and unpaid work is divided between women and men; in the
fact that women remain the sole caregivers at home, and in their limited access to resources.
What is more, these imbalances slow economic growth.

Women’s economic empowerment – that is, their capacity to bring about economic change for
themselves – is increasingly viewed as the most important contributing factor to achieving
equality between women and men. But economically strengthening women – who are half the
world’s workforce – is not only a means by which to spur economic growth, but also a matter of
advancing women's human rights. When governments, businesses and communities invest in
women, and when they work to eliminate inequalities, developing countries are less likely to be
plagued by poverty. Entire nations can also better their chance of becoming stronger players in
the global marketplace.

Some of the positive outcomes of women’s economic empowerment are the following:

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  Where women's participation in the labor force grew fastest, the economy experienced
the largest reduction in poverty rates.

 When women farmers can access the resources they need, their production increases,
making it less likely that their families are hungry and malnourished.

 When women own property and earn money from it, they may have more bargaining
power at home. This in turn can help reduce their vulnerability to domestic violence and
HIV infection.

 When women have access to time-saving technologies – such as a foot-pedaled water

pump or a motorized scooter – economic benefits can follow. Researchers have found
that technology helps women increase their productivity as well as launch income-
generating pursuits and entrepreneurial ventures. Those kinds of outcomes empower
women to become stronger leaders and to more effectively contribute financially to
their families, communities and countries.

Investing in women helps speed up the development of local economies and creates more
equitable societies.

Economic development efforts to combat poverty can only succeed if women are part of the
solution. Doing so yields a double dividend: When women are economically empowered, they
raise healthier, better educated families. Their countries are more economically prosperous
because of it, too.

Understanding of women's economic contributions as well as the hurdles that prevent them from
being successful should expand. Efforts should focus on how gender affects economic
development efforts related to assets and property rights as well as employment, enterprise
development and financial services to empower women in this aspect.

Increasing women's ownership, use and control of assets and property is very essential. Empower
women as economic agents and better their ability to access markets on competitive and
equitable terms. Development partners and government should aim to integrate gender

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perspectives into program and institution activities. It is believed that such an approach improves
the likelihood that efforts to strengthen women economically are successful.

Are there women in political powers/positions in your Woreda? Compare the relative
number with their counterparts and indicate what the next step should be by the concerned
bodies.

______________________________________________________________________________

[Link]. Political Empowerment

Democratic transitions in many countries have ushered in new ideas about the citizen’s role in
political life. The meaning of democracy and the responsibilities it entails are continuously being
negotiated in new contexts of ideological exploration and citizen aspiration. In recent years, as
the process of democratization has become more widespread, the complex relationship between
governance and women’s empowerment has come under increasing scrutiny by academics,
development practitioners, and grassroots constituencies.

Approaches to the overall empowerment of women have begun to integrate tools and strategies
designed to promote democratic values, practices, and institutions. This trend has stimulated
fresh insights on and innovative field programs in the area of integrating gender concerns with
development interventions.

The relationship between good governance and women’s empowerment are critical and here we
add the following three core elements as components of the political empowerment framework.

Political culture: A democratic political culture offers opportunities for the expression and
reconciliation of different views, demands governmental transparency, encourages citizen
participation, and supports a strong civil society.

Civil society: Characterized by effective citizen representation and participation in political life,
civil society is a constantly evolving network of politically active, aware organizations and

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individuals that represent diverse interests, shape public dialogue, and influence political
outcomes.

Government institutions: The creation of democratic bodies determines the degree to which
government is transparent and accessible and whether policies reflect an equitable balance of
society’s interests. If successful, organizations and individuals will be able to themselves freely
advocate for changes in policies, programs, laws, regulations, and institutions.

A democratic political culture functions and is critical to the advancement of women, primarily
because itencourages political consciousness and action. Consequently, as political alliances are
formed and information is shared, power relations within society and the political arena shift,
allowing previously marginalized groups (such as women) to identify and fight for their goals.
When this point is reached, the social capital (i.e., the relationships, institutions, and norms that
facilitate cooperation among various groups) of a country is enhanced, and democracy can then
gain a stronger foothold.

A vibrant civil society is a prerequisite of democracy. By building constituencies around

particular political concerns, civil society ensures that a range of citizens and interests can gain
access to political systems. Civil society actors, in particular politically conscious organizations
and individuals, also contribute to the development of political skills on the part of constituents,
a necessary component if citizen participation is to be firmly established and remain a consistent
factor in political life.

The nature of political culture and the role of civil society in a given context is determined in part
by government institutions, such as legislatures, ministries, judicial entities, and local agencies.
Such institutions make up a realm in which civil society actors can work to fulfill their political
goals and in which policymakers and political leaders can demonstrate their commitment to the
democratization process. Importantly, institutions provide a basis for judging government
accountability with regard to responsibilities to citizens and the creation of conditions that
catalyze and reinforce both political activity and empowerment by groups of citizens.

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As a democratic political culture expands worldwide, it is increasingly important to examine how
women—and often the institutions to which they belong—take on new roles and identities,
develop new skills, claim individual and collective rights, participate in public decision-making
processes, and establish an equal footing with their male counterparts.

Different research projects generated a deeper understanding of the reasons for women’s
exclusion from civic life and about how best to foster their participation in democratic process, in
particular regarding the tools and strategies that can be applied to promote participatory values,
practices, and institutions.

The following recommendations for program planning and implementation are subdivided into
three broad categories:

Tools and Strategies to Foster and Strengthen Women’s Participation:

 Support policy analysis activities.

 Promote human rights education.
 Continue skill building and support for women in public office.
 Use advocacy training as a means to understand and challenge inequitable societal
structures

Power of the Collective Voice and Experience:

 Facilitate the development of diverse networks for women’s groups.

 Support institutional capacity building.
 Create forums for women to exchange ideas and reflect on their experiences.
 Develop a written record for other organizations.

Credibility as a Vital Asset:

 Create and widely disseminate a credible body of information.

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  Collect gender-disaggregated information as a powerful tool for monitoring and assessing
women’s progress.

The following are lessons that come from collective project experiences:

 Sustainable development requires women’s active participation in public decisionmaking.

 Political consciousness results from critical thinking.
 Small steps provide the foundation for enduring social change.

What is your perspective towards the other gender (concerning roles and behaviours
of your opposite gender)?
___________________________________________________ ______

[Link] and Millennium Development Goals in Ethiopia

Dear learner! Mention millennium development goals? Which development goals

related with gender issue?

____________________________________________________________________________

5.4.1. Country Situation

Ethiopia has an estimated total population of 84,320,987 (42,556,999 males and 41,763,988
females) in 2012.2 The country is predominantly rural with only about 16% of the population
living in urban areas.3 Accordingly, the economy is largely based on agriculture. Ethiopia has in
recent years recorded some of the highest economic growth rates worldwide and made
impressive progress towards many of the MDGs. The country has registered an average annual
economic growth rate of 11% over the last nine consecutive years between 2004 and 2012.4 In
spite of this impressive economic record, Ethiopia remains one of the least developed countries
in the world, ranking 173th out of 186 countries in the recent (2013) UNDP Human
Development Index. About 27.6% of the population was estimated to live below the total poverty
line, with strong disparities between regions, as well as between rural and urban areas, in income
levels, poverty and access to social services.

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National Plan of Action on Children (2003-2010), the National Action Plan on Sexual Abuse and
Exploitation of Children (2006-2010), and the National Plane of Action on Gender Equality
(2005-2010) Gender inequality is a characteristic feature of Ethiopia. Though the country has put
in place commendable policy, legislative and program measures to promote gender equality,
cultural norms, traditions and practices continue to impede substantive equality for women. The
Constitution of Ethiopia (1995) establishes equal rights for women and men across economic,
social and political spheres including the possibility of using affirmative action to address
women’s current subordinate status. Subsequent to the adoption of the Constitution, extensive
legislative reforms were undertaken to harmonize domestic laws with constitutional provisions
and international human rights standards.

The primary policy document for the rights of women in Ethiopia is the National Policy on
Ethiopian Women, which was adopted in 1993. Policies on gender equality have been further
elaborated in National Development Plans. The current plan, the Growth and Transformation
Plan (GTP), emphasizes participation in the overall gender strategy for the period 2009/10-
2014/15.8 The priority objectives for the period include; ensuring women’s active participation
in the country’s economic development and equal benefit from economic growth; increasing
participation in the social sector and empowerment of women by abolishing Harmful Traditional
Practices (HTPs) and increasing women’s participation in politics.

The Ministry of Women, Children and Youth Affairs (MoWCYA) is the primary executing
ministry with the mandate for the rights of women as the lead agency for implementing the
policy framework on women and children’s [Link] the regional level the Bureau of Women,
Children and Youth Affairs (BoWAs) and at lower administrative levels similar structures are
the primary vehicles responsible for mainstreaming and ensuring women’s rights. However, the
Federal and Regional Women’s Affairs structures are still evolving and face capacity challenges
which affect how adequately the mainstreaming and institutionalization of gender equality is
addressed.

The policy, legislative and institutional measures taken by the government in recent years have
thus laid the foundation for gender equality and have already resulted in some positive trends.
However, it is a long road to get to meaningfully reduce gender disparity in the country.
Ethiopian women are still economically, socially and politically disadvantaged; in the enjoyment

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of human basic privileges, in accessing economic opportunities, political decision-making
processes, and in accessing basic resources and services. The 2012 Global Gender Gap Report
ranks Ethiopia 118th out of 135 countries, indicating the existence significant gender disparity in
the country.

[Link] objectives are prioritized in GTP regarding gender strategy?

________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________

5.4.2. Gender and Millennium Development Goals in Ethiopia

Ethiopia is still on the track towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals related to
gender parity in education, child mortality, HIV/AIDS, and malaria, according to the World
Bank. Yet meeting all of them with fewer than 1,000 days until 2015 seems unattainable.

The country’s impressive progress in different spheres of development including tackling

poverty, reducing child mortality and unprecedented growth in primary education enrollment
over the past several years will provide an opportunity for a greater and inclusive development
for the years to come.

Ethiopia reduced extreme poverty from 38.7 % in 2004-5 to 29.6% in 2009-10. The government
in its Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP) has also a target to reduce this further to 22.2% by
2014-2015 with aspiration to reach middle income country status over the coming decade (World
Bank).

The net enrollment rate in primary education also went up to 85.4 % in 2011/12. With the
introduction of the Health Extension Program, Ethiopia has provided an important platform
which contributes to achieving MDGs 4 and 5 – reducing child mortality and improving maternal
health. The reduction of under-five mortality from 166 in 2000 to 66 deaths per 1,000 lives birth
and meeting the MDG 4 ahead of the 2015 deadline also represents a huge success. Ethiopia has
also made important progress in reducing mortality rates among babies within the first 28 days of

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life. From 1990-2011, newborn mortality fell by 40%- the 8 th largest reduction in sub-Saharan
Africa and substantially more than the regional average for Eastern and Southern Africa (32%).

Traditionally, boys were more likely to attend school and less likely to drop out: in 1994/95,
boys’ gross enrolment ratio (GER) was more than 50% higher than girls’ (31.7% and 20.4%,
respectively). Since then, a number of initiatives have been implemented: encouraging women’s
employment in the civil service, promoting gender-sensitive teaching methods and increasing the
minimum marriage age to 18. In 2008/09, almost full gender parity was achieved: the GER was
90.7% for girls and 96.7% for boys. Government priorities in education – increasing enrolment
and access in rural areas (with a goal of achieving universal primary enrolment by 2015), gender
equality and curriculum reform – have been grounded in efforts to improve economic and human
development outcomes.

Result Areas by key Output Areas (Outcomes)

Output 1: Increased accessibility of financial & non-financial services for economically

disadvantaged women (Enhanced Economic empowerment of women):

Result Area 1: Enhanced capacity of institutions providing business development services to

women

Result Area 2: Providing accessible and affordable financial services to aspiring women
entrepreneurs

Result Area 3: Enhanced competitiveness and profitability of female owned businesses

Output 2: Enabling environment created and support provided for girls and women to improve
participation and access to secondary and tertiary education:

Result Area 4: Enabling environment in place to support female participation in education

Result Area 5: Enhanced female enrollment and retention in secondary and tertiary
education

Output 3: Strengthened institutional capacity for gender mainstreaming:

Result Area 6: Enhanced women’s participation in leadership and decision-making

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Result Area 7: Gender-responsive programming and accountability promoted

Result Area 8: Strengthened capacity of women’s machineries at all levels

Output 4: Increased institutional capacity and community level knowledge to promote and
protect the rights of women and girls

Result Areas 9: Mass mobilization and advocacy on girls’ & women’s rights and gender
equality promoted

Result Area 10: Supported development & implementation of a national strategy to protect
girls’ & women’s rights

Result Area 11: Enhanced institutional capacity and knowledge to protect the rights of girls
and women

Women’s economic empowerment: This outcome seeks to increase access to financial and
business development services by vulnerable women. This is being achieved firstly by
strengthening the capacities of financial institutions, Business Development Service (BDS)
providers and associations who in turn will be better able to provide diversified financial
products and BDS to Women; Secondly, by increasing access to training and information on
financial and business development services for Women in formal and informal businesses;
thirdly, by increasing access to credit for Women(in formal and informal businesses; and
fourthly, by developing a national strategy and implementation framework for micro finance
services targeted at vulnerable groups

Educational attainment of women and girls at secondary and tertiary levels: This outcome
is geared towards increasing opportunities for education, leadership and decision making for
Women and girls. It is being achieved by; firstly, increasing the number of girls and women who
receive support for secondary and tertiary education; secondly, increasing the number of teachers
with knowledge and skills to offer gender responsive pedagogies; thirdly, through increasing the
number of women and girls who attain basic functional literacy; fourthly, increasing women’s

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access to professional and leadership development opportunities; and finally, through increasing
general public awareness on the importance of women’s participation in leadership.

Strengthened capacities for gender mainstreaming: This Output Area is aimed at

strengthening federal and local government institutions in order for them to better implement
national and international commitments on gender equality. Systems for monitoring performance
on gender related national commitments at the federal and local levels are being put in place and
capacities existing in federal and local government institutions for gender responsive planning
and budgeting are being strengthened.

The Protection of the rights of women and girls: This outcome of the JP seeks to enhance the
capacity of formal and informal institutions at national and local levels to promote and protect
the rights of girls and women. This is being achieved by; establishing knowledge networks on
gender equality and women’s empowerment at federal and regional levels;
establishing/strengthening coordination mechanisms for the prevention and appropriate response
to Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) at federal and local levels; increasing the
capacity of service providers to deliver gender responsive support to survivors of violence;
enhancing the capabilities (knowledge, skills and systems) of law enforcement agencies to
promote and protect the rights of women; and by increasing community interventions/actions
that promote and protect the rights of women and girls.

5.5. Gender Issues in Ethiopia

The Government of Ethiopia has undertaken major steps to improve the status of women, and to
integrate them more fully into the development process. A massively scaled up effort is being
undertaken as part of the PASDEP to release the untapped potential of Ethiopian women. Direct
interventions include: (i) major efforts to get more girls into, and completing school, with a
target of gender parity by the end of the 5-yearperiod; (ii) major efforts to improve women’s
health, through an extensive program of female outreach health workers who will get down to
the village and family level; and a nationwide Making Pregnancy Safe Program to ensure
healthier pregnancies and the safer delivery of babies; (iii) liberating girls’ and women’s time
from the unproductive hours spent fetching water, by making water supply available within 0.5
km. for 85% of the population by 2010; (iv) adapting economic programs to be more responsive

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to the women clients, including a wide range of programs designed to boost productivity;
including agricultural extension, microcredit, natural resource management, and small business
promotion; and, (v) continuing legislative and institutional reforms to protect the rights of and
open opportunities for women, including implementing the National Plan of Action for Women.
Safeguarding rights such as access to land, credit, and other productive resources are central to
the strategy, as is protecting women from the multiple forms of other deprivations, such as
longer working days, and violence and discrimination against women which are still widespread
in the country. Specific steps in the last two years have included a program to register the names
of both spouses for land certification, revision of the Penal Code to outlaw Female Genital
Mutilation (FGM), and adoption of specific laws against gender-based violence.

Ethiopia is one of only a handful of countries in the developing world that has quotas for
affirmative action for women in leadership and politics. The number of women representatives in
the House of People’s Representatives (HoPR) reached 117 by the end of 2005 and the
proportion of elected women at regional councils level has increased to 40% in the more
advanced regions, although it still lags far behind in emerging and less-developed regions. In
addition, a significant number of initiatives are underway, including the National Action Plan on
Gender, which forms the core of the gender strategy under PASDEP, as well as analytical
initiatives such as a gender budget analysis, and strengthening gender-disaggregated data
reporting to better inform policy.

These policy steps have been complemented by conscious choices to promote the participation of
women in essential public services, for example in education, where the number of girls in
primary school has risen by over 4.6 million in the last ten years, representing an increase of
420% since 1995/96; in secondary education where it has more than doubled, and in tertiary
education where it has increased by over six-fold; the target to ultimately deploy 30,000 female
Health Extension Workers is well underway and 60% has so far been achieved (by the end of
2006/07), to provide services directly to women at the community level. With respect to the
target of gender parity by 2015, the ratio of females to males has risen to 0.93 in 2006/07 for the
first cycle of primary education, and to 0.78 for the second cycle and secondary education. The
massive change in the number of females participating in some key national areas since the onset

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of the International Development Goals (IDGs) in the early 1990s which evolved in to the MDGs
in the early 2000

In the action plan of the government of Ethiopia the following issues of gender are addressed:

I. Means and Mechanisms To Implement the Beijing Plat Form for Action

The Ethiopian Government's commitment and dedication to promote women's equal

participation in the economic, political and social developments of the country has been
manifested in various forms. A number of measures taken by the government have created
enabling environment to empower women to become active participants of the development
process and benefit from it. In 1992 the creation of a Women's Affairs Office within the Prime
Minister's Office mandated to coordinate and facilitate conditions to promote gender equality in
areas of development. The declaration of the first National Policy on Women in 1993 provided a
framework within which Government's commitment to empower women can be channeled. The
Women's Affairs Office of the Prime Minister's Office is charged with responsibilities to oversee
and coordinate activities leading to the effective implementation of the Policy.

The Policy states that the responsibility of ensuring the implementation of the National Policy on
Women lies mainly with the Government. Following the declaration of the National Policy on
Women, and in compliance with its strategy, the challenge then was the creation of a
government structure through which the implementation of the Policy can be materialized. In
this connection, the institutionalization of women's economic, political and social rights within
government structure (central government and in the regions) was not only a necessary step to
implement the Policy, but one that would enable the inclusion of women's needs and concerns
into government's policy and all development plans. The ultimate goal here is to achieve a level
where government policies on economic, political and social spheres and all development
intervention plans become gender-sensitive and gender inclusive.

It is with this spirit and in line with the guiding principles of the National Policy on Women that
Women's Affairs Departments were established with in 13 strategically situated line ministries.
Similarly, in line with Government's decentralization process, and in order to ensure the
incorporation of gender in the planning and implementation of development programs. Within
the regional governments Women's Affairs Bureau were established in 10 regional governments

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and in two special administrative regions.

Even though Government machinery plays crucial role in the implementation of the Policy,
coordinated and concerted efforts of government, non-government and women organizations are
crucial to the successful implementation of the Policy. The Ethiopian National Policy on Women
also recognizes the significant role Non-Governmental Organizations can play in the
implementation of the Policy. "All NGO and donor countries engaged in development activities
here in Ethiopia too are expected to do their utmost toward the implementation of the Policy."

Likewise the Beijing Platform for Action put emphasis on the cooperation and collaboration of
governmental and non-governmental organizations in the implementation of the
Recommendations of the Forth World Women Conference held in Beijing in 1995. In line with
this spirit of collaboration, some joint initiatives of governmental and non-governmental
organizations have taken place at the national as well as in the regional states and local
government level.

Modalities of cooperation to strengthen Gender initiatives between the Government National

machinery (WAO at the Prime Minister Office) and the National Umbrella NGO organization
(CRDA) have reached to agreement. This agreement includes among others to cooperate in the
area of Gender Mainstreaming, Advocacy, capacity building and creating grassroots women
movement.

II. Mainstreaming

All development program at National and Regional levels should be able to integrate gender
concerns in their plans and program to see that women participate, contribute benefit and their
effort is recognized and technologically supported. Thus the mainstreaming of gender in all
development programs should focus at establishing a system where by each sector program
would use gender as a measuring indicator to quantify project and achievements. To this effect
developing appropriate tools and methodologies to Incorporate gender in the planning is
developed and being used. Problems are also identified and experiences of gender focal points
are being shared and modifications are in the process of being designed.

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[Link]

One of the contributing factors for the subordinate position of Ethiopian women is the existence
of harmful traditional practices that puts women in subordinate position and militates against
their equal growth and development. Thus more awareness and sensitization programs in
different issues on gender should be addressed and advocacy at different level both at the policy
and grass roots is so important and for this reason using different media and strategy through
formal and informal methodology is of paramount importance. Unified effort of concerned
groups is believed to make an impact and bring the desired attitudinal change. Already advocacy
strategy has been designed to be implemented by both government, NGO's and women groups
on issues such as FGM and other HTP's and on violence against women including domestic
violence.

IV. Capacity building

In order to make women more efficient in their work and be aware of their problems they need
to have skills through training, discussions, networking and other possible means to bring out
their potential and work in their full capacity. Thus to materialize the advancement of women at
all levels building the capacity of all the stake holders and more so the women themselves
through resource (allocation training) establishing appropriate infrastructure---etc. is a
mandatory step towards achieving our goal.

V. Organization

To fight against all existing discriminatory practices and problems faced by the Ethiopian
women and for the achievement of good governance, a voluntary and Independent women
organization at different levels is believed to be an essential instrument. To ensure the
participation of women and to raise awareness and to encourage grassroots women around a new
awareness of common interest organization is of a paramount importance. Women if organized
can serve as pressure groups and can voice their interests and needs and fight for their rights.
Facilitating and designing mechanisms is considered as a priority, allocation of special fund for
women organization is one of the mechanisms that is being worked upon. Women organizations
are believed to serve as special forum for women to get exposures to be informed on the rights
and as support mechanism so that their participation and their being beneficiaries can be

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guaranteed in every walk of their lives. Furthermore development interventions could be
channeled to benefit these organized women.

VI. National Machinery

Women's Affairs Office under the social sector of the Prime Minister’s Office with a portfolio
of a Minster is the national gender focal point. It is accountable to the Prime Minister and is
responsible for coordination and monitoring of Women's Affairs activities at a National level
and creating a conducive atmosphere for the implementation of policy at various levels and in
different sectors.

The Women's Affair Office also creates a forum where government and non-government
organizations at national level exchange experiences. On top of this it undertakes studies
focusing on the problems of women and devises strategies for the practical solutions to
problems.

At the sector level there are Women's departments in the various ministries established to bring
out the issues of women's based on the duties and responsibilities of the respective ministries.
The departments are accountable to the respective ministries and commissions but also report to
the Women's Affair Office of the Prime Minister concerning their annual plan and other
pertinent gender issues that need due attention.

In the same manner, the Regional Women's Affair offices are accountable to each Regional
Administrative Council. The duties and responsibilities included provision of assistance of
Women's affair offices in their respective regions at various levels. Moreover they help to create
favorable condition for the implementation of Women's policy and follow up, and monitor
various activities undertaken at regional level. They identify areas of concern based on the needs
and priorities of each region and plan to achieve the goals envisaged.

The Women's Affairs Committee, established in the Council of Peoples representatives is

entrusted with the role of scrutinizing and checking gender sensitivity of proclamation & laws
before their promulgation.

The democratization process the new constitution the women's policy and the institutional set up
have created conductive atmosphere for the promotion and the advancement of women and the

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implementation of the plan of action.

Since Beijing gains for women in social political and economic spheres have been registered.

In the political front, the government encourages women take full part in the political life of the
country. Presently, out of 548 seats, in the House of Peoples Representatives 2.3% is occupied
by Women. The Federal Council which has a woman as its-speaker has 7 women among its 128
members. At the Woreda council the number of women in office has reached 8% . It is evident
from these figures that the political empowerment of women although a good beginning, needs
to be further enhanced and promoted to increase the participation of women at all level .For the
next election in the year 2000 we have set a goal to reach 15% at the federal level and 20% at
local level.

In the economic sphere, women in Ethiopia are given important role in the implementation of
the Five Year Development Programme which is based on the Agricultural Development Led
Industrialization strategy. The question of access to and control over the land which has hindered
the rural women from enjoying their basic economic rights has been properly addressed by the
new Constitution of Federal Democratic Government of Ethiopia guaranteeing them equal rights
with men. Land redistribution programs undertaken in some regions had treated women equally
with men. In addition, the Government has put in place policy and legislative measures which
empowered women to have access to credit facilities and extension services and improved
agricultural technology.

In the social field, the 1993 Health Policy, has given a special attention to the health needs of the
family, particularly that of women & children. In this regard, primary health care services that
include Mother-Child Health (MCH) and reproductive health services are expanding with the
establishment of clinics & health centers specially in rural areas by local governments
Furthermore HIV/AIDS is a major concern and family planning activities have been intensified
in view of high fertility status of women in Ethiopia which is amongst the highest amongst the
highest in Africa. Vaccination against killer diseases among children is intensified to improve
the survival status of children.

A National Education Policy which aims at raising the enrollment rate & retention of girls is
being developed and implemented. The Ministry of Education is in the process of reviewing the

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education curricula. In the education sector development program gender is mainstreamed in the
different components such as curriculum, teacher training, capacity building and through
distance education to enhance the participation and performance of female students at different
levels. Indicators in education sector development program are set in that female participation
rate at primary is expected to be 45% and the number of female teachers 35%.

A center has been established within the education institution to carry out research, training , and
documentation on gender issues. This center plays a critical role in generating data on women
and men, provides training on gender and encourages university staff and students at
undergraduate level to focusing on gender related studies. It also provides information on gender
not only to the university community but also to the general public and has periodic publications
on gender and development issues. It collects research findings from various institutions for use
by different individuals and organizations.

In order to produce gender sensitive information to the public, journalists awareness level and
attitude towards gender equality has to be improved, thus gender training through in service and
pre service training programs for journalists is provided. On the other hand regular programs on
women and development have been established through national and regional radio, newspapers
and TV programs. Basic information has been gathered on women and art and research was
carried out to evaluate the gender dimension in media production

In fighting violence against women, necessary measures are being undertaken to sensitize the
public through extensive use of the mass media Regular training programs have been devised for
the police force to enhance their awareness on the issues of gender-based-violence, and increase
their capability to protect women and to provide assistance to victims of such violence.

The Government is also undertaking the overall review of its family law and penal codes to
identify and change any discriminating provisions. Legislative actions are now underway and the
first preliminary draft is issued for public discussion. It is also to be noted that Ethiopia has
ratified the two important international conventions relating to the rights of women i.e. The
convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Dissemination Against Women & the Convention
on the Political Rights of Women.

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VII. Participation of Civil Societies

The National Women's Policy with a goal of " --- facilitating conditions conducive to the
speeding up of equality between men and women---" needs and emphasize the cooperation and
collaboration of governmental and non-governmental organizations including any stake holders
that works in the country in order to bring changes in the lives of the people in Ethiopia and
particularly on the women are encouraged to work in harmony. NGO'S and women groups are
major partners in the implementation of the policy at grass roots level. The national machinery
both at the Federal level and regional level are playing a role of bridge between governments and
NGO'S, CRDA (Umbrella organization of NGO'S) organized "Beyond Beijing" conference
immediately after Beijing government representatives also attended the meeting and prioritized
poverty as a concern to Ethiopia where they can concentrate their activities in line with the
objectives of their organization. Thus where specific NGO'S and women groups are mentioned it
is as an illustration of a particular kind of activity in which NGO'S and women association have
acted as promoters of women's right.

Among such organizations are the CRDA (Umbrella organization at national level), Rural
Development organizations, Religious and community organizations and women professional
associations and movements are involved in the implementation of the National Plan of action
whereby poverty eradication being the priority focus.

Professional women association such as women lawyers, Midwives Nurse. Association and the
National committee for the eradication of harmful traditional practices are working together in
matters that are directly of their concerns.

The national committee for the eradication of harmful traditional practices has been playing
major roles in bringing about a change of attitude, knowledge and practice of various target
audience, through training and information campaign with the involvement of government
machineries health personnel's, school teachers and grassroots community members, traditional
and religious leader, Youth groups and government officials.

A national baseline survey targeting over 60 ethnic groups in the country has been conducted.
Practices affecting women and the girl child were identified among which are female genital
mutilation, early marriage abduction the desire for children etc. The women study center at the

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university of Addis Ababa also managed a study targeting several groups and sectors on
different practices including violence committed against women and children these studies
among others are expected to serve as document for designing strategies to be implemented both
by government and NGO's and community in their effort to reduce the HTP practices affecting
women and children.

[Link]'s Groups

Various women's organizations are formed to promote women issues in different areas. Women
organize themselves by professions by common goal or interest and organize themselves and
form associations by gender. The grass roots women have now formed associations so that they
have access to credit, training and get self-employment or create various activities that are
productive and beneficiary. They also look for sources of fund and have projects that improve
their lives and satisfy their basic necessities.

Professional women associations such as women's health association, women lawyer's

association, women education association, women association of the disabled target to tackle the
problems in the respective areas and target women's interests; they bring out issues where
women are disadvantaged and find solutions. They work in collaboration with other similar
organizations in and outside the country. They promote Women's capacity by providing training
programs and experience sharing forums.

There are also indigenous women associations that work at grass roots level in communities with
a focus on the specific needs of women in their respective communities. This are part of larger
development associations but focusing and targeting women. They provide skill training, credit
and introduce labor saving devices to minimize the labor of women with regards to household
chores and assist women to develop their leadership skills and participate in the democratization
process.

The Ethiopian women entrepreneurs association, the Ethiopian midwives association and the
national association for the handicapped women are some examples of the encouraging growth
of civil society whose concern lies in addressing the specific needs of women.

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IX. Gender Disaggregated Data

This is an important aspect to analyze the situation of gender by sex. The situation of women can
be seen and realized if their numbers, participation or whether they have been advantaged or
disadvantaged in different areas is clearly put in comparison to that of women. Now being
disaggregated such as census the number of population in the country by age, by sex and by
region. Education data show enrollment drop out, participation of girls and number of teachers,
field of study by sex and other such information. All sector programes are disaggregated but
particular emphasis has been given to Human Resource Development to be monitored quarterly
and annually so that the number of women benefiting would be known and problems would be
identified.

Many institutions now are desegregating data by computerizing the information and to target
women's interest. This help to bring our issues where women are disadvantaged and they find
solutions through policy and program intervention. Moreover gender indicators in planning,
monitoring and follow up of development programs allow women to consider their interest and
thereby participate and benefit at all levels of development. The Gender Departments in the line
ministries and the Regional Gender Bureaus have been very instrumental in the follow up and in
convincing planners to disaggregate targets by gender.

X. Budget For Women

The Ethiopian government has recognized the need for establishing special program and
affirmative action to improve the economic status of women in Ethiopia. Major policy changes
have been made to integrate gender dimension in development intervention affirmative action
has been taken to enhance women's access and control over productive resources such as the
revision of credit rules and the establishment of rural credit systems to reach marginalized
grassroots women. The formulation of gender indicators in development projects and programs
are some of the examples of gender sensitive intervention. On the other hand the
institutionalization of gender in all government development programs eventually allows women
to benefit from development interventions at all levels.

To improve the economic status of women and their access and control over economic resources
grassroots women have received training on income generation skills and have been provided

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credit. To establish income generating activities both the government and the private sector have
been able to give special focus to women's economic needs through the revision and adoption of
the existing credit system to enable women to have improved access to credits, hence the
establishment of special fund promotion institute to facilitate the establishment of micro credit
enterprise is a major step towards women's economic empowerment.

Considering women's employment as statistics show many women are employed in the informal
sector and in the non-clerical non skilled areas. Women Employed in the professional areas are
very few. There is a trend now that women who are qualified and who meet the required criteria
enter into these professions and in the positions that have primarily been held by men. The
Second Global Trade faire of women Entrepreneurs will be held in Addis. The Ethiopian
Women Entrepreneurs is playing major role with the African Federation. The Establishment of
women activity centers in five regions with the World Bank IDF grant is believed to facilitate
market outlets for poor women.

XII. Women in Decision Making

Although the number of women in decision making is still low the visibility of women in the
public area has been enhanced by the representation of women in parliament and the
appointment of a number of women to high public places previously dominated by men. These
areas of women representations include women parliamentarians, women ministers, women
bureau heads, women department heads and other such positions

This visibility has contributed to creating awareness in the population on gender issues and
move particularly aspirations to young girls. These women also play a role in the public arena
and become role models to other women in different sectors.

Women in decision making positions in government and legislative bodies contribute to

redefining priorities, placing items on the agenda that reflect and address gender specific
concerns and experiences and provide new perspective on mainstreaming.

[Link] Policy Changes and Outcome

Since the beginning of Beijing Conference, the government has formulated a number of policies,
and legislative frame works and gender concerns are integrated in most of the newly formulated

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policies and laws.

The national constitution has been developed to protect the fundamental rights of women and
their interest of access and control over resource, about equality among women and men in
marriage. It recognizes the history of inequality and discrimination suffered by women in
Ethiopia. Ethiopian women are entitled to remedial and affirmative measures to enable them to
compete and participate on the basis of equality with men in political, economic and social life.
Women have the right to protection by the state from harmful customs and practices that press
them or causes bodily or mental harm. They have equal right to employment, promotion,
affirmative action is undertaken to improve the employment status of women through the
revision of the civil service codes and existing labour laws

Women's access to and control over productive resources including access to farm land, water
and forest resources, new policies and program have been formulated and adopted with
increased gender consideration and equity.

Thus as regard to property and land rights the constitution states that women shall acquire,
administer control, use and transfer of property. With respect to use, transfer, administration and
control of land women have as equal access as men to benefit this. Employment, promotion and
transfer of pension are explicitly put in the constitution.

Access to family planning education information and capacity building activities are provided in
order to prevent harm during pregnancy and child birth and safe guard the mother health.

Concerning maternity leave the constitution also affirms that maternity leave will be provided
with full pay and the duration is determined taking into account the nature of the work, the
health of the mother and the well-being of the child and family.

XIV. Impact of Micro Economic Policies

Structural adjustment program and micro economic policies have shown different impact on
women and men. Women's burden in addressing their family needs has increased as a result of
the structural adjustment program. The Ethiopian government has taken special focus and
affirmative action to address women's specific needs in structural adjustment programs. Women
have been fully integrated in this program with the provision of credit and training to establish

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alternative employment opportunities for women. The women affairs sector at the prime
minister’s office, and sectional and regional women's affairs department and bureau have been
critically involved in following up the status of displaced women and their integration in to the
major intervention programs.

Opportunities and Challenges

Profound change in political, economic social and cultural relationships have dominated in
Ethiopia that provided women, government as well as NGO's with challenges concerning
women's [Link] has called for concert efforts to put into action the goals and strategies laid
down in the constitution, the National Women's Policy and the overall Rural-Centered
Development programme.

The national Gender Policy frame work and the constitution are meant to provide a frame work
which all government structure and development partners can use tackle women's' in their
general or specific activities.

It is also an opportunity to have not only legislative support, policy frame work but also
institutional arrangements that enables the mainstreaming of gender concerns in all programs
and activities as it was recommended by the Beijing platform for action for the advancement of
women.

In the five-year development strategic plan every effort being made empower women. It is rural
focused, agricultural led industrialization plan of development that we base and try to integrate
the Beijing platform for action prioritizing poverty among the twelve critical areas of concern.

Challenges

Despite all the positive and encouraging activities ahead is much more challenging when it
comes to implementation of the action plan.

Despite the fact of the political commitment, legal support and institutional arrangement the
bureaucratic resistance to accept the gender experts as equal partners and to the gender equitable
integration of woman as subject of public policy has made it more difficult to perform

135
effectively because of traditional set up of society and thinking.

More serious shortcoming is the absence of organizations as constituencies to the national

machinery's in the civil society, because of past experience and because of lack of resources
combined with reluctance of women themselves.

In order to accelerate the advancement of women in Ethiopia It is believed that trespassing from
the public to the private and from the private to the public is the mechanism that generates a
form of genuine grass roots feminism where solidarity links and communication networks to be
set up around anew awareness of common interests. Allocation of special fund for woman
organization is therefore a goal to be achieved by mid 1999, because women organizations are
believed to serves as special forum for women to get exposures to be informed on their rights
and to make pressures on their constitutional rights so that their participation and being
beneficiaries can be guaranteed in all walks of their lives.

The Implementation of the women's policy, at regional level is also designed so that each
institution has responsibility of its own.

INSTITUTIONAL RESPONSIBILITY

Bureau of Education  Formulate education system which

encourage female

 Introduce Gender class

 Make the Education Curriculum and

System more gender sensitive

 Ensure Gender balance in the

community training center

Bureau of Health  Enhance maternal services

 Enhance family planning

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  Promote more out reach services

 Train traditional birth attendants and

community health against

 Promote health education

 Gender balance in training for jounior

health workers

Bureau of Information, Culture and  Make a cultural policy

Tourism
 Make a marriage law, and promote IEC
regarding family law

 Create awareness against HTP

 Formulate anti-harmful Culture

 Facilitate gender information thorough

news papers, and other media.

Bureau of Labor and social Affairs  Safeguard the job security of women

 Ensure equal pay for equal job and

promotion

 Train employees about gender issue

 Provide supports for the elderly by

formulating programs, policies and projects

 Make research about prostitution and

design strategy to over come it

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  Train the unemployed

 Have gender dis-aggregated information

 Mediate resource to help and train

prostitutes

Bureau of Agriculture  Introduce extension service in activities

which are closely related to women such as
Vegetable, milk production, pollutery etc.)

 Encourage women head families to

participate in every program

 Assist women in getting credit and

inputs and extension services

Bureau of Trade and Industry  Gender balanced Training services

 Organize informal sector participants in

group and ensure credit

Civil Service Commission  Ensure equal pay for equal job

 Encourage women professionals to take

high government positions

 Safeguard job security for women

 Design a promotion strategy (Salary,

education)

Investment  Design an incentive scheme for women

investors

138
  Give special incentives for projects
which promote female employment and
services

Commission for Disaster Prevention and  Work program's through which Female
Preparedness victims (with no land and means of
Production) can have a sustainable support

 Give priority to women and children

 Create a gender sensitive appraisal

system for NGO projects

Plan and Economy  Establish a system where by reporting

and planning is dis-aggregated on gender
basis

 Use Gender equality as a basis for

program and project selection.

Police  Fight violence against women such as

rape

 Safe guard prostitutes from men

violence by training, counseling etc.

 Encourage more Female members in the

police

Department of Proscution  Defend women and ensure their rights

 Follow-up the implementations of the

legal and Political rights of women

139
  Creat legal consciousness among the
community

Justice office  Clear women cases very quickly

 Study on most frequent women cases

and conduct training on solving them

 Train traditional courts

Women's Bureau  Be a center for regional coordination

 Design a gender training manuals

 Coordinate gender activities

 Conduct extensive gender awareness

seminars

 Assist organized women

 Look for funds to assist rural land less

and urban poor women.

 Conduct surveys and different

researches on women's projects

Kebele Administration  Encourage women participation in

decision making and benefits from dev't
work

 Create awareness about gender equality

in all occasions

 Encourage involvement of women in

140
 various development committees

 Organize grass root level women

organization

 Support women association by

providing offices, land etc.

Technology and research Centers  Generate and strengthen appropriate

technology that reduce the work load of
women

Water Energy and Mining bureau  Encourage the participation of the

women in water committee

 Facilitate water provision

 Introduce and encourage the utilization

of energy saving technology

[Link] National Policy on Ethiopian Women

The main objectives of the National Policy of Ethiopian Women include, creating and facilitating
conditions for equality between men and women, creating conditions to make rural women
beneficiaries of social services like education and health, and eliminating stereotypes, and
discriminatory perception and practices that constrain the equality of women. A number of
strategies have also been designed to achieve the above objectives, two of which are the
participation of women in the formulation of policies, laws, rules and regulations, and ensuring
the democratic and human right of women. The structures were clearly put delineating the
responsibilities of the Women’s Affairs Office (WAO) under the Prime Minister Office and the
Regional and Zonal Women’s Affairs Sectors, and the Women’s Affairs Department (WAD) in
the various Ministries. However, assessments done over the years show that both the (WAO),

141
and the (WAD) in the sectoral ministries lack capacity: they have problems with resources and
qualified personnel. In many cases WADs are marginalized and gender is not mainstreamed in
many of the activities in the ministries. The structure has problems reaching the grassroots since
it stops at Woreda level, a problem that has limited the implementation of the policy.

The National Population Policy formulated in 1993 was an instrument aimed at harmonizing the
rate of population growth with the capacity of the country. The Policy gives serious attention to
the issue of gender and describes the important roles women play in controlling population
growth. It clearly stipulates that the situation of women has direct bearings on the fertility level
of any society and explains how their education, employment and the provisions in the laws
given to women are related to their fertility and reproductive health. The goals, objectives and
strategies give a central place to the situation and empowerment of women. The goals include
raising the economic and social status of women, empowering vulnerable segments of the society
such as young children and women, removing all legal and customary practices constraining
women’s economic and social development and the enjoyment of their rights. Many of the
strategies revolve around empowering women through education, employment in both
government and private sectors and eliminating cultural and legal barriers.

The Ethiopian Education and Training Policy also has some provisions given to women. One of
the specific objectives in the Education and Training Policy is to introduce a system of education
that would rectify the misconceptions and misunderstandings regarding the roles and benefits of
female education. The policy indicates that the design and development of curriculum and books
would give special attention to gender issues. It further states that equal attention would be given
to female participants when selecting teachers; training them, and advancing their careers. There
is also a statement included which indicates that financial support would be given to students
with promising potentials. A number of initiatives have been taken to implement the policy. For
example, female teachers are selected with less GPA than male teachers and this has increased
the number of female teachers in elementary schools. But a lot needs to be done at the high
school level. The Women’s Affairs Department in the Ministry of Education has prepared a
gender policy and undertakes a number of activities to help close the gender gap
in education.

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.
The Health Policy was one of instruments designed by the Government of Ethiopia to improve
the health status of people and to facilitate the provision of basic health services. Health is an
intersectoral matter that it cannot be addressed by any one policy or plan of action.

A statement in the health policy reflects this fact: “the government believes that health policy
cannot be considered in isolation from policies addressing population dynamics, food
availability, acceptable living conditions, and other requisites essential for health improvement
and shall therefore develop effective intersectorality for a comprehensive betterment of life”.
The goal of the health policy is to restructure and expand the health care system and to make it
responsive to the health needs of the less privileged rural population, which constitute the
overwhelming majority of the population, and are the major productive force of the nation. The
policy supports the democratization and decentralization of the health service system, and
strengthening intersectoral activities. The policy accords special attention to the health needs of
the family, particularly women and children, and hitherto most neglected regions, the rural
population, and pastoralists, as some of its priority areas.

Dear learner how do you evaluate the implication of health policy provisions to women in
your community?_______________________________________________________

The Cultural Policy formulated in October 1997 views culture as incorporating the different
social, economic, political, administrative, moral, religious, material and oral traditions, and
practices of the various peoples and nationalities of Ethiopia. It also recognizes that for
development efforts to be effective and sustainable, they have to take into considerations the
cultures of people, which impact on the thinking and activities.
The policy recognizes that the cultural behaviors, practices, and attitudes that support and
promote stereotypes and prejudices against women, those that constrain the expansion of family
planning services and the promotion of reproductive health should be slowly eliminated. Instead,
situations should be created that promote the equality of the sexes. The content of the Policy
clearly elaborates the unfavorable situation of women, and articulates the need for a change that

143
ensures women’s active participation in all cultural activities and guaranteeing them equal rights
to the benefits.

The Development Social Welfare Policy was formulated by the Ministry of Labor and Social
Affairs in November 1996. The main objectives of the policy is studying the causes of social
problems and designing preventive and rehabilitative programs with full participation of all
stakeholders including the grassroots. The Policy acknowledges that war, famine, economic
crises of the past decades have harmed vulnerable groups, i.e., women, the elderly, children,
youth and the disabled, and makes these groups the Policy’s central focus. It also explains that
women are underrepresented in every sphere including education, employment, politics, and
other key decision making positions.

It further mentions that one of the major causes of social problems is the economic dependence
of women on men. However, talking about the various groups such as children, youth, elderly,
and the disabled, it does not say about the special problems females encounter as children,
parents, youth, the elderly, and the disabled, nor does it mention the measures that need to be
taken to alleviate their problems. For example,
such problems as harmful traditional practices that victimize female children, teenage pregnancy
and abortion, the vulnerability of disabled women to various types of violence are not given
attention.
Community participation, partnership and coordination, capacity building of actors at various
levels, advocacy and awareness creation, implementation of international conventions and other
social welfare related laws, and establishment of data bank system are outlined to be some of the
major strategies. The policy also articulates that the issues of gender will be mainstreamed in all
programs, projects, and services in addressing the target groups mentioned in the policy.

Activity.4. Discuss the education and training policy provisions to women?

________________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________

144
The Federal Policy on Natural Resources and the Environment was formulated in April 1996
with the overall goal of improving and enhancing the health and quality of life of Ethiopians and
to promote sustainable social and economic development through the sound management and use
of natural, human-made and cultural resources and the environment as a whole to meet the needs
of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their
own needs.

The policy starts with a conceptual framework that contends that human resources are of great
value in themselves and as creators and maintainers of natural resources have to be developed
and cared for, if natural resources are to be developed and conserved.
The policy gives importance to participatory approach and the feeling of ownership in
developing and conserving natural resources and an important place is given to gender. It
underlines the importance of the integration of social, cultural, and gender issues in sustainable
resource and environmental management.
Giving a high priority to raising the status of women by increasing female participation in the
education system at all levels is indicated to be one of the strategies in the crosssectoral issues.
Increasing the number of women extension agents in natural resource and environmental
management and designing programs that involve and benefit the most disadvantaged groups,
particularly women, children, the disabled and the landless are considered important. The policy
considers the disaggregation of data related to environment and to natural and man-made
resource use and managementaddressing gender issues by ensuring that energy plans adequately
address fuel-wood requirement as two of the strategies in the development and conservation of
biomass energy resources. In mineral resource development one of the strategies is providing
support to women in mineral development with special practical training and technical assistance
particularly in small-scale and artisan mining.

The policy gives a central place to institutionally supporting and establishing “Women in
Development” desks at federal and regional government agencies concerned with natural
resources development and environmental management. These desks would scrutinize projects,
programs, policies, directives, rules, and regulations to ensure that gender issues are integrated.

145
Capacity building for local communities to enable them to fully enfranchise their women,
disables persons and, as appropriate, youth and children, to effectively participate in the planning
and implementation of all development activities is also given importance. The policy is gender
sensitive and it promotes highly the participation of vulnerable groups including women in
conserving, sustaining, and managing the environment.

Summary
Women in Development (WID) may be traced back to 1970 when Ester Boserup published a
book titled Women’s Role in Economic Development. The book attempted to analyse the
circumstances of women and men within the development process. This approach toward
understanding the situation of women in the overall development process also assisted in the
development of strategies aimed at redressing the differences that exist between men and women
and among women themselves.
.
Major WID concerns
In order to achieve balanced development, WID advocated the integration of women into the
development process as a whole. WID’s observations were premised on the following
observations:

 National development policies and plans overlook women’s needs and priorities;
 Women’s contribution to national development is overlooked and undervalued in
numerous sectors including in subsistence agriculture, the informal sector, and even in
the family economic sectors;
 Many historical and cultural factors have contributed to women’s limited access to
resources and the means and tools of development e.g. education and training services.
 Women are left out of the development process e.g. education, employment, legal
systems etc.

To achieve this integration of women into the development process, WID advocated the
introduction of programmes and projects for women only. WID also suggested deliberate

146
reforms in sectors such as education, health, employment etc that would see more women
participation.
Gender analysis is a systematic gathering and examination of information on gender differences
and social relations in order to identify understand, and redress inequities based on gender.
Gender analysis is a valuable descriptive and diagnostic tool for development planners and
crucial to gender mainstreaming efforts
Women's empowerment has five components:
 women's sense of self-worth;
 their right to have and to determine choices;
 their right to have access to opportunities and resources;
 their right to have the power to control their own lives, both within and outside the home;
and
 their ability to influence the direction of social change to create a more just social and
economic orders, nationally and internationally.
Ethiopia has an estimated total population of 84,320,987 (42,556,999 males and 41,763,988
females) in 2012. The country is predominantly rural with only about 16% of the population
living in urban areas.3 Accordingly, the economy is largely based on agriculture. Ethiopia has in
recent years recorded some of the highest economic growth rates worldwide and made
impressive progress towards many of the [Link] Government of Ethiopia has undertaken
major steps to improve the status of women, and to integrate them more fully into the
development process.

Checklist
Dear student, below are some of the important points which includes the objectives of this
chapter which you have already gone through. Mark () to say "Yes" or No" in the box below
and evaluate yourself about the topics discussed in the unit. If you tick "No" to most of the
topics, it means that you need to understand more until you achieve the objectives set at the
beginning of the unit. In this case you should go back to the discussion part and read very
carefully until you master all the topics.

Topics of Discussion Yes No

147
  I can clearly explain concept of WID
 I can describe concept of gender analysis
 I can clearly concepts of women empowerment
 I can elaborate gender mainstreaming
 I can explain issues of gender in Ethiopia
 I can explain gender and millennium goals in Ethiopia

Self-Assessment Questions
[Link]/False
[Link] approach advocated for implementation of separate projects for women
[Link] analysis is a valuable descriptive and diagnostic tools for development planners and
crucial to gender mainstreaming efforts.
3.A general gender policies by itself is often not effective, unless it can ensure that gender is
integrated in to all other institutionaland sector policies.
4. Women’s empowerment implies women taking over control previously held by men.
5. Ethiopia is the only county that will attend all millennium goals before 2015.
[Link] Answer Questions
1. What are the rationales for gender analysis?
2. Identify articles and discuss issues raised under these articles in labor law proclamation
377/2003 and public servant proclamation 262/2002 provisions to address discrimination of
women ?
Glossary of Basic Terms in the Module

Culture: The distinctive patterns of ideas, beliefs, and norms which characterise the way
of life and relations of a society or group within a society.

GAD: In contrast to WID (or Women and Development), the GAD (or Gender and
Development) approach focuses on the socially constructed basis of differences between
men and women and emphasizes the need to challenge existing gender roles and relations

Gender Analysis: The systematic gathering and examination of information on gender

differences and social relations in order to identify, understand and redress inequities
based on gender
148
Gender Awareness: Gender awareness is an understanding that there are socially
determined differences between women & men based on learned behaviour, which affect
their ability to access and control resources. This awareness needs to be applied through
gender analysis into projects, programmes and policies.

Gender Discrimination: The systematic, unfavourable treatment of individuals on the

basis of their gender, which denies them rights, opportunities or resources.

Gender Division of Labour: The socially determined ideas and practices which define
what roles and activities are deemed appropriate for women and men.

Gender Equality and Equity: Gender equality denotes women having the same
opportunities in life as men, including the ability to participate in the public sphere.
Gender equity denotes the equivalence in life outcomes for women and men, recognising
their different needs and interests, and requiring a redistribution of power and resources

Gender Mainstreaming: An organisational strategy to bring a gender perspective to all

aspects of an institution’s policy and activities, through building gender capacity and
accountability

Gender Needs: Shared and prioritised needs identified by women that arise from their
common experiences as a gender.

Gender Planning: The technical and political processes and procedures necessary to
implement gender-sensitive policy.

Gender Relations: Hierarchical relations of power between women and men that tend to
disadvantage women.

Gender Training: A facilitated process of developing awareness and capacity on gender

issues, to bring about personal or organizational change for gender equality

Sex :This is a biological term referring to male or female depending on their sex organs

Sex role :This is a role which a male or female assumes because of the anatomical
differences between the sex

149
 References

1. Afshar, H. (1987) (eds) Women, State and Ideology: Studies from Africa And Asia.
The Macmillan Press Ltd. London
2. AusAID 1997, Guide to Gender and Development, AusAID, Canberra.
3. Birdsall, N.; and McGreevey, W.P. 1983. Women, poverty, and development. In Buvinic,
M.; Lycette, A.; McGreevey, W.P., ed., Women and poverty in the Third World. Johns
Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD, USA. pp. 3–13.
4. Braidotti, R.; Charkiewicz, E.; Häusler, S.; Wieringa, S. 1994. Women, the environment
and sustainable development: towards a theoretical synthesis. Zed Books, London, UK.
5. Buvinic, M. 1984. Projects for women in the Third World: explaining their misbehavior.
International Center for Research on Women, Washington, DC, USA.
6. CAFRA (Caribbean Association for Feminist Research and Action). 1993. CAFRA
News, 6(2).
7. DAC (Development Assistance Committee) no date, Gender Equality Tipsheets, OECD
Development Assistance Committee Working Party on Gender Equality, Paris,
<[Link]/dac/gender> (accessed online).
8. Evans, Alison 1992, ‘Statistics’, in LiseØstergaard (ed.) Gender and Development: A
Practical Guide, Routledge, London and New York.
9. Hunt, J. (2004). ‘Introduction to Gender Analysis Concepts and Steps”. Development
Studies Network. Development Bulletin, No. 64, pp.100-106
10. Moser, Caroline O 1989, ‘Gender planning in the Third World: Meeting practical and
strategic gender needs’, World Development, 17(11), 1799–1825.
11. Word Bank Report(2012,2013)

Answer Key for Chapter One Self-Assessment Questions

Chapter.1

[Link] political activists commonly campaign on issues such as reproductive rights

(including but not limited to the right to choose an abortion, the elimination of legal restriction

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on abortion, and access to contraception), violence within a domestic partnership, maternity
leave, equal pay, sexual harassment, street harassment, discrimination, and sexual violence.

For further discussion go back to the sub-section “Feminist Views” and read more.
[Link] are actually many types of feminist theories and movements. However, the dominant
ones are
a. Liberal Feminism
b. Radical Feminism
c. Marxist Feminism
d. Black Feminism
For further discussion go back to the sub-section “Types of Feminism” and read more.
[Link] the sub-section “Black feminism”
4. Socialization is the process, through which the child becomes an individual respecting his or
her environment laws, norms and customs. Gender socialization is a more focused form of
socialization, it is how children of different sexes are socialized into their gender roles and taught
what it means to be male or female. The socialization process is an all-encompassing educational
process from which values, goals, beliefs, attitudes, and sex-roles are acquired. Socialization is
nothing more than the educational process by which we learn everything.

5. Gender identity involves all the meanings that are applied to oneself on the basis of one's
gender identification while , gender roles might include women investing in the domestic role
and men investing in the worker role (Eagly 1987).

Chapter.2
Part.I
[Link] [Link] [Link] [Link]

[Link].
On a global level, relative to men, women’s lives are more centered in the home, a fact which is
immediately related to observed gender biases. In less developed nations, this domestic
specialization effectively excludes women and girls from society at large. The exclusion can be

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externally-imposed, as in some developing or Arabic countries, or internally by the women’s
own choices. Societal norms and rules may exclude women from particular types of paid
employment or leadership positions. On the other hand men may be excluded from child care
and the home sphere, which is considered the woman’s territory. This traditional division of
labor within the household makes some of the stylized facts that follow understandable

Chapter.3.
Part.I. True/False
[Link] 2 True 3 False 4 True 5 False
Chapter.4.
1. Economic growth, with increasing demand for skilled labour, can also have a positive effect
on gender equality, including educational opportunities. In the right circumstances, virtuous
circles can be created i.e. less gender inequality in education can lead to economic growth than
can lead to less gender inequality. But improving gender equality in education will only be
effective in promoting growth in countries with social and cultural institutions allow women to
take advantage of being more educated.

2.. Land Use Administration Laws are all enacted in conformity to the constitutional laws (Art. 5
and 10 of Proc. 89/97 of the Federal Land Administration Law) ensured equal rights of women
in respect to the use, administration and control of land with respect to transferring and
bequeathing holding rights.

[Link] and development is important because it focuses on connections between gender and
development initiatives and feminists’ perspectives, and deals with issues such as health and
education, decision making and leadership, peace building, violence against women and
economic empowerment. Development cannot be realized without the very significant
component of gender. Countries the world over have proved that exclusion of women in
development has rendered their development efforts futile. Due to this realization, gender parity
has become central to the development process everywhere, in international forums especially.

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As the world is focusing on development as a means of alleviating world poverty, removing
particularly gender inequalities will give the world a better chance to develop

Chapter .5.
[Link]/False
[Link] [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link]

[Link].
1. Rationale for Gender Analysis:

 It helps in realistic planning

 Allows identification of constraints, and opportunities
 It provides accurate information about the relations of men and women in different
activities based on people’s own experience.
 It brings gender-based inequalities to the forefront and reveals their causes and effects.
 It can transform the gender attitudes of the parties involved.
 It can prevent planning from giving rise to activities that increase inequalities and weaken
the status of women.
 It helps people make better and more sustainable decisions about the contents of
development cooperation projects.
 It increases the impact and quality of development cooperation in general.

[Link] accordance to Labor and Public Service proclamations, women are not to be discriminated
against as regards employment and payment on the grounds of sex; special protection is accorded
to pregnant women (Labor Law: Proclamation 377/2003: Art. 87); No sex-based discrimination
and female candidates are given preferential treatment to fill vacancies (Public Servants
Proclamation 262/2002: Art. 13); Widow’s and widowers have been given equal status in
pensions (Proc. 190/99) by amending Article 4 of the Public servant law of the 1962 that
discriminated women concerning pension.

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