Gender Mainstreaming

Fight against repression, marginalization, stigmatized identities and quest for equality has been a part of human history. Rapid growth ideology has impacted country in two critical ways. Firstly, it has lead to the exclusion of poor and the vulnerable communities from the development discourses and secondly, violating of human rights against those who question the current form of development emanating from crony capitalism. One of the noteworthy developments to counter the majoritarian hegemony in the current scenario is that of identity formation to safeguard their basic rights. Vulnerable communities on the basis of exclusion and discrimination have started organizing themselves on collective identities. Dehumanizing experiences faced by

Supporters of Feminist ideas perceive the term gender not merely as physical, biological differences between males and females but as “a set of culturally shaped and defined characteristics associated with masculinity and femininity” (Beauvoir, 1997). “The term ‘gender’ refers to the culturally expected behavior of men and women based on roles, attitudes and values ascribed to them on the basis of their sex” (International Committee of the Red Cross, 2004).

The concept of gender mainstreaming was first proposed at the 1985 Third World Conference on Women in Nairobi. The idea was formally introduced in 1995 at the Fourth World Conference in Women in Beijing. According to United Nation’s Economic and Social Council (UN ECOSOC)

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 policies and programmes in all political, economic and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is not perpetuated. Gender mainstreaming is not merely a question of social justice, but is essential for ensuring unbiased sustainable human development.

Being part of the mainstream means that women and men have equitable access to resources, including opportunities and rewards. It implies equal participation in influencing what is valued in shaping options within society. Becoming part of the mainstream means sharing equitably in the benefits of development, Becoming part of the mainstream offers the opportunity to influence who does what in a society, who owns (and can own) what, who has access to jobs and income, who controls the society’s resources and institutions, who makes decisions, who sets priorities (Taylor,