An analysis of feminist development theories between 1970 and 1995

An analysis of feminist development theories between 1970 and 1995

This essay will analyse the three dominating approaches to gender equality in the late 20th century in order to understand the successes and failures that have led to the current feminist movement in the development sector. Women in Development, Gender and Development and Women’s Empowerment demonstrate a notable shift in feminist development theory and by analysing each approach, it becomes clear in how each shift has had a positive impact on the progress of gendered development.

 Women In Development

Women in Development (WID) was a pioneering feminist perspective where liberal feminism emerged in the early 1970s in response to the modernisation theory, which carried the assumption that women were particularly recessive in development progress (Boserup, 1970). Modernisation approaches to development believed that if the Global South was to develop like the Global North, it needed to abandon traditional agricultural societies and embrace industrialisation to achieve the necessary growth. This created an ideology of the Global North as a ‘conflict-free, classless, democratic, egalitarian arrangement’ vis-à-vis Western capitalism, which overlooked the individual cultural, societal and political factors that vary within the Global South (Greig et al., 2007). The ideology remained ignorant to women’s needs, therefore as a response, WID set out to specifically integrate women into aid policies and programmes (Koczberski, 1998).

Male dominance became a hindrance in the integration approach within development agencies, which created the narrative poverty alleviation and basic needs should be the sole focus for women. Women were continuously denied equal access to resources, which led to criticisms of WID as it seemed to do little to challenge the patriarchy when put into practice. Having a linear view on women’s priorities and needs also failed to challenge the core principles of the modernisation theory.

The integration of WID not only emphasised a divide between men and women, but also created a bias between skilled Western women who were introduced into development agencies as WID experts, and Third World women who were left to play a secondary role in the framework (Koczberski, 1998). Mohanty (2003) criticised western feminists for generalising the Third World woman as a singular, monolithic other with a believed shared oppression. Despite being the first liberal feminist movement in an otherwise welfare-dominated scope, WID approaches were to make little progress until feminist discourse removed the barrier that classified women as a homogenous group.

 Gender and Development

As a shift towards neoliberalism took place in the broader development agenda, feminists criticised the capitalist nature of the development process for having adverse impacts on the productive and reproductive lives of women due to an increased focus on the commercialisation of agriculture and industrialisation (McIlwaine & Datta, 2003). This sparked a shift from WID to Gender and Development (GAD), an approach that analysed women’s subordination as a way to address inequalities and redistribute the power between genders. Women were no longer categorised as a homogenous group and divisions such as class, caste and race were introduced to feminist development theory.

The transition in feminist thinking from ‘women’ to ‘gender’ sparked an approach that encouraged power sharing between men and women as a fundamental human right (Chant & Gutmann, 2000). The GAD framework changed the feminist perspective from needs-based to rights-based and for the first time the violation of women’s rights, such as sexual rights and gender-based violence, were now being acknowledged in the wider development forum.

Through a new differentiation between groups of women that had never before been formally identified, GAD gave feminists of the Global South a platform to champion their views, which were previously addressed by Western feminists on their behalf. Of particular significance was the assembly of Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), a network of scholars, researchers and activists from the Global South working towards overcoming poverty and gender injustices. That said, a divide remained between Western feminists and their Southern counterparts due to the elitist language used within the GAD framework, alienating activists on the ground in the Global South (Nagar, 2002). It became evident through GAD that the knowledge women share amongst themselves must be ‘produced and shared in theoretical languages that are simultaneously accessible and relevant to multiple audiences’ (Nagar, 2002).

GAD signified a considerable shift in the way women’s rights were being perceive