Integrating Gender into Environmental Research and Policy
Joekes, Susan; Green, Cathy and Leach, Melissa (1996).
(Working Paper). Institute of Development Studies
Community participation has become a buzz word in water supply and sanitation projects, but it is no panacea. Failure to address gender biases in community organizations can undermine project performance as seen in the Macina Wells Project in Mali. An evaluation of this project in 1994 found both men's and women's work to be substandard. Women, assigned the task of well cleaning by older, authoritative male caretakers, neglected this task because it was added on to their already overloaded work schedules and because many of the male-imposed rules of the well were impractical and illogical. Women were given minimal influence over project planning, kept out of key decision-making responsibilities, and excluded from all technical aspects of the project. The allocation of men to high-status tasks also proved to be counterproductive since men lacked the incentive to carry out work related to water provision and sanitation which they felt to be in women's domain.
Recent research in many different settings has arrived at a new understanding of the links between gender relations and environmental management which carries very different policy implications; chiefly, that it is necessary to understand that men's and women's interests and incentives may be very different; that women must not be expected to participate in or contribute to resource use practices from which they themselves will not benefit and must, at least, be paid for labour contributions to a project on the same terms as men; and that local project management procedures must be designed to give real representation to women's interests. It is vital that policy makers avoid focusing exclusively on women's subsistence roles, and recognize the importance of their market-related activities as well as their range of livelihood choices taking into account that women generally have less command over cash than men and that where men control household expenditure, they may not give proper weight to women's interests or priorities.
One new approach, ecofeminism, which ascribes high spiritual value to women's environment-related sustenance activities such as the everyday provisioning of water, fuelwood, and food as well as to the reproductive sphere in general, sees women as environmental nurturers who promote environmental conservation. Although ecofeminism militates against the dominant male-oriented model of development as economically and socially subordinating women, the targeting of projects to women has had limited and sometimes counterproductive outcomes adding new "environment" chores to women's already heavy work load, and creating unrealistic expectations of women's ability to fix environmental problems.
Gender sensitivity and alternative approaches to this male - female divide are needed in environmental policy making and programme and project interventions. Women's involvement with natural resources may reflect gender-divided roles and lack of any other economic opportunity rather than an inherent caring relationship. The "specialness" of women's environmental knowledge is also open to debate since men also have particular expertise. Gender differentials in agro-ecological expertise are seen to be related to experience derived from the gender division of labour and not to any inherent biological difference between men and women. Another concern is that, while differences of interest between men and women are established, there is little concern to explore possible differences among sub-groups of men and sub-groups of women. Changes in macro-economic policies, infrastructural development or market conditions may alter the incentives for local resource users to produce or extract different products and so can have a profound effect on local environmental management, and on women's and men's involvement in it. A broad based model of the links between gender relations and environmental management is now favoured. If gender issues are to be properly addressed, however, it is incumbent on policy makers and on designers and implementers of development interventions to ensure that interventions do not deprive women of command over resources either absolutely or relatively to men.
