• Gender equity and development

Gender equity and development: Embracing an intersectional lens

Despite decades of engagement for gender equity, equal rights and opportunities for all genders has not been achieved - in fact, we are experiencing a global backlash against women’s rights and the very concept of gender and gender equity, which often go hand in hand with the criminalization of homosexuality and transgender identities. This points to the intersectional nature of gender, which means that gender-related discrimination is experienced differently depending on other social categories that gender overlaps with, such as sexuality, race, class, caste etc.

Gender-related research at IDOS ranges from concepts and methodologies originating from Gender and/or Feminist Studies, to critical reflections on the positionality of researchers who are themselves social actors and thus embedded in power relations.

In the context of a turn towards deliberate emancipatory development cooperation (sometimes labeled ‘feminist development policy’), IDOS researchers seek to move beyond merely naming discriminatory practices and structures towards dismantling the power relations that have created and perpetuate them. This requires intersectional analyses and a commitment to support the most marginalized communities as well as a concerted effort to link individual narratives on sexual politics to collective contestations of hierarchy and power.

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