Gender and Practice Study Group

Date: November 18^th 2009

Time: 1.30- 5.30pm

Place: Room 1 at Friend's Meeting House, Euston Road, opposite Euston station, Central London

Title: What makes a difference for women experiencing violence? A critical study of different approaches to tackling violence against women across the global south.

Download the full notes of the meeting here

The purpose of the afternoon will be to explore critically a range of approaches to tackling violence against women, from issues of prevention through to healing and new opportunities after the experience of violence. Obviously there are a huge range of behaviours covered by VAW including rape, sexual offences, domestic abuse, FGM, early and forced marriage. The kinds of violence women face vary according to their cultural context, whether it is peace, war or post conflict, religious beliefs and the legal context. The effects of violence are equally wide ranging including psychological and physical trauma, the spread of HIV and AIDS, death in some cases, loss of confidence, unwillingness to go into public spaces, disgrace for the family and much more.

This session will focus on some of the issues around VAW and explore different approaches to tackling these. Four speakers will present their own experiences and questions about what works and what is not working, and everyone who comes will be given an opportunity to contribute their own experiences of development approaches to tackling VAW, from a critical perspective. The deep rooted beliefs and norms that entrench violence against women are hard to change and the afternoon will try and explore openly and honestly where there is progress and where challenges lie.

The meeting will be chaired by Ceri Hayes, ex Policy Director at Womankind and a Social Development Consultant.

1.30 Arrive and coffee/tea

Speakers, from 2-3.30 pm

Emilia Muchawa, the Director of Zimbabwe Women Lawyer's Association, "Securing Protection for Women using the Domestic Violence Act in Zimbabwe: Challenges and Successes".

Suzanne Williams, Social Development Consultant and Contemporary Artist "Working From Within - The 'We Can' campaign to end violence against
women"

Brita Fernandez Schmidt, Senior Policy Advisor, Women for Women, ‘From victim, to survivor to active citizen - addressing violence against women in countries affected by conflict'

Dr Purna Sen, Head of the Human Rights Unit at the Commonwealth Secretariat, ‘A human rights approach to VAW?'

3.30-4 Contributions from the floor

4pm onwards Coffee/tea in small discussion groups

5.30 End

Feminist implications of the Global Financial Crisis 31st March 2009

This meeting was successfully held on 31st March 2009 and thanks to all who came, and especially the excellent speakers: Deniz Kandyotti, Nikki van der Gaag, Pauline Wilson, Diane Elson and Ruth Pearson.

Reports of most of the presentations can be found below

We need to think how best to build on this work and follow it up later in the year, perhaps with a special focus on lobbying/influencing work around setting the agendas for debates on women's rights and the impact of the crisis on gender inequality and women's position. meanwhile, thanks to all who made this an exciting meeting of practiitioners, activists and academics (and some people are I know all three!)

Papers from the meeting

Overview - T. Wallace

Discussion, Feedback and Action Points - T. Wallace

From Feminism to Gender Studies - D. Kandyotti

Gender Equality and the Economic Crisis (presentation) - D. Elson

Impact of Global Financial Crisis on Girls and Young Women - N. van der Gaag

The Food Crisis: From Strategy to Reality (presentation) P. Wilson

10 points for Tracking the Impact of the Financial Crisis on Women - D. Elson

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Untangling the Knots: Revisioning Feminist Engagement with Development

Download the report here

Tuesday February 5th, 11am- 4pm

The Friends Meeting House, Room 9
Euston Road
London WC1
[just opposite Euston train station]

The drive to mainstream gender and make it acceptable to the bureaucracies of aid has ripped the heart of the commitment to promote women’s rights and enable women to change their position in society that led feminists to engage with development. The political project of women mobilizing for change and empowering themselves seems to have got lost along the way. “Gender” became a password, then a catchword, and – some would say – it’s now become a hollow buzzword, robbed of its political and analytical bite. And “feminism” fell out of view, a term considered too harsh and too confrontational by some, and too much of a throwback by others. So where are we now? Is it time to revive the F-word and rehabilitate the G-word and find a way to put both to use to further the struggle for justice and equality for all in an ever more unequal and violent world? What would it take to untangle the knots and revitalise a gender agenda that’s run adrift?

An exciting discussion about future directions for feminist engagement with development and hear from a diversity of speakers, including Henrietta Moore from the LSE, Oxfam’s Jo Rowlands, Zimbabwean feminist digital artist Tessa Lewin and a number of others working across the academy-policy-practice interface. Speakers will open a debate to be pursued in intimate small group discussions and plenary, as part of a process aimed at the creation of a space to imagine alternatives and think to the future. 

The workshop was convened by Andrea Cornwall of IDS and Tina Wallace, Convenor of the DSA Study Group on Gender, Policy and Development Practice.
 
To keep discussions intimate and focused, the workshop had limited places.