Gov1 ojobo atuluku

Gender Training for Government Officials
by
Ojobo Atuluku - BPW - Nigeria
www.dip.com.ng
Gender responsive public service provision; meeting
the strategic interest of the excluded- usually women
and girls; producing results for women and girls
24th May, 2014
“Empowered Women Leading Businesses”
The XXVIII BPW International Congress 23rd -27th May 2014
BPW International Congress, Jeju, South Korea Atuluku,
Ojobo Atuluku - BPW - Nigeria www.dip.com.ng
1

Gender Responsive Governance
• Undertakes analysis for gender differentiation as males and females are not the same.
Neither females nor males are a homogenous group
• Take an interested in having adequate knowledge regarding major factors that influence
and are responsible for maintaining or changing the structure of gender differences.
• For gender balanced development to happen, policy makers need to aim in relation to
gender to
– Create or deepen awareness,
– Generate knowledge,
– Improve skill and behaviour
• For gender equality and women empowerment to happen, officials must of necessity
be able to
– Step back and be honest about their position on gender equality
– Develop skills – theirs and others’,
– Build capacity to translate awareness into very specific practical tools
• Show evidence based results for gender segregated populations
24th May, 2014
Ojobo - BPW - Nigeria www.dip.com.ng 2

Underlying assumptions for this presentation
• Gender not only the social construct attached to being male or
female but also the power relations that exist between men
and women in public and private spheres; in formal and non-
formal settings; changing across time, across cultures, across
class, across geography,
• Government and policy makers as duty bearers and citizens as
rights holders
• Equality and inclusion fundamental in good governance
regardless of other socio-economic, geographic or political
characteristics
• Government officials are duty bearers in their role in public
service24th May, 2014

Underlying assumptions for this presentation (2)
• In all major comparative development indices, females fare
worse than males
• A focus on those worse off is central to development thus a
focus on women and girls as actors and subjects of
development is a powerful ‘transforming’ tool for change
• Simultaneous attention to systems, institutions, processes in
Government and in the communities and social groups
• Men and women are partners in transforming the status quo
• Fundamentally, gender is personal and it is political
24th May, 2014

Critical Areas of Concern for Government
Officials concerned with change
1. Poverty – the persistent and increasing burden of poverty on women
2. Education – inequalities and inadequacies in and unequal access to education and training
3. Health – inequalities and inadequacies in and unequal access to health care related services &
reproductive health/rights
4. Violence – Violence against women - Gender based violence
5. Armed conflict & insecurity- as it relates to women as victims, survivors and decision makers
6. Economy – Inequality in economic structures and policies, in all forms of productive activities and
in access to resources
7. Power & decision making – Inequality between men and women in the sharing of power and
decision-making at all levels
8. Institutional mechanisms – for the advancement of women (decentralized and strengthened)
9. Human rights - Lack of respect for human rights of women
10. Media – Stereotyping of women and inequality in women’s access to and participation in all
communication systems, especially in the media
11. Environment – gender inequalities in the natural resources and in the safeguard of the
environment
12. The girl child – violation of the rights of the girl child and her invisibility
13. Women with disabilities
24th May, 2014

Gender Responsive Governance
• To attain gender responsive governance, leaders need to have activities
that are able to
– Understand the history that has kept women subjugated and discriminated
against
– Raise consciousness and create empowerment of women, individually or
collectively for long term, not largesse such as giving annual party/gift,
– Find ways of making project design and implementation or service delivery more
gender sensitive by involving the excluded and marginalized especially women
and girls
– Bring about changes to how Government system and its institutions work to
benefit women and men, girls and boys
• With the knowledge, appropriate policy, intervention can be designed to
enhance women’s status enabling them to take an equitable and just place
with men and to participate equally in the development process.
24th May, 2014

To Empower Women
• We need to believe that Women should play an active role in determining
their own lives/choices
• We ought to aim to empower women in leadership across sectors & spaces
and build self-belief/esteem
• Government Policies have to be as much about process as about product;
arising from the grassroots; organizing and politically mobilizing;
consciousness raising, popular education, developing critical thinking;
protecting fundamental human rights
• Don’t make it an issue of paying lip service to empowerment and participation
by a ministry, department or agency; but make it potentially very challenging
to power relations: concept of gender equality has become co-opted and de-
politicized
• Let it be action led by women and girls, for women and girls, in partnership
with men and boys
24th May, 2014

To bring about change, identify gender roles
This involves learned behavior in a given society, that condition
which activities, task and responsibilities are perceived as male
and female i.e. who does what in a given community. Work can
be divided into
• Production
• Reproduction
• Community managing role and
• Community politics
24th May, 2014

Productive Work
• activities carried out by men and women
–production of goods and services
• consumption -subsistence and
• trade
• functions and responsibilities may differ
–the gender division of labour
–women’s productive work would be less visible and
less valued than men’s
24th May, 2014

Reproductive Work
• Care and maintenance of the household and its
members
–Fundamental for survival
–Regarded as not being ‘real work’
–Usually unpaid for.
–Very likely manual, labour intensive, time consuming
–More probably to be responsibility of women and
girls
24th May, 2014

Community Work
• Involves the collective organization of
– social events and services,
– ceremonies and celebrations,
– community improvement activities,
– participation in groups and organizations, local political activities etc.
• Not captured in economic analyses
• Voluntary time
• Important for
– the spiritual and cultural development of communities and
– Helps develop community organizing and identity.
• Both women and men engage in community activities
– a gender division of labour also prevails here
24th May, 2014

Community Politics role
• Activities undertaken primarily by men
–At the community level,
–Organising at the formal political level.
–Results in increase in power and status.
24th May, 2014

Triple Role Multiple Burden
• Women, men, boys and girls are likely to be involved in all three areas
of work.
• In many societies, however, women do almost all of the reproductive
and much of the productive work. Any intervention in one area will
affect the other areas.
• Women’s workload can prevent them from participating in developing
projects.
• When they do participate, extra time spent on farming, producing,
training or meetings means less time for other tasks, such as child care
or food preparation.
24th May, 2014

1st step: Undertake a Gender Needs Assessment
• Women as a non-homogenous group
–have particular needs and interests which differ from those
of men as a non-homogenous group,
–not only because of women’s triple work role,
–but also because of their subordinate position to men in
most societies.
• These needs and interests could be
–practical or
–strategic
24th May, 2014

Practical Gender Needs:
• These are often linked to women’s
– reproductive role,
– to inadequacies in living and working conditions and
– to basic survival strategies.
• Meeting practical needs does not change the relationships which
maintain the subordinate position of women as a disadvantaged
group.
• Needs shared by all household members
– yet identified specifically as practical gender needs of women
– women assume responsibility for meeting these need
• No challenge to the subordinate position of women
• But they arise out of such position.
24th May, 2014

Practical gender needs may include:
• Water provision.
• Health care.
• Income earning for household provisioning.
• Housing and basic services.
• Family food provision.
24th May, 2014

Practical Gender Needs & Interests
• Tend to be immediate, short-term
• Specific to certain women
• Related to daily needs: food, housing, income, children’s
health, etc.
• Easily identifiable by women
• Can be satisfied by accurate/precise elements: food, hand
pumps, clinics
24th May, 2014

The satisfaction of practical needs and interests
• Tend to make the women beneficiaries and sometimes
participants
• Can improve women’s living conditions
• Generally, does not change the traditional roles and social
relations
24th May, 2014

Strategic Gender Interests
• Related to women’s subordination to men.
• Relate to issues such as equal pay for work of equal value,
rights to land and other capital assets, domestic violence,
women’s control over their own bodies.
• Meeting these needs may require “Social Engineering” (Use of
policies to deal with social problems).
• Meeting these needs helps women to achieve greater equality
and challenges their subordinate position.
24th May, 2014

Strategic gender interests may include:
• Abolition of sexual division of labour.
• Alleviation of the burden of domestic labour and child care.
• The removal of institutionalized forms of discrimination such
as rights to own land or property.
• Access to credit and other resources.
• Equal pay for equal work.
• Freedom of choice over family planning and child bearing.
• Measures against male violence (GBV) and control over women
24th May, 2014

The satisfaction of strategic interests
• Tend to make the women agent of change or empower them
to become agents
• Can improve the situation the woman has in the society
• Can give more power to women and transform the social
relations
• Gives room for the development of the whole society
24th May, 2014

Conclusion
• The Women Empowerment Principles is a veritable tool for achieving
gender equality results through policy
• As a female in Government, decide what legacy you want to leave
behind
• The world bank says investing in women is smart economics - investing
in girls is smarter economics
• Woman in the public domain straddle two worlds:
– understanding where women are coming from
– Authorized role in the development for the state.
• It is therefore easy to be able to make decisions and stand as a
champion for all issues pertaining to gender equality and women
empowerment
24th May, 2014

Gov1 ojobo atuluku

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