Gender and the millenium development goals

Abstract

It has taken nearly half a century for the goals of poverty reduction and gender equality to achieve this prominence in mainstream policy concerns. In the process, the understanding of poverty has been transformed from the early equation with income poverty to a more multi-dimensional understanding. This includes its human dimensions as well as its structural causes. The understanding of gender issues has also grown, but more slowly and unevenly. This is partly political, since gender equity may be threatening to the power and privilege of policy-makers themselves rather than being confined to a constituency ‘out there’. However, it is also partly conceptual and lies in the nature of mainstream macroeconomic analysis, models and methodologies. The work of gender advocates and feminist academics has helped to keep gender issues alive in the development agenda in some form or other since the 1970s. Moreover, the clear links that have been identified between poverty and gender inequality, particularly where SAPs have been imposed, have shown that unless macroeconomic thinking is better informed by gender analysis, macroeconomic policy will remain gender blind