LIST OF PANELS

Gender mainstreaming and gendered policy analysis has been conceptualised, programmatically applied, and empirically evaluated by scholars and policy professionals for more than three decades.  Over this period, there have been significant cross-national, subnational, and temporal variations in the adoption, adaptation, and institutionalisation of machinery and processes supporting gender expertise within the state (Hawkesworth, 2012; Hoard, 2015; McBride and Mazur, 2012; Paterson and Scala, 2021; Sawer, 2020; True and Mintrom, 2001).  Numerous strategies and instruments, including gender impact assessments, gender responsive budgeting, and feminist foreign policy, have also been promulgated by international organisations seeking to prompt states to reduce gender gaps and enhance gender inclusive governance and ‘growth’ (ILO, 2020; IMF, 2021; OECD, 2017; WTO, 2021; UN Women, 2022). 

Despite these initiatives, comparative evidence indicates that gender-expert policy capacity is regularly resisted, contested, and delegitimised in ways that “mainstream” policy expertise is not (Bustelo et al, 2016; Kunz and Prügl, 2019; Paterson and Scala, 2017; 2021). In addition, gender mainstreaming approaches have been critiqued for not adequately addressing intersectionality, Indigeneity, and decolonisation (Bilge, 2014; Clark, 2016; Liska, 2015; Nasht, 2017; Pihama, 2020).

These are important challenges for the study and practice of gender analysis, expertise, and building policy capacity. The timing is right for further engagement on this topic given policy capacity more generally has garnered renewed interest over the past decade or so.  For example, policy researchers and government agencies have investigated what policy capacity involves in an environment where bureaucrats find themselves working on increasingly complex problems, that require rapid policy responses, for multiple ‘masters’ and stakeholders (Howlett & Wellstead, 2011; Newman et al 2017; Peters, 2015; Washington and Mintrom, 2018; Wu et al 2015). 

To date there has been limited connection between these two sets of scholarship while gender expertise often remains side-lined from government’s core business, despite evidence to indicate that few policy domains are gender neutral.  Most recently, COVID-19 impacts and responses demonstrated that an absence of multi-level disaggregated data, and embedded gender expertise within the machinery of government exacerbated intersectional structural inequalities.

We propose a panel on Gender Expertise and Reframing Policy Capacity to explore wide ranging critical questions regarding the theory and practice of gender expertise, training and mainstreaming.  We welcome papers that engage with feminist, gendered, and intersectional approaches to the conceptualisation, contestation, and professional development of policy expertise and policy capacity. Papers that address theoretical, empirical, comparative questions, are encouraged, as are case studies of how gendered, intersectional, and decolonised expertise is valued and utilised as critical knowledges and practices by governments in fiscally challenging times. 

This panel will only accept onsite presentations.

Gender mainstreaming and gendered policy analysis has been conceptualised, programmatically applied, and empirically evaluated by scholars and policy professionals for more than three decades.  Over this period, there have been significant cross-national, subnational, and temporal variations in the adoption, adaptation, and institutionalisation of machinery and processes supporting gender expertise within the state (Hawkesworth, 2012; Hoard, 2015; McBride and Mazur, 2012; Paterson and Scala, 2021; Sawer, 2020; True and Mintrom, 2001).  Numerous strategies and instruments, including gender impact assessments, gender responsive budgeting, and feminist foreign policy, have also been promulgated by international organisations seeking to prompt states to reduce gender gaps and enhance gender inclusive governance and ‘growth’ (ILO, 2020; IMF, 2021; OECD, 2017; WTO, 2021; UN Women, 2022). 

Despite these initiatives, comparative evidence indicates that gender-expert policy capacity is regularly resisted, contested, and delegitimised in ways that “mainstream” policy expertise is not (Bustelo et al, 2016; Kunz and Prügl, 2019; Paterson and Scala, 2017; 2021). In addition, gender mainstreaming approaches have been critiqued for not adequately addressing intersectionality, Indigeneity, and decolonisation (Bilge, 2014; Clark, 2016; Liska, 2015; Nasht, 2017; Pihama, 2020).

These are important challenges for the study and practice of gender analysis, expertise, and building policy capacity. The timing is right for further engagement on this topic given policy capacity more generally has garnered renewed interest over the past decade or so.  For example, policy researchers and government agencies have investigated what policy capacity involves in an environment where bureaucrats find themselves working on increasingly complex problems, that require rapid policy responses, for multiple ‘masters’ and stakeholders (Howlett & Wellstead, 2011; Newman et al 2017; Peters, 2015; Washington and Mintrom, 2018; Wu et al 2015). 

To date there has been limited connection between these two sets of scholarship while gender expertise often remains side-lined from government’s core business, despite evidence to indicate that few policy domains are gender neutral.  Most recently, COVID-19 impacts and responses demonstrated that an absence of multi-level disaggregated data, and embedded gender expertise within the machinery of government exacerbated intersectional structural inequalities.

We propose a panel on Gender Expertise and Reframing Policy Capacity to explore wide ranging critical questions regarding the theory and practice of gender expertise, training and mainstreaming.  We welcome papers that engage with feminist, gendered, and intersectional approaches to the conceptualisation, contestation, and professional development of policy expertise and policy capacity. Papers that address theoretical, empirical, comparative questions, are encouraged, as are case studies of how gendered, intersectional, and decolonised expertise is valued and utilised as critical knowledges and practices by governments in fiscally challenging times.