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Applying a gender perspective in public policy: What it means and how we can do it better

Sex Discrimination

Applying a gender perspective in public policy: What it means and how we can do it better

Addressing Gender Equality and Women’s Rights in
Public Policy, International Women’s Day Forum
APS Human Rights Network Meeting
Members Dining Room 2, Old Parliament House,
18 King George Terrace, Parkes

Elizabeth Broderick


Sex Discrimination Commissioner
Australian Human Rights Commission

9 March 2012


Acknowledgment

Thank you, Cate, for your kind words.

Let me begin by acknowledging the Ngunnawal people, the traditional
custodians of the land on which we now gather. I pay my respects to elders,
past and present.

Thank you to the Attorney-General’s Department for co-hosting
today’s meeting of the Australian Public Service Human Rights Network with
the Commission. And I would also like to acknowledge my colleague Padma Raman,
Executive Director of the Australian Human Rights Commission, Cate McKenzie from
the Office for Women, and my fellow panellists.

The APS Human Rights Network is such an important initiative, even more so
following the enactment late last year of the Human Rights (Parliamentary
Scrutiny) Act 2011
(Cth). I am proud of the Commission’s involvement
in the initiative and, as you might imagine, am extremely pleased to be here
today to focus on addressing gender equality and women’s rights
in public policy
so early on in the programme.

Introduction

Let me start by wishing everyone a belated happy International Women’s
Day!

I have to confess that International Women’s Day is one of my favourite
days on the calendar - it is such an important opportunity to celebrate women,
and our hard-fought successes.

I had a shaky start yesterday. Channel 10 – not sure if you’ve
watched it – well don’t! But the day got better with the release of
the Security Council Resolution 1325 national action plan.

There have been many important developments for women over the last year.

Just last month, we had an historic win in the equal pay
decision.[1] This decision will award
more than 200,000 workers in the social and community services
sector—mostly women—much deserved pay-rises of between 19 and 41 per
cent.

Without question, the decision will make a substantial difference to these
workers and their families. Importantly, it will also play a significant role
in helping to reduce the gender pay gap, which, as we all know, has stagnated
around 17 to 18 per cent in recent
years.[2] And it will undoubtedly
assist in addressing the gap in both retirement income and
superannuation.[3]

But International Women’s Day also provides an opportunity to look to
the future and to reflect on how we can make gender equality a reality in
Australia.

I often find myself on days like this thinking about the kind of world I want
my 14 year-old daughter, Lucy, to grow up in, go to work in, travel in, have a
family in, and retire in.

When I find myself thinking about this, I am reminded that there is still
much we need to achieve.

For me, an important place to start is examining how we, as public servants,
can address gender equality and women’s rights in public policy. With
that in mind, I thought I would share some brief thoughts on 3 things:

  • the importance of taking a gender perspective into the development
    and implementation of public policy;
  • how we might do that; and
  • who is responsible for ensuring a gender perspective is
    applied.

I will make my remarks very practical in the hope of
offering some possible concrete tools that you can take away and use in your
day-to-day work to address gender equality and women’s human rights.

The importance of a gender perspective in public policy

So, why is it important to apply a gender perspective? And what are the
likely consequences of gender blind policies?

A gender perspective is important for the very simple reason that
‘[a]ll policies impact on men and women’s lives in one way or
another’[4].

Because of economic and social differences between men and women, policy
consequences, intended and unintended, often vary along gender lines. It is
only through a gender analysis of policy that these differences become apparent,
and solutions devised.[5]

Public policy has the capacity to either perpetuate or eliminate
discrimination and gender inequality. It is only by making gender a central
consideration in the development and implementation of public policy that we can
hope to advance gender equality and women’s human rights in Australia.

The risk in failing to do so is that public policy responses will not only
perpetuate existing forms of oppression against women and limit women’s
and men’s autonomy, but will also create new forms of gender oppression
and undermine broader efforts to achieve equality.

How to apply a gender perspective in public policy

The question that we each need to ask ourselves, then, is: how can I apply a
gender perspective in my day-to-day work as a public servant?

Let me say at the outset that I don’t think there is a single correct
way. I also don’t think that you have to be a gender expert to be able to
apply a gender lens to your work.

Each time I deal with a new or an existing aspect of public policy, I like to
ask myself a number of basic questions.

(a) Asking the woman question

Firstly, I ask myself the woman question - a staple of feminist
methodology for some decades now.

The woman question seeks to reveal the gender implications of public policy
for women. It asks: ‘have women been left out of consideration? If so,
in what way; and how might that omission be corrected? What difference would it
make to do so?’[6]

For example, what does a drought assistance policy or a climate change policy
that is gender-neutral on its surface, say or assume about
women?[7] More specifically, what
attributes, characteristics or roles does it ascribe to women? And in what way
does it disadvantage women?

The purpose of asking the woman question is to uncover the gender
implications of public policy that might otherwise appear to be neutral or
objective.[8] Asking this question
helps us to understand better how law and public policy ‘fails to take
into account the experiences and values that seem more typical of women than of
men, or how existing legal [and policy] standards and concepts might
disadvantage women’.[9]

As public servants, it is important that we are also sensitive to the
multiple, often invisible, forms of exclusion that many women face, based on
their race, their ability, their sexual orientation or, for example, their
age.[10]

Last week I attended the 56th session of the Commission on the
Status of Women (CSW) in New York - it’s the highest intergovernmental
forum at the UN that meets each year to consider exactly how public policy at an
international level impacts on gender equality. This year the CSW focused on the
empowerment of rural women, examining how gender equality can be incorporated
into a range of issues including: rural development, financing, land rights,
access to resources, food security and climate change.

At CSW, I talked at length about the importance of tailoring the
implementation of the National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and
their Children
to the specific experiences of victims and survivors of
domestic and family violence in rural
contexts.[11] It’s at times
like this I remember the story of Catherine Smith and her daughter Vickie - 2
women from a rural community who had experienced violence and who travelled to
the UN with us. In relation to the lack of services Catherine said in her
speech at the UN:

“It’s not easy to escape the violence. I remember running from
the house with my four children. We ended up walking almost 80 km to the
nearest town that had a refuge, sleeping on the river bank along the way, with
just the clothes we had on – my children in their school uniforms.

There was also a lot of discussion about the need to tailor policies on
violence and other issues to the specific experiences of subgroups of women,
including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, women from a non-English
speaking background and women with a disability.

(b) Asking the man question

In order to analyse the full range of gender implications of public policy, I
also like to ask myself the man question.

‘Asking the “man question” means simply to ask “What
is the position of boys and/or men in this situation?”’
‘Implicit in this question...is a second question, “Does this apply
to all boys and/or men, or does it affect different men
differently?’[12]

Asking the man question can help us understand better how public policy
contributes to the construction of male privilege and dominance in Australia.

It also helps us to understand how certain policies assign women and men
distinct attributes, characteristics and roles. Consider the example of the
sex-role stereotypes of men as breadwinners and women as carers, both of which
are commonly found together in a wide range of public policies, including in the
areas of taxation, employment and childcare. When public policies enforce or
perpetuate these stereotypes, rather than allowing individual men and women to
determine responsibility for breadwinning and caring roles for themselves, they
can exacerbate existing conditions of inequality between men and women. As Sally
Sara said at the UN Women’s Australia Breakfast this week, “to
change the world for women we also need to change the world for men”.

The risk in not asking the man question is that the complex nature of gender
relations in Australian society is ignored and a central part of gender
inequality – the construction of masculinities, male privilege and male
dominance – is left
unattended.[13]

(c) Interrogating institutions and structures for hidden gender
implications

Asking the woman question and the man question only gets us so far in
analysing the gender implications of public policy.

As public servants, it is important that we also consider how institutions
and structures are gendered and how this might affect the implementation of a
public policy.

I think feminist legal scholar Sandra Fredman said it best when she suggested
that

[t]he future is not simply one of allowing women into a male-defined world.
Instead, equality for women entails a re-structuring [of] society so that it is
no longer male-defined. Transformation requires a redistribution of power and
resources and a change in the institutional structures which perpetuate
women’s oppression. It requires a dismantling of the private-public
divide, and a reconstruction of the public world so that child-care and
parenting are seen as valued common responsibilities of both parents and the
community.[14]

Advancing gender equality and women’s human rights in a policy context
is consequently not just about including women’s voices or, for example,
removing barriers to women’s participation. It is also about the adoption
of positive measures to bring about a transformation in the institutions and
structures that cause or perpetuate discrimination and
inequality.[15]

Responsibility to ensure a gender perspective is applied in policy
development and implementation

So, who is responsible for ensuring a gender perspective is applied in policy
development and implementation?

The simple answer is that we all are.

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women recently
reminded Australia and other States Parties that they obligated under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (and other international human rights treaties) to

‘ensure that all Government bodies and organs are fully aware of
the principles of equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex and gender
and that adequate training and awareness-raising programmes are set up and
carried out in this
respect.’[16]

Hilary Charlesworth, a leading feminist legal scholar, has also cautioned
that a genuine commitment to advancing gender equality and women’s human
rights requires gender to ‘be taken seriously in central, mainstream,
“normal” institutional activities and not simply left in a
marginalized, peripheral backwater of specialist women’s
institutions.’[17]

So, whether we are a graduate, a departmental Secretary or a Minister and
whether we work in the Office for Women, the Department of Agriculture,
Fisheries and Forestry or the Department of Defence, each of us is responsible
for applying a gender perspective in the development and implementation of
public policy.

Conclusion

In conclusion, let me return to where I began.

International Women’s Day is a time for celebration and reflection.

Each of you here today has made such important contributions to public policy
in Australia. There is so much for you to be proud of and for us to celebrate
as a group.

I look forward to working with you and supporting you in your efforts to
advance gender equality and women’s human rights through public policy.

Thank you.


[1] See Equal Remuneration Case:
Australian Municipal, Administrative, Clerical and Services Union and others,
Australian Business Industrial
[2012] FWAFB 1000 (Fair Work
Australia). Available at www.fwa.gov.au/sites/remuneration/decisions/2012fwafb1000.htm (viewed 8 March 2012).
See also Australian Human Rights Commission, ‘Historic Decision leads
Australia a Step Closer to Making Equal Remuneration for Women a Reality’
(Media Release, 1 February 2012). Available at www.hreoc.gov.au/about/media/media_releases/index.html (viewed 8 March 2012).

[2] See Equal Opportunity for
Women in the Workplace Agency, ‘Pay Equity Statistics Fact
Sheet’ (May 2011). Available at www.eowa.gov.au/Information_Centres/Resource_Centre/Statistics/EPD%2012_V2_May2011_OnlineVersion.pdf (viewed 8 March 2012).

[3] See Australian Human Rights
Commission, ‘Accumulating Poverty? Women’s Experiences of
Inequality over the Life Cycle’ (September 2009). Available at www.humanrights.gov.au/sex_discrimination/publication/gender_gap/#s2 (viewed 8 March 2012).

[4] Louise Chappell, Deborah
Brennan and Kim Rubenstein, ‘Australian Intergovernmental Relations: A
Gender and Change Perspective’, in Paul Kildea, Andrew Lynch and George
Williams (eds) Tomorrow’s Federation: Reforming Australian
Government
(2012), 228, at
228.

[5] Above.

[6] Katharine T. Bartlett,
‘Feminist Legal Methods’ (1990) 103(4) Harvard Law Review 829, at 837.

[7] See, for example,
Margaret Alston, ‘Drought Policy in Australia: Gender Mainstreaming or
Gender Blindness’ (2009) 16(2) Gender, Place and Culture 139;
Margaret Alston, ‘Gender and Climate Change in Australia’ (2010)
47(1) Journal of Sociology 53.

[8] Katharine T. Bartlett,
above note 6, at 837.

[9] Above.

[10] ‘Intersectionality is a basic concept for understanding the scope of the
general obligations of States parties contained in article 2. The discrimination
of women based on sex and gender is inextricably linked with other factors that
affect women, such as race, ethnicity, religion or belief , health, status, age,
class, caste, and sexual orientation and gender identity. Discrimination on the
basis of sex or gender may affect women belonging to such groups to a different
degree or in different ways than men. States parties must legally recognize and
prohibit such intersecting forms of discrimination and their compounded negative
impact on the women concerned.’ Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination against Women, General Recommendation No. 28 on the Core
Obligations of States Parties under Article 2 of the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
UN
Doc.CEDAW/C/2010/47/GC.2, (19 October 2010), at para. 18. Available at www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cedaw/comments.htm (viewed 8 March 2012).

[11] See Elizabeth Broderick,
‘The Need for a Contextualised Response to Domestic and Family Violence in
Rural Areas’ (Speech delivered at Commission on the Status of Women,
56th Session, Side Event: Impact of Violence against Rural Women,
United Nations Headquarters, New York, 2 March 2012); Elizabeth Broderick,
‘Violence against Women with a Disability in Rural Australia’
(Speech delivered at Commission on the Status of Women, 56th Session,
Side Event: Rural Women and Girls with Disabilities: Economic Empowerment &
Political Participation, 28 February 2012). Available at www.hreoc.gov.au/about/media/speeches/sex_discrim/index.html (viewed 8 March 2012).

[12] Nancy E. Dowd,
‘Asking the Man Question: Masculinities Analysis and Feminist
Theory’ (2010) 33 Harvard Journal of Law & Gender 415, at 415
note 1. See also Angela P. Harris, ‘Gender, Violence, Race, and Criminal
Justice, (2000) 52 Stanford Law Review 777.

[13] See Nancy Levit,
‘Feminism for Men: Legal Ideology and the Construction of Maleness’
(1995-6) 43 UCLA Law Review 1037, at
1054.

[14] Sandra Fredman,
‘Beyond the Dichotomy of Formal and Substantive Equality: Towards a New
Definition of Equal Rights’ in Ineke Boerefijn et al (eds) Temporary Special Measures: Accelerating De Facto Equality of Women under
Article 4(1) of the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of
Discrimination against Women
(2003), 111, at
115.

[15] Above.

[16] Committee on the
Elimination of Discrimination against Women, above note 10, at para. 17
[emphasis added].

[17] Hilary
Charlesworth, ‘Not Waving but Drowning: Gender Mainstreaming and Human
Rights in the United Nations’ (2005) 18 Harvard Human Rights Law
Journal
1, at 1.