Policymaking: Insights and Challenges from Gender and other Equality Perspectives

Abstract

This panel is aimed at discussing policymaking from gender and other equality approaches. Policymaking comprises the articulation of problems as political problems, agenda setting, policy formulation or production, policy adoption, policy implementation, policy monitoring and evaluation. Gender perspectives have challenged policy studies in several ways by exposing the lack of neutrality of policymaking and suggesting ways for gendering policymaking, for instance through the strategy of gender mainstreaming. Scholars working on class, ethnicity, sexual orientation and intersections among these inequalities have shown that policymaking is not only gender- but also class-, ethnicity- and sexuality-biased. What do these approaches tell us for better understanding policymaking? What challenges do they make to the process of ‘making’ policies? What are the insights coming from gender and intersectionality studies for revising the discipline of policy studies? In this panel we are interested both in theoretical and empirical papers that wish to analyse policymaking from gender and other equality perspectives. We welcome papers that will analyse policymaking as a ‘process’ rather than focusing on the ‘output’ of policymaking, and we are interested in papers that will explore the actual ‘making’ of policies. More empirical papers might explore the formal aspects of the policy process (articulation of policy problems, agenda setting, policy adoption, policy implementation, policy monitoring and evaluation), or might focus on the formulation of policy documents, that is on how policies are constructed, which norms they do reflect, and what roles are attributed to which actors. More theoretically-driven papers might look at developments within the broad field of policy-making by drawing from literature from political science, policy studies, public administration, as well as feminist economics and legal studies. The panel is meant to delineate the boundaries of the policymaking field and to challenge from equality perspectives the broader discipline of policy studies.

Title	Details
Policy Making in the Field of Domestic Violence: Western European Agenda and Southern European Social Model	View Paper Details
The Russian Doll Effect: Intersectionality and Identity Politics in Gender Equality Policies in Europe	View Paper Details
Gender and Policy in Europe: The Case of Policy Coherence for Development	View Paper Details
Last but not Least: Gender Sensitive Evaluation as a Forgotten Piece of the Policymaking Process	View Paper Details