Social Capital and Emotional Politics in Promoting Gender Mainstreaming in Taiwan

Social movement theories such as political opportunity, mobilizing structures, and strategic framing have been used to explain the adoption of gender mainstreaming (GM) by national governments and international organizations. This study argues that theories of social capital and emotion work are also explanatorily applicable as exemplified by the case of Taiwan. Taiwan is not a UN member state due to China’s interference, which makes it unlike many countries whose main drives to initiate GM come from UN mandate or international pressure. Gender mainstreaming by the Taiwanese government began in 2005 under the Executive Yuan, with work spearheaded by feminist activists in the Committee of Women’s Rights Promotion (CWRP). This paper looks at alliance strategies adopted by these feminist activists to promoting GM within the state from 2005 to 2009. The CWRP consisted of the premier as convener, the vice premier, 16 heads of departments, and 18 civilian representatives. By taking advantage of the shifting political opportunity structures, feminist activists managed to win the support of the President and the Premier and institutionalize communication channels with high-level officials in all ministries. By employing emotion work to earn civil servants’ trust and by transforming some of them into femocrats, the feminist activists also successfully created social capital between feminist networks and the bureaucrats. As trust, mutual benefits and regular networking between these feminist activists and government departments accumulated, the executive power and influence of the CWRP increased, leading to the comprehensive implementation of GM throughout the entire central administration. In conclusion, the paper discusses the dichotomous differentiation of social movement and institutional politics and how it can be broken; and theories of social capital and how it can strengthen the relationship between the women’s movement and the State and increase the governance capacity of the national machinery.