Editorial: No Economic Justice without Gender Justice

It seems incredible in these days of economic crisis that over 2,200 women (and some men) found the time and money to fly to Istanbul for a discussion on gender and economic justice at the AWID Forum 2012. Registrations closed a week before the event opened and the majority of the 800 organizations and individuals who answered the call for sessions and papers could not be accommodated

New dynamics for gender equality in a changing context

__Abstract__ 1 DCF VIENNA POLICY DIALOGUE Advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment: The role of development cooperation December 13-14, 2012 Wendy Harcourt1 Keynote Addres

Editorial: Reclaiming a continent

I recall first hearing Africa referred to as ‘The lost continent’ when I was in Tanzania listening to women who had gathered from just a fewof the 54 countries that make up Africa.They were fiercely defending their countries, the diversities of their lives, the histories and futures. They argued for authenticity of their cultures, their histories, their languages in defiance of development policy thatwas bundling theminto one big basket case.They were strong in their rejection of Africa as a requiring a special focus of development policy and strategy. They reminisced on African renaissance and freedom ^ away from the development rhetoric that at that time (inthe early1990s) depicted Africa as an economic development failure. It was a deeply troubling debate one that certainly rocked my own sense of what was the future for these women and their countries. This journal issue on ‘African Strategies for Transformation’, I am glad to say, presents a far more positive story of ‘The Continent’. The articles are reflections of many of the successes in Africa over the recent years highlighting the myriad of innovative activities forAfrican-led economic and social change

Gender Matters to Whom: Keeping the Politics in Gender and Development

Wendy Harcourt looks candidly at mainstreaming gender in development and in social movements. She explores the difficulties of bringing gender into development policy and social movements spaces, two areas where she has been actively engaged over the last two decades. The talk will be a critical look at gender 'mainstreaming', but not in the usual sense. It will look at the gender mainstreaming in the area of ‘body politics’ – the bureaucratizing of gender within population and development policy and in global social movement processes

Editorial: The times they are A-Changin

The famous1963 song by Bob Dylan The Times They Are A-Changing rings true in the year 2011. As in the1960s, there are young and old people on the streets demanding change to the economic system, an end of war, climate justice, women’s rights, gender equity and true democracy. The year has seen Arab revolutions, European governments toppling, faltering banking systems, and the occupation movement full of young and old spreading the message of the 99 percent fromWall Street to 900 cities around theworld

Gender, environment and place-based globalism’

__Abstract__ Thank you for the great honour of speaking at this Conference to mark the contribution of Parto to gender research in rural regions which includes important contribution to gender and diversity in relation to human ecology, her networking and leadership in connecting gender and global issues in the work of the university

Crossborder feminisms: Wendy harcourt in conversation with Srilatha Batliwala, Sunila Abeysekera and Rawwida Baksh

Wendy Harcourt interviews three feminist activists who have been engaged in feminist action from the grassroots to transnational levels. They reflect on changes in feminist and women's movement organizing, both in terms of what are the new issues emerging today and what feminist organizing has given to transformational movement building

Women, Youth and the Economic Crisis in Southern Europe

__Abstract__ The paper raises questions about how the economic crisis is being played out ‘in place’ taking an embodied, generational and gender perspective. We place in a political context – examining how global realities are experienced in place and argue that we need to look at the every day realities of the crisis from a gendered and generational perspective in order to counter grand narratives of gloom and doom where women (whether old, young, migrant, heterosexual or otherwise) are particular victims. We seek to show how by contextualizing the gendered and generational realities of the crisis in southern Europe can we change the narrative of overwhelming paralyzing crisis to one of potential transformation. We focus on the rise of resistance, solidarity economies and new types of communities in the search for alternatives to neoliberal capitalism by women and youth in southern Europe. We look at how people are organizing differently as a result of the crises, creating news forms of political economic and social relations. Dominant narratives tend to exclude the stories of the unprivileged in such reshapings of political, economic and social relations, this paper is the beginnings of bringing the experience and understandings of women and youth in southern Europe to the centre of the analysis of the economic crisis in Europe