30 contact hours in total, semester-based or intensive


There is a general consensus that public policy is not gender neutral, but that it impacts on men and women differently. Yet there is great debate as to what this means in practice. At the international level, there is a range of instruments designed to ensure the human rights of women and to promote gender equity. These instruments are both influential in shaping the domestic policy agenda and highly contested. At level of national government, policies and institutions concerned with the role, statue and rights of women are common. In some cases these policies and institutions aim to promote gender equity; in others, they are designed to promote women’s ‘traditional’ role. Why is gender relevant to public policy? What are the major debates, and why are they so intense? Can public policy be gender neutral? Are policies and institutions that focus on women only necessary? How does religion, culture and class interact with gender to produce particular policy outcomes? What is gender analysis? How does thinking about gender result in better policy outcomes. Gender and Policy is an interdisciplinary course that explores these questions…and more. It examines the inter-relationships between gender, public policy and social outcomes in the international and national contexts, drawing on examples from the so-called ‘industrialised and developing worlds’. It critically analyses the priorities of a range of actors – including nation states, international agencies, and NGOs – and the power relations that shape both these priorities and the resulting policies and practices. The course includes analysis of the role of women in shaping policy priorities. But it also moves beyond a focus on ‘women’ to an understanding of the gendered roles and relationships of women and men. This approach calls for analysis of gender relations within society, as well as analysis of the assumptions on which policies are based.