Why gender mainstreaming?

Gender mainstreaming in education, work and employment has since the 1990s been on the agenda of ILO, UNESCO (Beijing conference 1995) and of the European Union and its member state politics (EU 1996). ‘The (re)organisation, improvement, development and evaluation of policy processes, so that a gender equality perspective is incorporated in all policies at all levels and at all stages, by the actors normally involved in policy-making’ (Council of Europe, 1998). ‘A gender perspective on education and employment should pay attention to gender parity ... in education and should incorporate a gender perspective in all policies and programmes ... Attention should also be paid to gender-aware educational environments and to educational segregation. ...(P)olicies focused on the labour market need to be screened so that they counterbalance tendencies towards occupational segregation. ... (G)ender equality needs to be mainstreamed into macroeconomic policies, policies and regulations on unpaid care work, and decision-making in private governance. In all gender mainstreaming practices, women’s voices must be included.’ (GENDER MAINSTREAMING)In the Nordic countries, national initiatives to gender equality boosted since the late 1960s and have gradually become part of educational and employment legislation.

The organizational practices and individual experiences may not, however, follow the assumptions behind mainstreaming policies, legislation and formal indicators. The unconscious, culturally and historically embedded ways of gendering are often not perceived. This has typically been characterized as gender-blindness. (Rantalaiho et al 1997.) While the gap between policy discourse and individual experiences has grown during the Europeanisation, it is questionable if the dominant indicators on gender mainstreaming – enrolment, incomes, institutional representation etc. – are appropriate for understanding the transforming patterns and meanings of gendering in the realities of education, work and employment (marketization, individualization, precarization), connected to changes of family and social relations. The actual diversities and dynamics of gendering – e.g. emergence of caring manliness and career motherhood - are widely ignored in the mainstreaming policies. Until recently gender mainstreaming politics and educational research have stressed the inclusion of women´s voices. More comprehensive understanding of shifts in gender relations and their implications to equality, require, however, approaches, which analyze gendering as a relational process and practice. (Heikkinen 2009.)

The presentation is based on four empirical researches, which study relations between individual experience, changes in working life and implementation of gender mainstreaming politics in Finnish educational and occupational environment.

EU commission 1996. Incorporating equal opportunities for women and men into all community policies and activities. European Council 1998. Gender mainstreaming: Conceptual framework, methodology and presentation of good practices. Council of Europe, Strasbourg, 1998. GENDER MAINSTREAMING IN EDUCATION AND EMPLOYMENT, no date, http://roentgen.etf.eu.int/pubmgmt.nsf/(getAttachment)/B0E04DDF3BF831FFC12572830051F3C4/$File/NOTE6YFEXE.pdf. Heikkinen, A. 2009. Converging Gender in Education and Work. In Heikkinen, A., Kraus, K. (eds.). Reworking Vocational Education. Policies, Practices and Concepts. Bern etc.: Peter Lang. Rantalaiho, L and T. Heiskanen (eds) 1997. Gendered Practices in Working Life. London: MacMillan Press.