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How can poor an .d marg i -na l i sed women c la . lm the i rc i t i z e n s h i p r i g h t s ? W h a t i sgood governance from a gen-der perspective? These issueswere the centre of debate atthe internat ional conferenceGoverning for Equity held inKetala,India in October. Eliza-beth Khaias repbrts.

" The aims of the conference wereto build international support forgender equitable governance. and ttldisseminate the key finding's fromthe action research projects carriedout by the 16 participating organisa-tions from SouthernAfrica and SouthAsia in the Gender, Citizenship andGovernance Programme of theRoyal Tropical Institute of the Neth-erlands (KID.

Sister Namibia was one of the fiveorganisations participating in thisproject from Southern Africa. Ouraction research focussed on the 50-50 Campaign for gender balance inelected positions of government.

We critically analysed ihe proc-esses and outcomes of the many ac-tivities conducted by the NamibianWomen's Manifesto Network duringthis campaign, and looked in particu-lar at the impact of the campaign onthe participating women in townsand villages all overNamibia as wellas on pblitical parties, parliament andthe media.

Through the KIT project we have

over,the past two years been able toshare our work, experiences and re-flections with other Southern Afri-can NGOs active in the field of gen-der, citizenship and governance,namely the ZambiaWomen's Lobby

'Group, the Zimbabwe Women'sLawyer's Association, the Centre forApplied Legal Studies in Johannes-burg and the Gender Advocacy Pro-gramme in Cape Town.

The Kerala conference providedthe Southern African projects withthe opportunity of sharing and dis-cussing our research findings withthe projects from India, Pakistan, SriLanka and Bangladesh as well aswith academics from universities and

'research centres, politicians and gov-ernment representatives and devel-opment professionals from theUnited Nations and the World Bank.Our common agenda was to under-stand more deeply how to combineresearch with action leading to so-cial change.

Taking office

In the conference workshop "Tak-ing office: women's political partici-pation and representation" SisterNamibia's project was presented anddiscussed together with projects

from Sri Lanka, India, Zambia andBangladesh. We concluded that theinstitution of quotas and other affir-mation action mechanisms designedto enable more women to be electedto political office is increasingly be-ing accepted as necessary and desir-able. This has led to growing debatesabout the political process itself inthe different country contexts wheresuch mechanisms have been intro-duced.

While these mechanisms are use-ful, they are mapped onto specificsystems of political patfonage andculture which require closer exami-

'nation and analysis by activists whoaim to establish women as politicalactors, since strategies will dependon this analysis.

If the aim is to empower poor andmarginalised women to becomeequal participants in the politicalprocess then we must be able to de-fine in the different contexts whichwomen we will strategise to em-power. We thus have to move beyondseeing 'women' as a homogeneouscategory.

The action research projects re-vealed that there is a growing desireand demand among poor rural andurban women to enter the political

Revai Makandje of the Zimbabwe Women Lawyers'Association analysing howwomen used the Charter for Women's Rights developed by the Constitutional Wom-en's Coalition of Zimbabwe as a lobbying tool in the constitutional reform process inZimbabwe.

process and to aspire for political of-fice. Further, the process of demand-ing equal representation and of sup-port ing women who have beenelected through quota systerns hasexpanded the democratic space forwomen.

All the projects showed that pro-moting women in politics meansbuilding a constituency that will pro-vide support but also demand ac-countability. A key strategy used byall the action reseilrch projects hasbeen the consultative process - in-volving women themselves in defin-ing political representation, the qual-ity of representation and the desiredoutcornes.

This in turn has led to constituencybuilding in favour of women's equalrepresentation in politics and power.The challenge that is before us is toanalyse how the shi f ts in powerbrought about Qy .elected'women'sactiviS'm can be collated to definewhat is 'good' about goVernance andhow it contributes to equity.

" Claiming ci t izenship

A second conference workshoplooked at the issue of women's citi-zenship more broadly. Citizenship isgenerally seen as a 'given' set ofen-titlements (rights) shared equally byall who live within or belonging to aterritory, a nation.

This notion of 'citizenship' ob-scures the inequalities and differ-ences between people arising fromtheir positioning across the lines ofgender, class. race, ethnicity. caste.religion, sexual orientdtion and othercategories that impinge upon theirability to claim their rights. In manysocieties women and men do notenjoy the same citizenship rights.Women do not for example enjoyequal rights within marriage, withregard to guardianship of childrenand inheritance.

The projects discussed in thisworkshop have helped to articulatewomen's voices by foregroundingthe real experiences of exclusionfrom entitlements and rishts that

women face.For example, Durbar, the largest

sex workers' organisat ion inIndia, staked a claim to re-define theissues involved in trafficking into thesex trade on the grounds that sexworkers are the people most affectedand thus have a right to participatein art iculat ing programmes andmechanisms to control trafficking.

The action research projects alsoaimed at changing the discourseabout women's rights and entitle-ments, and have linked different setsof rights. Apparent in the initiativesundertaken'by the projects is also achange in feminist debates. There isa move away from fundamentalisms- that one set of demands for equal-i t y i s equa l ly app l i cab le to a l lwomen.

This was highlighted by the projectof the Centre forApplied Legal Stud-ies (CALS) in working on law re-form for customary marr iage inSouth Africa. While feminists havealways held monogamy to be thecornerstone of demands for equalitybe.tween men and women in mar-

, riage, the CALS project through con-sultation with women married undercustomary law demonstrated that thiswas not necessarily the most impor-tant right that the concerned womenwanted to secure. The strategy thusshifted to the development of lawsthat protect the rights of each wifein a polygynous marriage.

Engendering goyernance- insti tut ions

The projects discussed in the thirdworkshop focused on strategies forpromoting good governance from agender perspective. Engenderinggovernance is a political process ofchallenging the core values of insti-tutions and their practices; and ofcreating a 'public' that will demandtransparency and accountability aswell as participation in decisions re-lat ing to resource al locat ion.

Projects examined issues such asthe role of civil society organisations.the meaning of participation, the

strategy of working in tandem withpublic institutions and through alli-ances, and the importance of work-ing both at the level of material prac-tice and symbolic representation.

The obstacles faced in engender-ing governance institutions wereenumerated as being the unwilling-ness of men to share power; the in-adequate dialogue and collaborationof those in power with women's or-ganiiations and civil society organi-sations representing women's inter*ests; the continuing under represen-tat ion of women in posit ions ofpower, and the lack of mechanismsof accountability in institutions tomonitor gender equitable outcomes.

The actions undertaken by theprojects have been to carry out ananalysis of the needs and problemsof women as a const i tuency andwomen representatives in institu-t ions; an analysis of the genderpower relat ions within inst i tut ionsthat re-produce gender inequality;shifting the focus from practicalneeds to strategic gender interests;the building of a critical mass of gen-der aware leaders within institutions,and increasing exposure to experi-ences of good practice.

These act ions have generatedgrowing acceptance of women's par-ticipation and a greater understand-ing of the broad range of capacitybuilding strategies necessaryfor en-gendering institutions. The work-shop concluded that affirmative ac-tion to ensure gender equality withininstitutions should remain a focus,while accountability mechanismshave to be made more visible andverifiable.

The action research from the 16participating projects will be pub-lished by KIT early next year. SisterNamibia will also publish our reportlocal ly as wel l as a documentar ionof the work of the Namibian Wom-en's Manif'esto Network on the 50-50 Campaign. $This artic/e is based on the conferencereporl pub/rshed on the KlT website. Formore information ut4t www.kit n//gcg