Communicating Gender and Advocating Accountability in Global Development

Karin Wilkins

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781137450470
• eBook ISBN: 9781137450487
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Gender Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Case studies of micro-enterprise, girls' education, and population programs suggest that our discourse limits our potential to conceive of development, communication, and gender outside of neoliberal ideologies. Advocacy for global social justice demands a different accountability through critical research.

1

Communication, Gender, and Development

Women are more central than ever before to visions of global development: so why then do gender inequities remain? More money is being spent in development in the name of women’s empowerment. More women are serving in roles of global leadership. More girls are being educated. But serious gender gaps in employment, in pay, in legal rights, and in leadership positions challenge the ability of both women and men to reach their potential. The overarching question guiding this project concerns how it is that development has failed to resolve gender disparities on a global scale.

Issues surrounding gender and women feature prominently in the articulation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which represent a “blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions,” according to the United Nations (UN) (2015a). Among other concerns, the MDGs focus on reducing maternal mortality, achieving universal access to reproductive health services, and improving rates of female participation in formal education, paid employment, and elected political positions. While attention to women in development is valuable, recognition of gender dynamics highlights potential concerns with the ways in which programs articulate problematic assumptions about both women and men in society.

The eight MDGs, focusing the work of the development industry, are to:

1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

2. Achieve universal primary education

3. Promote gender equality and empower women

4. Reduce child mortality

5. Improve maternal health

6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases

7. Ensure environmental sustainability

8. Encourage global partnership for development

Working toward these goals, the UN declared that specific outcomes would be reached by 2015; with the passing of this year, the UN and other development agencies are presenting their visions for “post 2015” strategies, now intended to achieve significant change by 2030 (UN, 2015b).

What we do know is that although some progress has been made for girls and women, particularly in terms of increasing rates of literacy and primary education, narrowing gender gaps between girls and boys, improving sources of safe drinking water, reducing child and maternal mortality, and reducing the proportion of people in poverty,¹ many important and preventable problems remain.

Still, significant proportions of women do not have access to health and family planning services, paid employment, or political positions with power, and are dying unnecessarily when giving birth (UN, 2015a). Globally, gender gaps, particularly in terms of education and health status, have improved in most countries, though gaps between men’s and women’s economic attainment and political empowerment remain wide, according to a recent World Economic Forum report (Hausmann et al., 2011). Gallagher concludes, based on her reading of the 2010 World Economic Forum report, that in some countries gender gaps have actually increased rather than decreased, and that there is “[n]o country in the world [that] has achieved gender equality” (Gallagher, 2011, p. 132).

As citizens, women are lacking a voice, even if they are more visible. Although women are estimated to constitute 40% of the global workforce, women earn far less than men for the same positions and hold only 1% of global wealth (World Bank, 2012). Women are also much less likely to make it onto Forbes’ wealthiest in the world lists: of the richest 100 people in the world (Forbes, 2014) only 11 are women, and about half of these are listed due to “family” wealth. When women do accrue their wealth separately from family connections, typically they do so through fame enabled by their commodification in mediated venues.

Global disparities in income by gender need to be understood within a broader context in which the proportion of those who are truly wealthy grows smaller, in sharp contrast to a burgeoning global community of those in poverty. The very richest of the global elite, at 1% of the world’s population, own almost half of all global wealth (Credit Suisse, 2014). These proportions are directly oppositional when considering those who are in the poorest half of the global population, owning less than 1% of global wealth (Credit Suisse, 2014). The International Labour Organisation (ILO) reports that women are particularly disadvantaged in the context of informal economies and wage distributions (ILO, 2015). Gender inequities in wages earned are stimulated through undervaluing the work that women tend to do, the structural conditions of professions and workplaces, gendered norms about familial roles, and a lack of collective organizations such as unions (ILO, 2015). Feminist research needs to situate women’s conditions not only within gender differences, but also in the context of unequal global wealth distribution (Lee, 2006, p. 191). Gender gaps are exacerbated given other conditions of marginality, manifest in concrete circumstances.

This project is motivated by my serious interest in improving conditions for marginalized communities, whether considering devastating yet preventable gaps across gender, class, or ethnicity or other conditions differentiating relative positions of power. While individual evaluations of single projects may help assess the effectiveness of particular interventions, a valuable contribution of critical research is to broaden the scope to include development interventions as part of an industry, working within complex local, national, regional, and global contexts. In this way, research is directed toward accountability in terms of social justice, rather than aiming to meet the criteria of individual donors. Situating development within an industry allows us to focus on the discourse that structures how problems are defined, how interventions are conceptualized as solutions, and what targeted beneficiaries are expected to gain.

Development discourse serves as more than a set of phrases used to explain the world and its myriad problems. This discourse structures the allocation of resources toward particular subjects as well as designated countries and communities. The first intermediary research question then concerns how development discourse constructs problems and solutions in its public narratives. Communication surfaces as a projected tool within this narrative, as a mechanism to promote social change; but critical research reminds us of the complexity of communication, as a way of structuring discourse, as well as an industry creating wealth and fame, which contribute to global development. The second intermediary research question concerns how communication works within development programs for women in the fields of microenterprise, population, and education. The final intermediary research question highlights the articulation of gender within these narratives, how women are conceptualized as actively engaged or passive recipients, the ways in which they are valued, and whether men, or gender dynamics, are recognized in this discourse.

The articulation of development, communication, and gender is explored through analysis of public discourse, within political-economic contexts. In this study, public discourse includes publications and public statements explaining programs and their evaluations, as well as published news on designated topics, including the building of girls’ schools by Angelina Jolie, Madonna, and Oprah Winfrey; microenterprise programs in South Asia; and population and reproductive health programs in Egypt. In each of these cases, conditions critical to the political-economic context are explored, connecting concerns with patriarchy with the potential for a neoliberal framework to dominate the development narrative.

Next, I conceptualize development as an intervention, within a global industry structuring resource allocations. This attention to political economy resonates with a neoliberal ideology, building from earlier models of modernization. Political economy also helps guide the next discussion of communication, arguing for a critical communication approach to the study of development. As a field of study, political economy foregrounds “the power relations, that mutually constitute the production, distribution, and consumption of resources, including communication resources” (Mosco, 2009, p. 2). The political economy of development, then, building from this foundation, recognizes the power relations among agents engaged in the production and distribution of resources committed to the project of development.

The following section considers the role of feminist critique in connection to research on development as well as studies of communication. Feminist scholarship offers a valuable approach in understanding the importance of power relations, embedded in structures and norms, that limit development intervention and the possibilities for communication in approaching more meaningful work toward social justice.

Development

Development as narrative

Global development as an industry distributes resources from networks of wealthy institutions toward their approved recipient agencies on behalf of perceived publics. The narrative guiding the development industry begins with the recognition and framing of problems that can be solved through strategic intervention, feasibly funded and implemented by partner agencies, with the power to assert their institutional missions and their strategic visions. The projected purpose is to act to promote a public good, conceptualized beyond the institutional parameters of the acting agencies. This goal to benefit people outside of the donor community is critical in differentiating “development” as strategic social change, with a mission to improve the conditions not just of the individual or organization funding the intervention, but also of a broader community. What defines public benefit, and how best to achieve social change toward that benefit, is contingent upon narratives of development that structure the allocation of resources as well as the articulation of the nature of the social change process, the problem and its solution, and the people expected to receive the benefit.

Dominant narratives of development still rely on modernization as a foundational paradigm, even though for decades scholars have critiqued this framework through critical analysis of national dependencies and growing inequalities, pointing out the elitist and patriarchal assumptions made, and the lack of more open structures for participatory decision making. But the idea that nations, through their receipt of foreign aid, channeled in appropriate directions with the blessing of their donors, can improve the conditions of their citizens through strategic planning and targeted intervention relies on the expectation of modernization. Through the use of technology and the process of bureaucratic management, modernization offers a vision of how serious development problems can be solved.

The global narrative of development has been challenged not only by critical academics, but also from an entirely different angle by private agencies. The Narrative Project, designed to promote a positive message about development progress, has recently been initiated by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation along with partner agencies including Bond, Care, Comic Relief, DSW, The Global Poverty Project, InterAction, ONE, Oxfam, Path, Results, Save the Children, US Global Leadership Coalition, United Nations Foundation, and Welt Hunger Hilfe, which together are responsible for billions of dollars in development programming (Wilkie, 2014). Scott (2014), Director of Global Brand and Innovation at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, explains that having witnessed negative attitudes through public opinion research in the US, the UK, France, and Germany, development agencies have realized that they need to “improve [the] public perception of development,” countering the idea that “aid is wasted.”

Two types of goals appear to be operating in this project. The first goal is to change public perceptions to support development intervention. Bilateral and private agencies are increasingly concerned with their public relations, feeling the need to justify their institutional survival by projecting the idea that they are not only “doing good,” but doing it well (Kremer et al., 2009). The critical point here is that these institutions feel a need to show donor communities that they are worthwhile (Pamment, 2015). The desperate need for optimism promoted through the Gates Foundation resonates with a rather American predisposition to cloak serious concerns with layers of optimism, whether the issue is cancer or poverty (Ehrenreich, 2010). These discussions of changing the narrative declare that progress has been made, but more could be done to demonstrate actual documentation.

While the goal of this public relations intervention may be to change attitudes among donor country citizens, another goal, less well publicized but reportedly included in an internal memo, is to change the wording used in development narratives (Wilkie, 2014). Specifically, the project suggests that instead of calling people “poor” we “use terms that invoke dignity and pride.” Moreover,

The project also recommends that groups not “position donor countries, celebrities or NGOs as heroic providers of benefits and solutions for poor people.” This could be difficult for groups like ONE, the charity synonymous with global superstar Bono and his band U2, as well as for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, through which Microsoft founder Bill Gates funds highly publicized global health and development projects.

(Wilkie, 2014)

This resolution would indeed change the development narrative in important ways, given the problematic articulation of Western, white (as well as single, heterosexual) men as heroes in relation to women of color as victims in the global South. But there may also be room for some concern here that along with this strategic shift in language is a specific interest of Bill and Melinda Gates, voiced in their videos on the narrative project, that we no longer have “poor countries” by 2035.

Critics of development models that focus on aid as a primary mechanism for resource distribution suggest that broader concerns with inequities and social justice are neglected. It is not just the language that needs to be changed, but also the way in which development institutions engage in strategic intervention (Dutta, 2011; Hickel, 2014; Quarry & Rameriz, 2009; Thomas & van de Fliert, 2015; Wilkie, 2014). The argument presented in this book is that the language used in discourses about development helps to guide strategies, and that to promote significant shifts in development intervention we need an accountability that not only references better rhetoric but also builds on thoughtful evidence.

On a global scale, we can understand development as an industry enabled by an extensive network of organizations, including bilateral and multilateral donors, partnering with nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), foundations, corporations, individuals, and at times, civil society organizations (CSOs). Narrowing our focus, we can consider development strategies in terms of approaches to particular types of constructed problems, whether in health, poverty, education, gender, or sustainability, for example. Moving to an even more concrete level, we can explore strategic interventions, as well as their constructed assessments. These groups of interventions call into play particular narratives in justifying their focus, as well as their own ability to solve these problems.

Critics of development discourse raise concerns that these narratives tend to be asserted as common sense, yet through their articulation narrow the potential ways in which one might consider engaging in social change processes. Escobar (1995) offers an insightful critique of the managerial approaches taken by prominent development institutions, such as the World Bank. Mitchell (1991) shares this concern that the narratives of development, particularly when applied to visions of Egypt’s development problems, attribute the conditions of poverty in some countries to their having too little arable land for too many people, rather than considering the many other possible ways of understanding national economic and human conditions. The implications of these dominant narratives in development are particularly problematic when situated within corporate frameworks, demonstrated in Richey and Ponte’s Brand Aid (2011). How gender becomes articulated in this narrative will be described later in this chapter in the section entitled “Gender” (Cornwall, 2007). The importance of the development narrative is manifest in how the industry structures resources and engages in intervention (Nederveen Pieterse, 2001).

Whereas modernization emphasizes national intervention, funded through foreign sources that seem invisible in these narratives, situating development as an industry within a global network recognizes the international and transnational conditions of organizational networks, social movement practices, and climate concerns. Increasing attention to the prominent role of transnational social movements and activist networks offers an importan...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• 1. Communication, Gender, and Development
• 2. Communicating Gender in Microenterprise Development
• 3. Communicating Gender in Population Development
• 4. Communicating Gender in Education Development
• 5. Advocating Accountability for Gender Justice
• Notes
• Index