Sending mixed messages: Gender-based analysis and the "status of women"

Canadian Public Administration

Volumn 40, Issue 4, 1997, Pages 582-598

  Grace, Joan ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0009216892     PISSN: 00084840     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1754-7121.1997.tb02174.x     Document Type: Article

References (67)

1. For a substantive overview and evaluation of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women, see Caroline Andrew and Sanda Rodgers, eds., Women and the Canadian State (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1997). These categories are taken from Maureen O'Neil and Sharon Sutherland, "The Machinery of Women's Policy: Implementing the RCSW," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State, p. 204.
2. For a substantive overview and evaluation of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women, see Caroline Andrew and Sanda Rodgers, eds., Women and the Canadian State (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1997). These categories are taken from Maureen O'Neil and Sharon Sutherland, "The Machinery of Women's Policy: Implementing the RCSW," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State, p. 204.
3. Ibid.
4. Statistics Canada, "Wife Assault in Canada," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1994); Donna S. Lero and Karen L. Johnson, 110 Canadian Statistics on Work and Family (Ottawa: Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994); Statistics Canada, "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1996); Statistics Canada, "Women, Men and Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Spring 1995); Lorraine Michael, Leah Vosko and Laurell Ritche, "Women and Work," in N. Sharma, ed., The National Action Committee on the Status of Women's Voters' Guide (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1997).
5. Statistics Canada, "Wife Assault in Canada," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1994); Donna S. Lero and Karen L. Johnson, 110 Canadian Statistics on Work and Family (Ottawa: Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994); Statistics Canada, "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1996); Statistics Canada, "Women, Men and Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Spring 1995); Lorraine Michael, Leah Vosko and Laurell Ritche, "Women and Work," in N. Sharma, ed., The National Action Committee on the Status of Women's Voters' Guide (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1997).
6. Statistics Canada, "Wife Assault in Canada," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1994); Donna S. Lero and Karen L. Johnson, 110 Canadian Statistics on Work and Family (Ottawa: Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994); Statistics Canada, "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1996); Statistics Canada, "Women, Men and Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Spring 1995); Lorraine Michael, Leah Vosko and Laurell Ritche, "Women and Work," in N. Sharma, ed., The National Action Committee on the Status of Women's Voters' Guide (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1997).
7. Statistics Canada, "Wife Assault in Canada," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1994); Donna S. Lero and Karen L. Johnson, 110 Canadian Statistics on Work and Family (Ottawa: Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994); Statistics Canada, "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1996); Statistics Canada, "Women, Men and Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Spring 1995); Lorraine Michael, Leah Vosko and Laurell Ritche, "Women and Work," in N. Sharma, ed., The National Action Committee on the Status of Women's Voters' Guide (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1997).
8. Statistics Canada, "Wife Assault in Canada," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1994); Donna S. Lero and Karen L. Johnson, 110 Canadian Statistics on Work and Family (Ottawa: Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994); Statistics Canada, "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Autumn 1996); Statistics Canada, "Women, Men and Work," Canadian Social Trends (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Spring 1995); Lorraine Michael, Leah Vosko and Laurell Ritche, "Women and Work," in N. Sharma, ed., The National Action Committee on the Status of Women's Voters' Guide (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1997).
9. Status of Women Canada, Gender-Based Analysis: A Guide for Policy-Making (Ottawa: Agency, 1996), p. 1.
10. Status of Women Canada, Perspectives 9, no. 1 (Spring 1996), pp. 1-2.
11. Status of Women Canada, Setting the Stage for the Next Century: The Federal Plan for Gender Equality (Ottawa: Agency, 1995), p. 14.
12. Status of Women Canada, Gender-Based Analysis, p. 4.
13. Status of Women Canada, Federal Plan, p. 14.
14. Status of Women Canada, Gender-Based Analysis, p. 3 (emphasis in the original).
15. Status of Women Canada, Federal Plan, p. 11.
16. Senior policy analyst, Status of Women Canada [interview] 22 September 1996.
17. Iris Marion Young, "Gender as Seriality: Thinking about Women as a Social Collective," Signs 19, no. 3 (Spring 1994), p. 718.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.; Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), p. 41.
20. Ibid.; Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), p. 41.
21. This thought was influenced by the work of Carole Pateman. For further elaboration of her argument, see Carole Pateman, "Introduction: The Theoretical Subversiveness of Feminism," in C. Pateman and E. Gross, eds., Feminist Challenges: Social and Political Theory (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1986), p. 8.
22. Nancy Adamson, Linda Briskin and Margaret McPhail, Feminist Organizing for Change: The Contemporary Women's Movement in Canada (Don Mills, Ont.: Oxford University Press, 1988), p. 199.
23. Sandra Burt, "The Status of Women: Learning to Live Without the State," in A.F. Johnson and A. Stritch, eds., Canadian Public Policy: Globalization and Political Parties (Toronto: Copp Clark, 1997), p. 264.
24. Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Employment Insurance: Gender Impact Analysis (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, 1996). The department has since created and published its own in-house gender-based analysis guide. See Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Women's Bureau, Gender-based Analysis Guide; and Gender-based Analysis Backgrounder (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, both 1997).
25. Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Employment Insurance: Gender Impact Analysis (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, 1996). The department has since created and published its own in-house gender-based analysis guide. See Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Women's Bureau, Gender-based Analysis Guide; and Gender-based Analysis Backgrounder (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, both 1997).
26. Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Employment Insurance: Gender Impact Analysis (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, 1996). The department has since created and published its own in-house gender-based analysis guide. See Canada, Department of Human Resources Development, Women's Bureau, Gender-based Analysis Guide; and Gender-based Analysis Backgrounder (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, both 1997).
27. Employment Insurance Act, S.C. 1996, c. 23, [June 1997], p. 1a; Caledon Institute of Social Policy, Caledon Memorandum: Social Reinvestment (Ottawa: Institute, 1997), p. 7.
28. Ibid.
29. Alice Nakamura, Employment Insurance: A Framework for Real Reform. C.H. Howe Institute Commentary, no. 85 (October 1996), p. 7; Employment Insurance Act, p. 1a.
30. Alice Nakamura, Employment Insurance: A Framework for Real Reform. C.H. Howe Institute Commentary, no. 85 (October 1996), p. 7; Employment Insurance Act, p. 1a.
31. Department of Human Resources Development, Employment Insurance, p. ii.
32. Ibid.
33. Ibid., pp. 2, 3 and 22.
34. Monica Towson, Research Notes: The Social Security Review and Its Implications for Women, #4 Unemployment Insurance (Ottawa: Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1994), p. 6.
35. Non-standard work is defined here as part-time work, self-employment, part-year employment, tempopary or contract work, and at-home paid work. See Harvey J. Krahn and Graham S. Lowe, Work, Industry and Canadian Society (Scarborough, Ont.: Nelson Canada, 1993), p. 92.
36. Ibid., p. 130.
37. Department of Human Resources Developement, Employment Insurance, p. ii.
38. Paul Phillips and Erin Phillips, Women and Work: Inequality in the Canadian Labour Market (Toronto: James Lorimer & Company, Publishers, 1993), pp. 112-13.
39. Nova Scotia, Advisory Council on the Status of Women, Working More for Less: The Restructuring of Unemployment Insurance in Canada (Halifax: Queen's Printer, 1996), pp. 4-5.
40. Ibid.
41. Ibid., p. 5.
42. Sandra Hardring, "Introduction: Is There a Feminist Method?" in S. Harding, ed., Feminism and Methodology (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987), pp. 1-14.
43. Lorraine Code, "Questions of Methods in Feminist Practice," in S. Burt and L. Code, eds., Changing Methods: Feminists Transforming Practice (Peterborough, Ont.: Broadview Press, 1995), p. 20 (emphasis in the original).
44. Margit Eichler, "Sexism in Research and Its Policy Implications," in J. McCalla Vickers, ed., Taking Sex Into Account: The Policy Consequences of Sexist Research (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1984), pp. 20-34.
45. S. Gunew, A. Yeatman and S. Phillips, "Discourse, Identity, and Voice: Feminist Contributions to Policy Studies," in L. Dobuzinskis, M. Howlett and D. Laycock, eds., Policy Studies in Canada: The State of the Art (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996), p. 243.
46. Harding, "Introduction," in Harding, Feminism and Methodology, p. 243.
47. Ibid. (emphasis in the original).
48. Ibid., pp. 7-9.
49. The term "discursive constraints" is taken from Sanford F. Schram, Words of Welfare: The Poverty of Social Science and the Social Science of Poverty (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), p. xxiv.
50. Joan Kelly-Gadol, "The Social Relation of the Sexes: Methodological Implications of Women's History," in Harding, Feminism and Methodology, p. 19.
51. Anna Yeatman, "Voice and Representation in the Politics of Difference," in S. Gunew and A. Yeatman, eds., Feminism and the Politics of Difference (Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 1993), p. 228. It should be noted here that the merits and shortcomings of the term gender have been debated in the feminist literature and in the women's movement as being too essentialist and ignorant of women's multiple oppressions. Some feminists now focus on identity in recognition that there is no one women's voice. See Gunew, Yeatman, Phillips, "Discourse, Identity, and Voice," in Dobuzinskis, Howlett, and Laycock, Policy Studies in Canada, pp. 242-65. While this paper acknowledges the importance of this debate, it nonetheless takes the position that gender is still a useful concept.
52. Anna Yeatman, "Voice and Representation in the Politics of Difference," in S. Gunew and A. Yeatman, eds., Feminism and the Politics of Difference (Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 1993), p. 228. It should be noted here that the merits and shortcomings of the term gender have been debated in the feminist literature and in the women's movement as being too essentialist and ignorant of women's multiple oppressions. Some feminists now focus on identity in recognition that there is no one women's voice. See Gunew, Yeatman, Phillips, "Discourse, Identity, and Voice," in Dobuzinskis, Howlett, and Laycock, Policy Studies in Canada, pp. 242-65. While this paper acknowledges the importance of this debate, it nonetheless takes the position that gender is still a useful concept.
53. Status of Women Canada, Performance Report: For the period ending March 31, 1996 (Ottawa: Agency, 1996), p. 3. This history of the swc dates back to the RCSW'S recommendation to establish a Status of Women Council. For elaboration, see O'Neil and Sutherland, "Machinery of Women's Policy," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State.
54. Status of Women Canada, Performance Report: For the period ending March 31, 1996 (Ottawa: Agency, 1996), p. 3. This history of the swc dates back to the RCSW'S recommendation to establish a Status of Women Council. For elaboration, see O'Neil and Sutherland, "Machinery of Women's Policy," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State.
55. George Anderson, "The new focus on the policy capacity of the federal government," CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION 30, no. 4 (Winter 1996), p. 480.
56. Status of Women Canada, Performance Report, p. 9.
57. G. Bruce Doern, "From Sectoral to Macro Green Governance: The Canadian Department of the Environment as an Aspiring Central Agency," Governance 6, no. 2 (April 1993), pp. 179-83.
58. Paul G. Thomas, "Central Agencies: Making a Mesh of Things," in Alain-G. Gagnon and James P. Bickerton, eds., Canadian Politics, 2nd edition (Peterborough, Ont.: Broadview Press, 1994), p. 288.
59. Doern, "From Sectoral to Macro Green Governance," CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, p. 181.
60. Ibid., pp. 183 and 184.
61. Linda Geller-Schwartz, "An Array of Agencies: Feminism and State Institutions in Canada," in D. McBride Stetson and A.G. Mazur, eds., Comparative State Feminism (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1995), pp. 46-8; O'Neil and Sutherland, "The Machinery of Women's Policy," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State, p. 212.
62. Linda Geller-Schwartz, "An Array of Agencies: Feminism and State Institutions in Canada," in D. McBride Stetson and A.G. Mazur, eds., Comparative State Feminism (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1995), pp. 46-8; O'Neil and Sutherland, "The Machinery of Women's Policy," in Andrew and Rodgers, Women and the Canadian State, p. 212.
63. Status of Women Canada, Federal Plan, p. 18.
64. Senior policy analyst, Status of Women Canada [interview] 22 September 1997.
65. Ibid.
66. Jonathan Malloy, "Standing in the Way? The Ontario Women's Directorate as a Horizontal Policy Agency." Paper presented at the 69th annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association, Memorial University of Newfoundland, June 1997, p. 6.
67. Anderson, "New Focus on the Policy Capacity of the Federal Government," CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, pp. 480-1.