Teresa Rees

Reflections on the uneven development of gender mainstreaming in Europe

Abstract Gender mainstreaming was endorsed as the official policy approach to gender equality in the European Union and its member states in the Amsterdam Treaty (1997). New member states have been obliged to adopt a gender mainstreaming approach as a condition of joining the EU. However, despite this endorsement, there remains considerable confusion as to what gender mainstreaming is and there has been uneven development in the adoption of gender mainstreaming tools. This article seeks to contribute to the debate by identifying three principles that appear to underlie gender mainstreaming in Europe – treating the individual as a whole person; democracy; and justice, fairness and equity. It then draws on the experience of a number of European countries to identify where tools associated with each set of principles have been introduced. These include gender-disaggregated statistics, gender budgeting and ‘visioning’. The article illustrates how there appear to be very few examples of a gender mainstreaming approach where promoting gender equality is the main policy goal (agenda setting). More often, gender mainstreaming is used as a means of delivering on or is subsumed under another policy (integration). Despite these weaknesses in practice, the article concludes that gender mainstreaming has significant potential as a transformative strategy.

Education for enterprise: the state and alternative employment for young people

The state, industry and the voluntary sector are all investing resources in encouraging the development of the ‘enterprise culture’ among the young unemployed. Such measures can be interpreted as an attempt to sustain the work ethic while changing attitudes, aspirations and expectations towards employment. They constitute a major effort to change work cultures. The alternatives being advocated, such as self‐employment, small businesses, co‐operatives and community businesses have starkly opposing ideologies behind them. So far there has been no systematic research on the development of alternative forms of work by young people, not even at the level of charting the extent and form in which they are emerging. This paper seeks to make a start by exploring the rhetoric behind the ‘education for enterprise’ movement and the patterns of support and advice on offer. It then discusses the implications of the fostering of the ‘enterprise culture’ for our analyses of state intervention in youth unemployment and th...

Women in science and medicine

Your Editorial “Promoting women in science and medicine” (Nov 20, p 1712)1 is timely. The genSET science leaders panel2 analysed gender and sex bias in basic research and found that medical treatments for women are less evidence-based than for men. Pain research demonstrates this point well: 79% of animal studies published in the journal Pain over the past 10 years included males only, with a mere 8% of studies on females only, and another 4% explicitly designed to test for sex differences (the rest did not specify).3 Editors of peer-reviewed journals can require analysis of sex and gender effects when selecting papers for publication. The US Journal of the National Cancer Institute does it as a matter of “commitment to sound, scientific research”: “where appropriate, clinical and epidemiological studies should be analysed to see if there is an effect of sex or any of the major ethnic groups. If there is no effect, it should be so stated in Results”.4 The Journal of the American College of Cardiology and Circulation (the American Heart Association journal), also adopted this practice. Nature journals are at present considering whether to require the inclusion of such information.5 Could The Lancet adopt such guidelines as part of its gender equality and scientific quality policy?

Population and industrial decline in the South Wales Coalfield

Rees T. L. (1978) Population and industrial decline in the South Wales Coalfield. Reg. Studies 12, 69–77. The South Wales Coalfield has undergone major changes since the mid forties both in terms of its economic structure and population base. The decline of the two dominant industries, steel and coal has produced large scale unemployment. At the same time the area has experienced annual net migration losses in recent years. This paper attempts to give a picture of population and industrial decline in the South Wales Coalfield, examine government policies aimed at stemming unemployment and outmigration, and to report on findings of a behavioural study of migration to and from one South Wales valley between 1969 and 1975.

Adult Training Policy and Local Labour Markets: Preliminary Comments on the Training Access Points Initiative

Abstract Widespread concern over the British economys international performance has given rise to numerous new initiatives in adult training policy, with a view to raising labour productivity and reducing unemployment. The Training Access Points project is one of the most recent of these. It is argued, however, that an examination of the implementation of this project highlights a number of problems which characterise adult training policy as a whole. In this paper, particular attention is focussed upon: (1) the limits of ‘vocational’ education and training; (ii) the tensions between serving the interests of the unemployed and increasing economic efficiency by improved labour productivity; and (Hi) the problems of implementing a national training strategy in the light of the major disparities in conditions between regional and local labour markets. A n alternative policy approach, more closely attuned to the realities of con temporary local labour markets, is briefly reviewed.