2.4 The Historical Framework of Gender

Women and Gender approaches in development have evolved over past decades. Until the early 1970s, development policies addressed the needs of poor women entirely in the context of their role as wives and mothers. Known now as the ‘welfare’ approach, the focus was on mother and child health, childcare, and nutrition. It was assumed that the benefits of macro-economic strategies oriented towards modernisation and growth would trickle down to the poor, and that poor women would benefit as the economic position of their husbands improved. Women were passive recipients of benefits. Water and sanitation services were defined in the context of health care and hygiene, which were seen as women’s responsibilities.

From the 1970s and 1980s, the Women in Development (WID) approach aimed to integrate women into the existing development process by targeting them, often in women-specific activities. Women were usually passive recipients in WID projects, which often emphasised making women more efficient producers and increasing their income. Although many WID projects improved health, income, or resources in the short term, they did not transform unequal relationships, and a significant number were not sustainable. A common shortcoming of WID projects was that they did not consider women’s multiple roles or that they miscalculated the elasticity of women’s time and labour.

From the late 1980s on, the Gender and Development (GAD) approach was developed with the objective of removing disparities in social, economic, and political balances between women and men as a pre-condition for achieving people-centred development. Much of the work in the water sectors today is informed by this approach. However, there are many perspectives in this approach and no one blueprint for enabling equality and equity in water resources management.

Both WID and GAD approaches are still in use.

In recent years, a gender and empowerment approach has attempted to transform existing gender relations by stressing women’s self-empowerment.