In the face of global challenges such as climate change, growing inequalities, pandemics and backlash against women’s rights, it has become increasingly important for us to reflect on what changes are needed to ensure that the gains made towards gender equality are not lost. Evidence has shown that increasing women in leadership positions is central to advancing equality. However, in this piece, Srilatha Batliwala argues that strategies aimed at gender parity alone are not truly transformative, as we risk reproducing discriminatory power dynamics that perpetuate the very inequalities we are working to overcome. Rather, to be truly transformative, she argues for the need to change the principles and values of leadership and how it is practised, regardless of gender identity.
In this think piece, Srilatha provides:
Srilatha Batliwala is Senior Adviser, Knowledge Building, CREA, Senior Associate, Gender at Work, and Hon. Prof. of Practice, SOAS, University of London.
In the face of global challenges such as climate change, growing inequalities, pandemics and backlash against women’s rights, it has become increasingly important for us to reflect on what changes are needed to ensure that the gains made towards gender equality are not lost. Evidence has shown that increasing women in leadership positions is central to advancing equality. However, in this piece, Srilatha Batliwala argues that strategies aimed at gender parity alone are not truly transformative, as we risk reproducing discriminatory power dynamics that perpetuate the very inequalities we are working to overcome. Rather, to be truly transformative, she argues for the need to change the principles and values of leadership and how it is practised, regardless of gender identity.
In this think piece, Srilatha provides:
Srilatha Batliwala is Senior Adviser, Knowledge Building, CREA, Senior Associate, Gender at Work, and Hon. Prof. of Practice, SOAS, University of London.
“Feminist transformation is not only concerned with changing society or the world at large, but begins with the self and the spaces in which we work and live. It involves recognising that we, and the spaces, organisations and structures we occupy, are important sites of change.”
