Feminist, Grassroots and Transformative Visions of Change in Neoliberal Re-structuring (original) (raw)
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2009
This article reports on a national survey of Canadian rape crisis and sexual assault centres conducted in 2005. We situate our results in relation to feminist literature on the perils of institutionalization. We argue that institutionalization takes on new forms in the context of neoliberalism and we emphasize the resistance of centres to underfunding and to individualized victims' services policy frameworks. Despite significant pressures to redefine as social service delivery agencies, Canadian centres continue to engage in social change activism and define themselves as specifically feminist/pro-woman/equality-seeking organizations. Our respondents vary significantly in size and resources, yet nearly all emphasize the significant obstacle of inadequate funding and all continue to rely heavily on the unpaid work of (usually women) volunteers to do more with less.
Current neo-liberal measures in the context of service provision combined with recent austerity-dictated cuts to public services are having a negative impact on women's grassroots organisations, in that the joint effect of these changes jeopardises women's organisations' ability to provide targeted services to a range of women in vulnerable situations. There is a growing concern that gender equality in the UK will be seriously affected by this process Women's Resource Centre, 2013). feminist review 109 2015 (180-189) © 2015 Feminist Review. 0141-7789/15 www.feminist-review.com
IT'S HARD TO CHANGE WHAT WE WANT TO CHANGE”Rape Crisis Centers as Organizations
Gender & Society, 1994
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Resilient Feminism: Social Movement Strategy in a Conservative Regnum
Fridell, M. and L. Turnbull. 2014. “Resilient Feminism: Social Movement Strategy in a Conservative Regnum.” Pp. 243-255 in Counting on Marilyn Waring, edited by Margunn Bjornholt and Alisa McKay. Ontario: Demeter Press. Marilyn Waring showed that democratic planning and policy responsive to women’s lives require that accounts show deficit sides, and require that our societies regularly, democratically assess whether our exchanges are of value. We discuss Waring’s praxis in the context of the early 21st century feminist movement, focusing on the illustrative case of the UN Platform for Action (UNPAC) to fuse feminist momentum with dwindling state accessibility to craft feminist political advocacy, education projects, gender budgeting, and intensive initiatives mobilizing marginalized aboriginal and low-income women to collectively identify problems and elaborate skills. In the context of worldwide feminist momentum galvanized by Waring and others, as well as aboriginal women’s increasingly successful efforts to insert their critical presence in colonial governance, UNPAC’s approaches to making state infrastructure more receptive and accountable to the requirements of women across class and race was eventually successful in the form of intersectional policy assessment across departments of the Provincial government. But the organization’s feminist tactics and strategies have been modified over time in response to anticolonial organization, as well as the changing context of political opportunities. We suggest that within the conservative, high-inequality landscape that Western societies have built over recent decades, feminist organizations working in Waring’s tradition will need to form coalitions, strategic networks and campaigns—both within and outside the halls of the political and legal establishment—mobilizing women in their roles as societal reproducers. Waring’s work across social and geographic divides, advancing the visibility, claiming the value, and promoting the fearlessness of women, will serve well as the theoretical and practical foundation for a world that needs women to rise up together.
2018
Within the United Kingdom (UK) in recent years, disadvantaged young women have been documented as having unmet needs and experiencing gendered inequalities. In response, UK policy-makers have funded early interventions for so-called vulnerable young women. This paper presents a feminist analysis of young women’s talk about their journeys through a gendered intervention (Project X). Data were generated in focus groups during an evaluation of Project X. The focus groups were carried out using creative methods of data collection. The young women were asked to make a storyboard illustrating their journey through Project X and the impact it had had on them. They were then encouraged to reflect on, and talk about, their experiences. A secondary analysis and interpretation of the focus group data took place in addition to that required for the purposes of evaluation. This more in-depth analysis laid bare the various discourses the young women took up in order to make sense of their life ex...