Despite various decades of research and claim-making by feminist scholars and movements, gender remains an overlooked area in development studies. Looking at key issues in development studies through the prisms of gender and feminism, the authors demonstrate that gender is an indispensable tool for social change.

Women, Feminism and Development illustrates the significance and relevance of work on development carried out from a feminist perspective, with a particular focus on the contribution of Canadian researchers and activists. Covering a wide range of themes and concerns, the volume gathers authors from different organizational backgrounds and academic disciplines, and includes chapters on such different cultural and geographical areas as China, Malaysia and Thailand, Mexico and the West Indies, Uganda, Malawi and Ghana, and Canadian Inuit and Indian communities. A unity of purpose as well as a call for a fundamental reconceptualization of society emerge from these varied voices. Women, Feminism and Development is structured to convey a feminist perspective for the construction of theoretical, methodological, and political approaches to development; a critical evaluation of the effect of development policies on women's lives and gender relations; and an understanding of the multiple strategies that can lead to the empowerment of women and real development.

"'Gender Matters' is a manual aimed to assist educators and youth leaders work on issues of gender and gender-based violence with young people. This publication presents theoretical information, methods and resources for education and training activities, along with concrete exercises that users can put into practice in their daily work. Violence is a serious issue which directly affects the lives of many young people. It often results in lasting damage to their well-being and integrity, putting even their lives at risk. Gender-based violence, including violence against women, remains a key human rights challenge in contemporary Europe and in the world. Working with young people on human rights education is one way of preventing gender-based violence from occurring. By raising awareness on why and how it manifests and exploring its impact on people and in society, gender-based violence will no longer go undetected. Gender really does matter, to women, to men, to young people - to all of us. This manual serves to explore these human rights issues and act upon them."--Book jacket.

This book provides an insightful approach to understanding the contemporary circulations of feminist repertoires and shows how the international/transnational circulations of gender are interconnected, even coextensive, with the globalization process itself. Fed by a shared reflexivity on relations among activist groups, state institutions, and international actors involved in the production and dissemination of contemporary norms dealing with gender, each chapter shares methodological premises and studies the circulation of gender-related norms and knowledge in situ and by varying standpoints. Specifically, the authors de-compartmentalize the academic disciplines and go beyond classical geographic divisions, in order to map social spaces and networks of actors involved in the production and circulation of gender-related repertoires. Last, the book grasps circulatory processes and entangled social phenomena, which are usually subject to disciplinary and thematic divisions separating collective action and public action, development aid and feminism, law and international relations. Focused on collective and individual experiences within women’s organizations, activist careers, unstable mobilizations, public policies temporalities, the chapters reveal the mechanisms through which these arrangements are made and shed light on strategies deployed by actors rooted in specific social and political contexts. This book will be of key interest to students and scholars of gender studies and more broadly to politics, International Relations, sociology, geography, history, and anthropology.

Body Politics in Development sets out to define body politics as a key political and mobilizing force for human rights in the last two decades. This passionate and engaging book reveals how once-tabooed issues, such as rape, gender-based violence, and sexual and reproductive rights, have emerged into the public arena as critical grounds of contention and struggle. Engaging in the latest feminist thinking and action, the book describes the struggles around body politics for people living in economic and socially vulnerable communities and covers a broad range of gender and development issues, including fundamentalism, sexualities and new technologies, from diverse viewpoints. The book's originality comes through the author's rich experience and engagement in feminist activism and global body politics and was winner of the 2010 FWSA Book Prize.

When, why and how can religion and culture be both sources, and places of expression for fundamentalisms, particularly in relation to politics? Those are the central questions asked throughout this book alongside a discussion on the result when religion, strenthened by culture, is used as a political tool to access moral and social power. Cultural and religious messages often form the basis of decisions, laws and programs made in politics, and have a direct effect on society in general, and on women and gender relations in particular. The various forms taken by fundamentalisms in some African countries and the contexts under which they have emerged, the ways in which they (re)shape identities and relationships between men and women are also analysed in this book. These fundamentalisms are frequently sources of concern in social debates, in feminist and feminine organizations as well as in academia and politics. The manipulation of cultures and religions are becoming progressively political, and consequently can cause social discrimination, or even physical, moral, and symbolic violence.