Gendering Regional Governance: A framework for analyses

Abstract

This paper outlines a framework for analyzing regional governance arrangements from a gender perspective. To begin, we consider the shift from government to governance and how this has created new regional structures. We then outline our conceptualisation of gender and define what we mean by 'gender analysis'. Following this, we undertake a gender analysis of six dimensions of regional governance: context and place; membership; equity policies; management; operations; and legitimacy, ethics and accountability. In identifying these as critical to the study of gender and regional governance, we were motivated by a framework first developed by Goodwin and Painter (1996) and enhanced in further work by Goodwin (1998). Their approach of articulating research questions relevant to a critique of the sites of regulation for the new developments in regional governance, drawing on 'a range of academic and practitioner accounts of change', prompted us to think how such an approach could be adapted to build a systematic framework for gender analyses of regional governance institutions. In adapting their process, we have integrated insights from the literature that has evolved around gender in regional contexts, and from the gender and organisation studies literature more generally, to articulate fundamental research questions for those interested in undertaking a gendered examination of regional governance.