Implementing an Integrated Governance Strategy: The Quest for Gender Mainstreaming in Canada

Abstract

There is strong evidence that gender mainstreaming (GM), a gender equality governance strategy, is performing poorly across jurisdictions. While many national and regional governments have adopted gender equality policy tools, developing and implementing an integrated GM strategy requires substantive reforms to existing procedures and institutional settings. The goal of the article is to demonstrate that, in Canada, current gender equality policy using a gender-based analysis (GBA) approach does not feature the same governance arrangement as the alternative GM approach would entail. Using the Canadian federal government as a case study, the gender equality policy instrument mix is examined to demonstrate how different problem definitions result in suboptimal performance. The article concludes that Canada’s current gender equality policy regime only advances the mainstreaming of GBA, and not the mainstreaming of gender equality in general.