Shifting meanings of gender equality in development: Perspectives from Norway and Ethiopia

Abstract

This paper explores how differently situated actors in Norway and Ethiopia relate to global gender and development policies and interpret the concept gender equality. We show that a universalizing gender language influenced by both United Nations policies and the World Bank’s gender discourse have made strong imprints on how gender equality is conceptualized at policy and grassroots levels in Ethiopia and in Norwegian gender and aid policies. However, diverging meanings of gender equality also emerged in our research, showing how an apparently dominant terminology may be transformed by actors whose conceptualizations are contextually embedded, selective and strategic.