The European Union and Gender Equality: Emergent Varieties of Gender Regime

Abstract

The implications of the development of the European Union for gender equality are analyzed through an assessment of the development of a path-dependent form of the gender regime in the EU. Two issues underpin this analysis, one concerning the theorization of gender relations, the second concerning the nature of EU powers. The analysis of gender inequality requires more than a simple scale of inequalities and additionally requires the theorization of the extent and nature of the interconnections between different dimensions of the gender regime. The powers of the EU are extending beyond the narrowly economic in complex ways. The European Union (EU) is a polity growing in importance as it deepens its powers over a wider range of policy domains, enlarges the number of member countries, and has an increasingly coherent and powerful presence on the world stage (European Commission 2003c). What are the implications of this growth for gender equality in the EU? Two key issues underpin the answer to this question, one concerning the diverse patterns of inequality in gender relations and a second concerning the nature of the powers of the European Union. In the first instance, theorizing gender relations and gender inequality is more complicated than the construction of a simple scale of inequalities, because there are different possible standards and goals.