The impact of women’s movements’ activism experiences on gender transformation policies in democratic South Africa

Abstract

abstractWomen’s movement activism has formed significant conduits through which the advancement of gender transformation policies is enacted in South Africa (SA). Through their experiences – strongly rooted in women’s movement activism and its advocacy for gender equity and women’s empowerment – women activists arguably help push the transformation agenda in gender transformation policies, including gender mainstreaming (GM) and Employment Equity (EE). A qualitative study conducted in 2017 with women leaders in SA’s democratic national Government found a link between women’s movements and democratic governments’ recognition of gender transformation policies. Based on state feminist theoretical thinking, this article views and analyses the impact of women’s movement activism experiences in enabling women in leadership positions and in helping them to push the gender transformation agenda in policy formulation policies. It thus argues that women’s movements’ activism in SA has contributed to and had some positive impacts on the sexist and patriarchal political, economic and social institutions, gradually engendering the recognition of women and promoting their participation in these institutions.However, the authors also contend that social environments in government structures are marred with barriers that impede women leaders with activism experiences, who actively and continually push for feminist agendas with substantive gender transformation outcomes. Although transformation policies are prioritised in democratic SA, gendered discourses still mainly disadvantage women across racial identities, gender orientations and (dis)abilities, to name a few. Even so, women’s movements’ activism still provides women with the experience of being agents of gender emancipation in their respective spaces in SA and Africa at large.