Overview

Theorizing Feminist Policy avoids the usual clash between feminist analysis and non-feminist social science in mapping out the new field of feminist comparative policy. Instead, it intersects empirical feminist policy analysis with non-feminist policy studies to define and contribute to this new and emerging field of study. Consulting a wide sweep of empirical and theoretical work, the book first defines Feminist Comparative Policy showing how it dialogs with the adjacent non-feminist areas of Comparative Public Policy, Comparative Politics, and Public Policy Studies. Theorizing Feminist Policy seeks then to strengthen one of the weakest links of this new area - the study of explicitly feminist government action. In the remaining chapters, the books defines feminist policy as a separate sector, with eight sub sectors - blueprint, political representation, equal employment, reconciliation, family law, reproductive rights, sexuality and violence, and public service delivery. It develops a qualitative and comparative framework for analysing the profiles and styles of feminist policy in post industrial democracies and uses the framework to examine twenty seven different cases of feminist policy formation across thirteen different countries. The initial empirical study makes a case for feminist policy as a new sector of state action, concluding tentatively that successful feminist policy formation is a subtle combination of feminist strategic partnerships, non feminist support, institutions, culture, and international influences. These tentative findings also shed new light on the perennial questions of comparative politics and policy: do politics, institutions, national policy style, sector, institutions, or culture matter the most in determining policy processes and outcomes? The books finishes by suggesting the next steps in developing comparative theories of feminist policy formation. Theorising Feminist Policy, therefore, goes beyond just describing the dimensions of feminist policy from existing literature, it seeks to systematically contribute to comparative theories of how the contemporary post-industrial state has taken on social change at the beginning of the 21st century. Series Blurb: Gender and Politics represents the most recent scholarship in the areas of women, gender, politics, and is explicitly cross-national in its oranization and orientation. Recognising the contribution of women's studies to gendered political analysis, the goal of Gender and Politics is to develop, and to publish frontier analyses and empirical research exemplary of the intersection between political studies and women's studies. Gender and Politics series is edited by Professor Karen Beckwith at the Department of Political Science, College of Wooster and Professor Joni Lovenduski, Department of Politics, University of Southampton.

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9780198293934

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This well researched and innovative book will make an important contribution to the task of gendering political science and is a valuable addition to the literature on state feminism and gendered policy-making as well as public policy in general. It will be useful to anyone interested in understanding feminist policy-making success (and failure) in post-industrial societies. West European Politics ... a well thought-through and sophisticated attempt to analyse feminist public policy in 13 Western democracies. West European Politics ... an extraordinary resource and a highly imaginative approach. Political Studies Review The sheer wealth of material drawn upon is staggering and the book is clearly invaluable as a guide to what is going on in the different countries under the various policy headings. Political Studies Review ... offers a complex framework for analysing feminist comparative policy (FCP). Political Studies Review

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