Transforming the Rules of the Game: Gendered Liveability in Peri-urban Dhaka

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The Readymade Garment (RMG) industry fuels economic growth in Bangladesh, employing 4.4m workers, of whom 80% are women. Given rapid urbanization and migration – increasing economic opportunities for women is strategic to narrowing gender gaps in South Asia1.
However, rapid urbanization also creates unprecedented challenges in Dhaka, where the population has increased from 6.6 to 21.7 million2 in three decades. For women RMG workers employment comes at a cost of systemic challenges – including unpaid domestic labour, poor housing, water supply and sanitation infrastructure, and unaccountable, masculine formal and informal governance systems.

How do income opportunities, governance and liveability play out in peri-urban Dhaka, and what are the gender implication of these complex challenges?

In this session, I discuss past and new research to highlight why we need to better unpack how gender, power, politics, and difference play out in the governance of food, water, environment systems in the peri-urban locations where

Dr. Deepa Joshi is the Gender, Youth and Inclusion Lead at WLE and International Water Management Institutes (IWMI). A feminist political ecologist by training, her research has analysed shifts in environmental policies and how these restructure contextually complex intersections of gender, poverty, class, ethnicity and identity. Her interests lie in connecting gender and environmental discourse to local capacity building initiatives and advocating for policy-relevant change across developmental institutions. She has worked primarily in South Asia, and to a lesser extent in South East Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. Her published research presents ethnographic analyses of how inequality is reiterated and experienced across institutions and processes of policy-making, in policies per se and in implementing institutions at scale. Before Joining WLE, she worked at the Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience at Coventry University, and earlier at Wageningen University and DFID.

The seminar will be recorded and uploaded to the youtube channel:
REACH: Improving water security for the poor
www.youtube.com/channel/UCsz5BapANRE_iIL1nopPYig/featured

The Readymade Garment (RMG) industry fuels economic growth in Bangladesh, employing 4.4m workers, of whom 80% are women. Given rapid urbanization and migration – increasing economic opportunities for women is strategic to narrowing gender gaps in South Asia1.
However, rapid urbanization also creates unprecedented challenges in Dhaka, where the population has increased from 6.6 to 21.7 million2 in three decades. For women RMG workers employment comes at a cost of systemic challenges – including unpaid domestic labour, poor housing, water supply and sanitation infrastructure, and unaccountable, masculine formal and informal governance systems.

How do income opportunities, governance and liveability play out in peri-urban Dhaka, and what are the gender implication of these complex challenges?

In this session, I discuss past and new research to highlight why we need to better unpack how gender, power, politics, and difference play out in the governance of food, water, environment systems in the peri-urban locations where

Dr. Deepa Joshi is the Gender, Youth and Inclusion Lead at WLE and International Water Management Institutes (IWMI). A feminist political ecologist by training, her research has analysed shifts in environmental policies and how these restructure contextually complex intersections of gender, poverty, class, ethnicity and identity. Her interests lie in connecting gender and environmental discourse to local capacity building initiatives and advocating for policy-relevant change across developmental institutions. She has worked primarily in South Asia, and to a lesser extent in South East Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. Her published research presents ethnographic analyses of how inequality is reiterated and experienced across institutions and processes of policy-making, in policies per se and in implementing institutions at scale. Before Joining WLE, she worked at the Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience at Coventry University, and earlier at Wageningen University and DFID.

The seminar will be recorded and uploaded to the youtube channel:
REACH: Improving water security for the poor
www.youtube.com/channel/UCsz5BapANRE_iIL1nopPYig/featured

These events are part of a series of events we are hosting throughout the year, titled
Gender, Research and Action in the Global South

Drawing from diverse backgrounds and countries of expertise, this multi-disciplinary seminar series provides a space for discussing approaches and nuances of research on gender in relation to environment, development and beyond. The topics will range from reflections on the potential of researchers in impact generation through their gender sensitive studies, analysis of data needs and methodologies for gender research, as well as broader discussions on gender inequalities in development. We aim to open an honest dialogue of both the successes in gender research and practice as well as the risks and challenges.

The seminar is 1 hour consisting of a 30 minute presentation and a Q&A session. The seminars on are held on Fridays.

Conveyers: Dr. Marina Korzenevica, Dr. Marya Hillesland and Robert Ferritto