Nalini Yadav, is a doctoral scholar at Jamsetji Tata School of Disaster Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Her interest areas include gender in relation to disaster studies, social policy, and development.
Gender relations as well as natural disasters are socially constructed under different geographic, cultural, political-economic, and social conditions and have complex social consequences for women and men. – Elaine Enarson, 2000
The concept of gender relations
Concept of gender describes socially approved attributes, role, activities and responsibilities that are connected to an individual through their sex. These are socially constructed rather than biologically determined. It determines how individuals are perceived in society and how they are expected to think and act in the given social structure. There are set of social relationships between both males and females, known as gender relations that are basically concerned with distribution of power between both the sexes. Gender relations are social inequalities that can be produced and reproduced through social institutions, norms and practices. According to class, race, ethnicity, disability, and differences of time and place, there are variation in gender relations and over the time they might change in the given society. However, many societies try to establish them as natural way of organizing roles and relation between men and women. In much of the south Asian countries, including India women are given inferior social status than men wherein their primary responsibilities are limited to the household.
Reproduction of unequal gender relations through social institutions
Social institutions are conceived as norms, values and code of conduct expressed through traditions, cultural practices, customs and formal-informal laws. They shape social and economic opportunities for men and women and decide their autonomy in decision making. In this way institutions affect development outcome and also bring inequalities in gender relations. The Social Relation Framework developed at Institute of development Studies (Sussex University) is an effective framework to analyse how unequal gender relations and discriminatory practices are created, maintained and reproduced within the social structure through distribution of resources, responsibilities, and power. The framework addresses four key social institutions which reproduce unequal gender relations: the state, the market, the community/civil society, and family/kinship. State as a larger institution consists of legal, military and administrative organizations; market ranges from firms, financial corporations, farming enterprises and multinational; community is made up of various supra family groups, village tribunals, political factions, neighbourhood networks and non-governmental organization. The last institution is that of family which has household, extended family and lineage groupings as major components. Despite the smallest, kinship and households are primary sites of producing and practicing unequal gender relations.
Contextualising unequal gender relations into disasters
From the social relation framework, it is understood that gender inequality is deeply rooted in societies. It prevails prior to disasters, making women more vulnerable to the consequences. The sociological inquiry of disasters further emphasises that attributing to their gendered identity, both men and women experience disasters differently. The inequality in accessibility to resources is a key factor behind increased disaster vulnerabilities of women. They experience disasters through intersecting social relations of gender, race and class. Gendered vulnerabilities have been documented in forms of increasing food insecurity, malnutrition, rise of early and forced marriages, girls being exposed to sexual violence, curtailment of their education, deterioration in reproductive and sexual health, and insecure employment etc. These inequalities affect their recovery strategies and make it difficult for women to bounce back after disasters. Studies conducted on aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Mitch, and the Indian Ocean Tsunami present empirical evidences of the same.
Researchers have encouraged the application of gender sensitive frameworks in development policies to address the impacts of disasters on women however, reducing the gendered effects of disasters is not an easy task because gendered vulnerabilities do not derive from a single factor such as poverty, but reflect historically and culturally specific patterns of relations in social institutions, culture and personal lives. In general women have less access and control over assets and resources than that of men. Thus, the root cause lies in lack of access to resources that allow people to cope with hazardous events.
In recent literature it has been revealed that gender and its relation with socio-cultural factors still have not received proper attention in disaster research. Lack of In-depth qualitative research studies focusing on gendered impacts of disasters level are very rare especially in less developed nations. Another challenge in gender-based disaster research is that existing studies tend to overlook and address the unequal power relations and social relations. Representation of women all over the globe as a homogenous group cancels out the geographical and sociocultural aspects of vulnerabilities. There has been academic and policy level response particularly towards female-headed households establishing them as poorest and most affected. Although, this claim has now been contested due to little evidence supporting the assertion. A generalised overview has popularised the view that all women are poor and therefore suffer more from adverse impacts of natural disasters. The Lack of gender disaggregated data at the household level and credible research on gender issues, lack of evidence from countries
further supports the generalised notion. This silences contextual differences and takes away the much-needed understanding required for studying specific female groups. Assumption about gendered vulnerabilities that women suffer the most since globally they are poor has resulted in narrowed development policy response focusing on cash transfer programs aiming at female poverty reduction. Using poverty as a proxy for vulnerability ignores factors such as social norms and relations that inform individual status and individual response.
Therefore, more empirical evidences from different geographical and sociocultural settings are needed to understand women’s specific needs when disaster strikes which will further reflect in robust policy frameworks. Along with emphasizing on gender in disaster research, incorporating a gender view in disaster planning is essential to improve the effectiveness of the response programmes.
Including gender in Disaster Risk Reduction
The Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA 2005-2015) has been at a step forward in context of gender in DRR. It contains an explicit reference to gender than any other international policy frameworks for DRR. It states that a gender perspective should be integrated into all disaster risk management policies, plans, and decision-making processes. Inclusion of the gender element at all stages of the disaster cycle can bring efficiency in disaster risk reduction. Although it would not fundamentally change the reproduction of gendered vulnerabilities but it will be crucial in addressing the gender gap reflected in policies. Women form their social network through their parenting and caring roles, which enable them to identify those at greatest risk in the community. Their social networks and social capital can be important resources to respond to a crisis in the short and medium term. To upscale women in DRR, following practices can be adapted at various levels of disaster management:
• Early warning
Women may need additional support to be able to act effectively due to gender specific constraints such as a lack of decision-making authority, lack of financial, physical, human, social capital, and socio-cultural norms on mobility. For an effective early warning system, it is required to understand the fact that women and men have different areas of responsibilities, tasks, degrees of freedom of movement, dress codes, education, and so on across regions which affected their mobility.
• Search and rescue
It is important to ensure that gender analysis is kept in focus while planning search and rescue projects. Collecting gender-specific data on affected people, identifying gender-defined roles, divisions of labour, access to resources, and other activities in the community provide basis for developing an assessment of women’s and men’s needs for assistance.
• Recovery
Including women’s decision making in the early relief and recovery process will enhance their participation and break the gender barriers. Since women are more engaged within the households, they are capable of identifying and prioritising immediate needs of households such as food, water, level of shelter and specific needs of women and adolescent girls.
• Sanitation
Inclusion of women in assessment of safety and sanitation needs will ensure creation of planned facilities to protect them against sexual abuse so that they are able to access sanitation facilities without personal risks. In addition, due to local norms adolescent girls and lactating mothers hesitate to voice their needs to male relief workers within camps. Placing female volunteers enables them to easily communicate their practical needs.
One glaring challenge in inclusion of women in disaster risk reduction is to not to reimpose gendered roles. Traditionally, women juggle between their reproductive roles, productive roles, and community management roles. The notion of caregiver is closely associated with women which continues even after disasters strike. Their caregiving responsibilities are reinforced by international donor agencies in forms of specifically targeting female beneficiaries in the recovery process. Therefore, inclusion of women in DRR cycle must go beyond their ‘traditional’ and ‘natural’ roles and responsibilities.
Conclusion
Gender inequalities are produced and reproduced in daily lives, which intensify in times of disasters. Disaster-based actions alone cannot reduce these inequalities. There is still a long way to understand the importance of adopting a gender perspective in Disaster Management. The key lesson is not that gender matters but that how gender is addressed, matters. The way to reduce disaster risk is through promoting gender equality with specific programmes and projects that look to address unequal gendered power relations during, after and most critically before a disaster. Without such fundamental changes, women will continue to be at greater risk of disasters.
Bibliography
- Bradshaw S. (2013) Gender, Development and Disasters, Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.
- Enarson, E. (2000) ‘Gender Equality, Work and Disaster Reduction: Making the Connections, revised version of Gender and Natural Disasters’, Working Paper #1 (September 2000) prepared for the ICON In Focus Programme on Crisis Response and Reconstruction, Geneva.
- Kabeer N. and Subrahmanian R. (1999) Institutions, Relations and Outcomes: Framework and case studies for Gender-Aware Planning, Zed Books Limited.