How does climate change adaptation policy in India consider gender? An analysis of 28 state action plans

ABSTRACT

Gender mediates climate vulnerability and adaptation action. Consequently, climate change adaptation policy has seen a push towards ‘mainstreaming’ gender and prioritizing ‘gender-responsive’ climate action. However, it is unclear to what extent this mainstreaming advances or obscures gender considerations and whether current climate policies reflect developments in the gender and climate change literature. This paper explores how gender is operationalized in adaptation policy in India through a policy review of 28 State Action Plans on Climate Change. We juxtapose normative goals around reducing differential vulnerability with policy approaches to mainstreaming gender and propose entry points that link advances in gender and feminist studies with climate change adaptation policy. Our analysis indicates that most subnational climate policies in India explicitly mention gender as a mediator of vulnerability and adaptive capacity but operationalize it inadequately and unevenly. We also reflect on how the heuristics of mainstreaming get operationalized in policies (gender-blind, gender-sensitive, to gender-transformative approaches) and what that means for addressing gendered vulnerability.

Key policy insights

• While explicitly mentioned, gender concerns are unevenly operationalized in India's subnational climate policy.

• In most State Action Plans on Climate Change in India, gaps exist between normative goals such as reducing differential vulnerability and empowering women, and policy approaches (namely gender-blind, -neutral, -specific, -sensitive, and -transformative approaches).

• To be effective, the conceptualization of gender must expand beyond focussing on differences between women and men to engaging more with intersections of sex, caste, class, and resources.

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• adaptation
• gender
• intersectionality
• mainstreaming
• India

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The five priority areas are (1) Capacity-building, knowledge sharing and communication, (2) Gender balance, participation and women’s leadership, (3) Coherence (within United Nation entities and stakeholders towards the consistent implementation of gender-related mandates and activities), (4) Gender-responsive implementation and means of implementation, (5) Monitoring and reporting gender-related mandates under the UNFCCC.

2 Gendered vulnerability refers to the fact that vulnerabilities to the impacts of climate change differ by gender and these differences are overlaid on pre-existing inequities that intersect with gender (e.g. disproportionate labour, disparate participation in decision-making, low workforce participation, etc.). Also see Alston (2013); Moosa and Tuana (2014); and Rao et al. (2019a).

3 The Gender Inequality Index is a composite measure reflecting inequality between women and men in three different dimensions: reproductive health (maternal mortality ratio and adolescent birth rate), empowerment (share of parliamentary seats held by women and share of population with at least some secondary education), and labour market participation (labour force participation rate). The Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks national gender gaps on economic, political, education and health criteria.

4 This translation of gender as equalling women is symptomatic of the broader policy environment on gender and trans rights in India. While transgender people are recognized in India as a third gender, under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code 377, homosexuality was illegal until September 2018 when the Supreme Court finally ruled in favour of recognition. Given this context, non-binary categories have been largely invisible in public discourse and policies, with the exception of health (e.g. HIV).