To ensure a gender-sensitive approach to climate finance, women’s particular vulnerabilities must be recognized and women included in the planning, experts said during a Twitter chat with the Global Gender and Climate Alliance.
With the global community investing billions of dollars to fund a response to climate change, the alliance said it is essential to ensure these funds promote policies and programs that reduce inequality between men and women so they are able to address climate change effectively and on an even footing.
The chat addressed why gender-sensitive climate change matters, who benefits and why it is important now. Participants questioned what could be done to ensure climate funding is inclusive and fair to all.
Hrmm. Without googling, I guess it’s something about patriarchy preventing women from access to science and environmental decision making - right?
Personally, I work with a lot of women in government. Obama’s CEQ and the EPA are both headed by women, and they attend our events regularly. At Vermont Law School, most students were women. And, if I recall, science and enviro-based education programs are dominated by women by something like 60/40 ratio to men. And Lisa Schipper is my climatey-idol. Btw, I’ve written several pieces about women, see here and here (see a big list of posts here).
In my experience, women make better decisions than men in the environmental space. They’re more efficient, stick to the facts, and ask more questions.
If my experience scales up to a generalization as well as a measurable societal trend, then maybe eco-feminism theory will be a but a blip in history…
In my field of urban planning and environmental law, women are making huge inroads. At Vermont Law, where I attended for 3 years, female students out numbered males around 60/40. So, while this video is valuable, it’s not entirely reflective of reality in nearly all the environmental fields. Worse, the video doesn’t make a case for women to want aspire to a career making movies other than as some sort of counterbalancing antidote. Clearly, in public service, there are a lot of old, white dudes who occupy the plurality of management, director, even mayoral positions, but they’re retiring soon…
A blog about the interactions between the built environment, people, and nature.
I'm a Washington, DC-based climate adaptation specialist. I help governments and stakeholders around the world increase their capacity to deal with climate impacts.
In addition to traveling and hiking, I research, publish, and lecture on how cities can adapt to climate change.
"Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt." - John Updike
