Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

The feminist building-blocks of a just, sustainable economy

Jayati Ghosh 15th November 2021

Jayati Ghosh finds in a UN Women report a blueprint for an economy which serves the public—rather than the other way around.

economy,economists,economics,UN Women,feminism,feminist
Many women around the world—as with these traders in Liberia—work in the informal economy (ImageArc/shutterstock.com)

Feminist economists have long argued that the purpose of an economy is to support the survival and flourishing of life, in all its forms. This may seem obvious but it turns on its head the prevailing view, which implicitly assumes the opposite causation: the economy runs according to its own laws, which must be respected by mere human actors. In this market-fundamentalist perspective, it is a potential angry god which can deliver prosperity or devastation and must be placated through all sorts of measures—including sacrifices made in its name.  

Yet the economy, its markets and its various institutional forms are human creations, which can also be revised and reshaped according to democratic will. That means economic policies can and should be aligned with social and environmental goals.

This used to be seen as a rather wishful, even eccentric, view. But the pandemic and the emergent threats posed by climate change and other ecological destruction have given it more resonance. Even so, the basic idea can seem a bit woolly and unstructured—full of good intent rather than practical strategies for implementation.

Now UN Women has produced a Feminist Plan for Sustainability and Social Justice, which puts much-needed flesh on the bare bones of a feminist approach to the economy, relevant to the contemporary world. It not only rehearses the well-known problems with how economies are functioning but provides clear guidelines for policy, at local, national and international levels. It is based on the goal of ensuring sustainable livelihoods for all, while enabling the equitable flowering of human potential in harmony with nature.


Our job is keeping you informed!


Subscribe to our free newsletter and stay up to date with the latest Social Europe content. We will never send you spam and you can unsubscribe anytime.

Sign up here

Care work

Once it is accepted that economic policies must be put at the service of sustainability, gender equality and social justice, what follows? First, unpaid care work and the environment cannot be treated—as they effectively have been all this time—as limitless resources, which can be used for free and depleted without cost or consequence.

Instead, economic institutions and policies must not only recognise the contributions of care work and nature, but be directed towards socially valuing them and providing the conditions in which they will flourish. A priority of economic policy then becomes creation of decent jobs in strategic green sectors, such as care, agroecology and decentralised renewable energy.

Investing in care is absolutely essential, without treating it as a commodity, personal choice or family obligation. Rather, care work must be seen as a collective good to be adequately resourced and regulated, with expansion of affordable, quality care services which provide decent work to such workers. Social and financial support to unpaid caregivers must also be increased, including through paid family leave and universal child allowances.

Gender-sensitive

The institutions, regulations and policies that provide essential protection for labour, including collective-bargaining rights, living wages, decent working conditions and social protection, have to be strengthened, and the structures and systems made more gender-sensitive and responsive. Workers’ rights in the informal economy are particularly important, as women proliferate as small-scale farmers, domestic workers, home-based industrial outworkers, waste pickers, petty retail traders and food vendors. The expansion of gender-responsive social-protection systems has the macroeconomic advantage of boosting demand, even as it enables greater social resilience against future shocks—including those caused by the escalating environmental crisis.

The global food system is broken—unhealthy, environmentally disastrous and economically unequal. It needs to be rebuilt from the bottom up, so that it supports diverse crop production in sustainable ways for local, national and regional markets, provides food security for all, promotes biodiversity and ensures livelihood security especially for small producers, including women. 

We need rapid transitions to sustainable patterns of production and consumption to stave off the looming environmental catastrophe. Decentralised, renewable energy systems are now more feasible and can provide more jobs for women, while providing alternatives to polluting, ecologically-damaging, traditional cooking fuels and reducing the drudgery of unpaid care work.

Public-investment push

All this necessarily requires a big public-investment push, to enable economic recovery and lay the basis for structural transformation. That in turn demands a global architecture that allows nations to enlarge their ‘fiscal space’ through progressive macroeconomic policies and multilateral co-operation—especially through tax co-operation which ensures multinational companies and the wealthiest people contribute the most. Public spending in support of care and environmental preservation should be seen as part of global public investment, rather than as ‘aid’ or consumption.

Whenever there is talk of partnerships nowadays, the focus is on ‘public-private partnerships’, whereby governments underwrite the risks and subsidise the costs of corporate investment. But these need to prioritise people and the environment over profits, unlike the experience with Covid-19 vaccines. Also, it is just as important (if not more so) for governments to focus on families, community organisations and small businesses as interlocutors, so that states can promote innovation in all areas relevant to life and nature. 


We need your support


Social Europe is an independent publisher and we believe in freely available content. For this model to be sustainable, however, we depend on the solidarity of our readers. Become a Social Europe member for less than 5 Euro per month and help us produce more articles, podcasts and videos. Thank you very much for your support!

Become a Social Europe Member

Such enhanced involvement requires states to be more responsible and responsive, along with greater accountability for non-state actors, within and beyond national boundaries. Feminist movements and civil-society organisations are essential to counterbalance both state and market power, providing voice to marginalised and excluded groups—and they need to work in tandem. 

UN Women have offered us a clear and persuasive blueprint for what can be done. Now the task is to do it.

This is a joint publication by Social Europe and IPS-Journal

Pics 4
Jayati Ghosh

Jayati Ghosh is professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is co-chair of the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation and a member of the UN secretary-general’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism and the World Health Organization's Council on the Economics of Health for All.

You are here: Home / Economy / The feminist building-blocks of a just, sustainable economy

Most Popular Posts

Visentini,ITUC,Qatar,Fight Impunity,50,000 Visentini, ‘Fight Impunity’, the ITUC and QatarFrank Hoffer
Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic

Most Recent Posts

transition,deindustrialisation,degradation,environment Europe’s industry and the ecological transitionCharlotte Bez and Lorenzo Feltrin
central and eastern Europe,unions,recognition Social dialogue in central and eastern EuropeMartin Myant
women soldiers,Ukraine Ukraine war: attitudes changing to women soldiersJennifer Mathers and Anna Kvit
military secrets,World Trade Organization,WTO,NATO,intellectual-property rights Military secrets and the World Trade OrganizationUgo Pagano
energy transition,Europe,wind and solar Europe’s energy transition starts to speed upDave Jones

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

ETUI advertisement

Social policy in the European Union: state of play 2022

Since 2000, the annual Bilan social volume has been analysing the state of play of social policy in the European Union during the preceding year, the better to forecast developments in the new one. Co-produced by the European Social Observatory (OSE) and the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI), the new edition is no exception. In the context of multiple crises, the authors find that social policies gained in ambition in 2022. At the same time, the new EU economic framework, expected for 2023, should be made compatible with achieving the EU’s social and ‘green’ objectives. Finally, they raise the question whether the EU Social Imbalances Procedure and Open Strategic Autonomy paradigm could provide windows of opportunity to sustain the EU’s social ambition in the long run.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

Discover the new FEPS Progressive Yearbook and what 2023 has in store for us!

The Progressive Yearbook focuses on transversal European issues that have left a mark on 2022, delivering insightful future-oriented analysis for the new year. It counts on renowned authors' contributions, including academics, politicians and analysts. This fourth edition is published in a time of war and, therefore, it mostly looks at the conflict itself, the actors involved and the implications for Europe.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube