In/visible women of the sea. Gendering fishery politics and advocacy

forthcoming

Fishery is commonly conceived of as a “man’s world”, even if women comprise half of the fisheries and aquaculture work force value chain globally. Gender inequality is a persistent feature of the fishery sector, despite attention to the issue by scholars, policy advocates, and in some countries; public officials and fisher women themselves. The GENMAR-project will fill substantial empirical and theoretical knowledge in our understanding of why and how women are continuously marginalized in fisheries. Current research shows that fisherwomen’s roles and contributions are not only habitually underrecognized, but they are also often excluded from governance- and management processes and lack social and economic rights. However, we know little about how gender equality policies- and recommendations in fishery are negotiated through political- and advocacy systems. Further, in the face of increased attention to the issue, little is known of where and why it loses momentum in political systems. Moreover, women’s role and agency in fishery politics, advocacy and governance is an understudied field, offering limited knowledge of how and why their struggles are hindered. GENMAR’s research objective is situated at the intersection of these three urgent knowledge gaps, constituting a major leap forward. We will develop a multi-sited, multi-scalar, comparative and theorized ethnography of gender inequality, gender advocacy and gender policies in fisheries in Spain, Brazil, Tanzania and Thailand, and a case study of fishery policy in the EU-commission and the UNs Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Theoretically, the project brings the current body of literature into dialogue with gender studies, social science concept analysis, legal anthropology and anthropological approaches to the state, organizations, law and policy. Methodologically, the project draws on ethnographic fieldwork, extended interviews, focus groups, document- and media studies and law- and policy analys