Women and State Environmentalism

Hopefully, everyone is settling into their online courses and continue to have the motivation to get through the semester. I know I am lacking a little bit of that.

In this week’s blog, I wanted to talk about a study analysis conducted by Norgaard and York on state environmentalism and the connection with gender politics and inequality. Norgaard and York based their study analysis on the following question: “Does the degree of gender equality in the political realm within a nation have an impact on state environmental policy? (Norgaard, York 507). When reading the study, it’s so hard not to think about Women in the global south and what we know from previous readings about how they face oppression due to environmental degradation. This comes from the idea mentioned in the study analysis about how nations with more equality for both men and women are to be more prone to protecting the environment. The support for this idea comes from two categories. The first being that women are more likely to look out for the environment when compared to men. The second category states that sexism and environmental degradation are “interconnected.” In different studies completed in different nations, girls were shown to “exhibit more environmental awareness and responsibility than boys” (Norgaard, York 509). If women are put into higher positions in politics, from these studies, it is said that more could be done to improve the environmental policies. Sexism and environmental degradation are two things tied together making it hard for states lacking gender equality to gather and promote better environmental policies. Once again, as shown in some of these studies mentioned by Norgaard and York, with gender equality and women in politics, states and nations would have more support for environmental protection policies.

An important statistic mentioned in the Data and Methods section of the study comes from the rankings of nations. The nations are ranked by level of gender equality and then by state environmentalism. What was found was those states showing the most equality towards women had the highest ranking for state environmentalism. An example mentioned in the results and discussion section of the study regarding Norway. “Norway both had one of the highest percentages of women in parliament in the world at 36.4% and ratified 13 of the 16 treaties” (Norgaard, York 515). Norway gives great life quality for its citizens and puts an end to the patriarchy and capitalism that we might see somewhere like Kuwait for example which is ranked -56.0 for state environmentalism and 0.0 for gender equality. In allowing born nurturers to have a stance in protecting our environment, improvement can and will be seen.

Before I sign off for this week, I wanted to include two examples that also support the stance of Norgaard and York with the connection between women in politics and state environmentalism.

The first example is another study called Bread and Roses: A Gender Perspective on Environmental Justice and Public Health. In this study, evidence is brought up showing that women are typically given the burden to carry when it comes to environmental degradation, but don’t have a say in what happens with environmental policies in nations lacking gender equality. From our section in this course on Women and the Environment, we know that women and environmental degradation are shown to be interconnected in nations lacking equality. Women face oppression and blame when it comes to not being able to gather clean water for their family for an example. This study falls hand in hand with that of Norgaard and York because it works to give evidence that when women are given a say in environmental policy, change can occur for the better state of the environment.

Example 1 Link: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5086744/

The last example I found is an entire article asking different questions about women and the environment and explains why women in politics work better for implementing environmental policies. It mentions a study on environmental awareness being a more feminine trait. In the study, it talks about who was more likely to use reusable bags as opposed to plastic.

Example 2 Link: https://www.ecowatch.com/why-we-need-more-women-involved-in-creating-environmental-policy-2593948717.html