Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-8kt4b Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-06T19:14:30.081Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Developing Experience, Networks, and Capacities: Leadership as Practiced in Feminist Human Rights Activism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 August 2014

Brooke A. Ackerly
Brooke A. Ackerly*
Affiliation:
Vanderbilt University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

This essay draws on insights from research into human rights activism to propose a feminist human rights account of leadership that could be applied to political science. I advance the view that the practice of leadership is one of building networks and strengthening the capacity of others to advocate for themselves and their communities. In this view, leadership leverages the political and strategic capacities made possible by relative positions of privilege and so transforms the networks, capacities, and privileges of others. Mentoring is an integral part of this activist approach to leadership. In this view, leadership and mentoring are about developing the networks that make transformation possible; they are collective and political. For illustration, I begin with insights about the importance of networks learned through a personal experience in Bangladesh and juxtapose that experience with the experience of Bangladeshi labor rights organizers before providing a more general account of two key aspects of this leadership: building networks and strengthening capacity in others.

Type
Critical Perspectives on Gender and Politics
Information
Politics & Gender , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , September 2014 , pp. 455 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © The Women and Politics Research Section of the American Political Science Association 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Ackerly, Brooke A. 2012. “Breakthrough Evaluation: An External Rights-Based Evaluation of Grantmaking for Gender Equality.” The Netherlands: Global Fund for Women and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.Google Scholar
Ackerly, Brooke A. 2013. “Studying Politics in the Age of Academic Humility.” Politics, Groups and Identities 1 (1): 98–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ackerly, Brooke A., and McDermott, Rose. 2012. “Recent Developments in Intersectionality Research: Expanding Beyond Race and Gender.” Politics & Gender 8 (3): 1–4.Google Scholar
Ackerly, Brooke A., and True, Jacqui. 2008. “An Intersectional Analysis of International Relations: Recasting the Discipline.” Politics & Gender 4 (1): 156–73.Google Scholar
Crenshaw, Kimberle. 1991. “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color.” Stanford Law Review 43: 1241–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daniels, Cyndi. 2014. “Transforming a Department, Transforming a Discipline.” Politics & Gender 10 (3): XX–XX.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davis, Kathy. 2008. “Intersectionality as Buzzword: A Sociology of Science Perspective on What Makes a Feminist Theory Successful.” Feminist Theory 9 (1): 67–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferree, Myra Marx. 2008. “Inequality, Intersectionality and the Politics of Discourse: Framing Feminist Alliances.” In The Discursive Politics of Gender Equality: Stretching, Bending and Policy-Making, ed. Lombardo, Emanuela, Meier, Petra, and Verloo, Mieke. New York: Routledge (EU Series), 86–104.Google Scholar
Friedman, Elisabeth Jay. 2000. Unfinished Transitions Women and the Gendered Development of Democracy in Venezuela, 1936–1996. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.Google Scholar
Friedman, Elisabeth Jay. 2003. “Gendering the Agenda: The Impact of the Transnational Women's Rights Movement at the UN Conferences of the 1990s.” Women's Studies International Forum 26 (4): 313–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hancock, Ange-Marie. 2007. “When Multiplication Doesn't Equal Quick Addition: Examining Intersectionality as a Research Paradigm.” Perspectives on Politics 5 (1): 63–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hancock, Ange-Marie. 2011. Solidarity Politics for Millennials: A Guide to Ending the Oppression Olympics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joachim, Jutta. 2003. “Framing Issues and Seizing Opportunities: The UN, NGOs, and Women's Rights.” International Studies Quarterly 47 (2): 247–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jordan-Zachery, Julia S. 2007. “Am I a Black Woman or a Woman Who Is Black? A Few Thoughts on the Meaning of Intersectionality.” Politics & Gender 3 (2): 254–63.Google Scholar
McCall, Leslie. 2005. “The Complexity of Intersectionality.” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 30 (3): 1771–1800.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mershon, Carol, and Walsh, Denise. 2013. “Meeting Agenda.” Presented at “Applying the Lessons of Gender, Race, and Intersectionality to the Political Science Discipline,” Conference within a Conference, Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, Orlando, FL.Google Scholar
Tripp, Aili Mari. 2006. “The Evolution of Transnational Feminisms: Consensus, Conflict, and New Dynamics.” In Global Feminism: Transnational Women's Activism, Organizing, and Human Rights, ed. Ferree, Myra Marx and Tripp, Aili Mari. New York: New York University Press, 51–75.Google Scholar
Weldon, S. Laurel. 2006. “The Structure of Intersectionality: A Comparative Politics of Gender.” Politics & Gender 2 (2): 235–48.Google Scholar
Weldon, S. Laurel. 2008. “Intersectionality.” In Politics, Gender, and Concepts: Theory and Methodology, ed. Goertz, Gary and Mazur, Amy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 193–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar