Lessons from Australia: Strategies for Gender Equity Policy

Lessons from Australia: Strategies for Gender Equity PolicyAuthor(s): Catherine MarshallSource: Feminist Teacher, Vol. 14, No. 2 (2002), pp. 161-178Published by: University of Illinois PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40545883 .

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Lessons from Australia: Strategies for Gender Equity Policy

by Catherine Marshall

Picture entering a large, well-furnished office at the top and center of a state or national agency and meeting a well-paid and well-staffed official.1 Imagine her managing budget, personnel, and sophisticated projects for gender equity in schooling, aided by good connections with other key policy actors whose agencies, staff, budgets, and initiatives might be called upon. This was the case in the 1990s in Australia, where gender equity (GEP) initiatives had attained status in the mainstream policy arena2. Key actors paid attention, sponsored initiatives, and controlled positions and budgets in implementing agencies, facilitating the development of this office. Activists and bureaucrats (femocrats) maintained gender as a policy issue, developed sophisticated programs, processes, monitoring systems and networL· to maintain the initiative3 They sustained implementation strategies, having benefited from the social justice activism of teachers and parents and from the theory and research of scholars who could, and would, make demands in the policy arena.4

Suppose you want to be an activist for gender equity in education in the United States. What can be learned from Australia's experience developing gender equity education policy (GEP)? Australia has advanced gender equity where other countries' policy systems have produced symbolic and under-funded policies, or even left the issues unattended (Marshall "Undomesticated"; Stromquist "Sex Equity"). This paper will offer an analysis of the context and appearance of gender equity policy in Australia, suggest strategies for analyzing the status of GEP in the United States, and describe promising techniques learned from the Australian model.

Methodology The ensuing description of Australian gender policy is derived from three months'

participant observation, document analysis, and elite interviewing in Victoria, Queensland, Australian Commonwealth Territory (ACT) and Canberra, the national capital, supplemented by the analyses of previous researchers.5 Participants were identified with the assistance of scholars and activists involved in Australia's gender equity movement. They were "femocrats" (feminists holding positions as high officials in government bureaucracies), teacher union activists, scholars, and educators with tasks for implementing gender policies, and scholar/ activists; many were some combination of these categories.6 All were interviewed for approximately one to two hours. Confidentiality of sources is maintained in this report by identifying people by their generic position (e.g., union activist). In addition, participants received a draft and were invited to suggest edits if their words were identifiable in any harmful way. Literatures on policy communities' responses to challenges, on policy discourse analysis, and feminism framed this analysis.

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Previous accounts of GEP showed the need to collect data on the national level (Blackmore et al.; Yates). Data collection focused on the GEP action in Victoria and ACT, states/territories with early and active GEP participation. Queensland's culture and policies presented barriers so GEP momentum had been more modest until the early 1990s. The data analysis, guided by concepts from policies, policy literatures, and feminist analysis, identified (a) a story of GEP emerging as a challenge, and (b) the prevailing perceptions of the politically viable and efficacious elements of GEP policy in the Australian context.

The Australian context for GEP: development and growth Australia's political and social traditions are rooted in British colonial history, diverse

immigrant roots, and democratic and social justice philosophies promoting an ethos of opportunity for all. Education for all children was assumed to be of national importance and was tied to social and economic progress, with meritocratic assumptions that education raises individuals' opportunities. In recent decades, education policymakers faced demands from minority populations and from women for policies and programs to promote equity.

Gender equity policy in Australia developed from roots in "fair go" cultural assumptions, Australian political structures, strategic use of education policy structures, and strong networks from the margins and in the center of policy action. A respondent shares:

We had that [culture of individualism] in our pioneering aspect but we also clearly have the view that everybody in this fairly rich country is entitled to some share of resources. . . . My experience and view of gender equity and my view of equality is a very similar view to many Australians, not only females, that people are entitled to a fair go and if there are barriers to that fair go then they should be shifted (provided it doesn't cost too much). (Interviews)

Australian GEP first emerged in an effort to promote girls' equal access to education benefits. Strong and viable GEP developed as Australians were attuned to worldwide movements (e.g., the women's movement). For example, in 1972 the Women's Electoral Lobby (WEL) was founded, inspired by eleven women who had read a Ms. magazine article on feminists assessing US politicians.

Beyond educational policy, efforts were underway to embed GEP in the larger culture. As GEP proposals moved from the margins of politics to the center, many activists were appointed or elected to positions in bureaucracies and politics where, in some instances, their main task was gender equity.

Critical to the success of GEP in Australia was the passing of the National Policy for the Education of Girls in Australian Schools (NPEGAS) in 1987. NPEGAS was the first national policy for education in Australia. Significant to NPEGAS' success is the fact that is was nationally funded, it contained comprehensive and activist provisions, it established a requirement for reporting each school's status on responding to GEP, and it mandated Equal Opportunity officers in each school. Additionally, the policy could be pointed to as leverage in the face of resistance, and it could act as legislative authority when required. NPEGAS was more than a symbolic policy; it had explicit action plans, monies, positions, and implementing strategies for embedding gender equity into the structures of education (e.g., job descriptions and procedures).

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Over time, NPEGAS operated within a context of other policies developed to facilitate gender equity, including the Stop the Violence Against Women policy and the Achieving Economic Equality for Women policy. "It's actually the intersection of policies that has been most effective. NPEGAS fits into a landscape of policy" (Interviews).

Women from unions, parent groups, bureaucracies, and in-school sites worked together, building GEP momentum. Networks developed, so GEP workers from around the country were constantly sharing information and drafts of policy briefs. This was greatly facilitated by (Commonwealth-funded) conferences convened from all over the country. Part of the strength of the networks came from women educators' anger about blatant legal inequities (e.g., no scholarships existed for girls in university; married teachers had to quit; only males received principalships and senior management positions; women educators were assigned morning tea as their main school-wide responsibility, etc.) and the pre-existence of the Association of Women Educators (AWE), which was lying in wait for such a cause. An informant recalled, "It was actually easier THEN to be radical than it is now. Teachers out there in the schools were being so openly discriminated against" (Interviews). Many involved in gender politics within the teacher unions and in schools were activists in a range of issues.

Activism in teacher unions was crucial for policy formulation and implementation of GEP. One union official described a conscious and deliberate goal to have the union leadership reflect the gender makeup of the union membership, saying, "That would mean 60% women. People know that women's votes count and you'd better set it up so that at least 50% of elected leadership are women" (Interview).

Research that was well publicized created public concern to address gender. An activist recalled:

The National Action Plan's setup [. . .] reduced the backlash - it wasn't produced by a bunch of feminists taking over [...]. It was called National Action [...]. And that set it up for Listening to Girls [a research report] to get lots of media coverage. That generated an enormous amount of concern, even outrage. The major "sit-up- and-take-notice" issues were that sexual harassment was the most significant element in girls' bad experiences at a school [. . .]. Listening had a strong run in the media. We launched the Says Who? [anti-harassment training] materials. That all legitimated the National Action Plan. It showed that [the problem] was cultural (Interviews).

Thus, values had shifted to support and maintain national policy with funding and monitoring; with sponsored research, materials, and training; and with union and activist attention. Also, by focusing on structures and by consultation and integration, GEP's challenge to hegemony was an integral part of valuing social justice and good practice.

In addition to the critical roles played by teacher unions and other networks, activities instrumental for GEP success in Australia included working with existing programs and agendas, as well as having new GEP positions built into the infrastructure. Women attained senior positions in bureaucracies and could stay attuned to policy- window openings, for instance, by linking the violence and sexual harassment issues on the agenda, connecting them to more mainstream behavior management work and to the range of social justice agendas. Legislation mandated that gender issues be monitored: the National Gender Equity Task Force required that all reporting be broken down by gender. As one femocrat explained, "That was strategic; so every year, all systems have to address gender when they're reporting on health, phys ed, or

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anything else!" (Interviews). Long consultation processes were cultivated, and this was seen as key for challenging hegemonic policy communities and education practices. A Victorian GEP activist explained, "Make sure that not only can you make them implement but it's something they want to implement" (Interviews). GEP activists created programs (e.g., for a rural women's network and a land care organization) based on principles of equity, gender equity, equality, and community-based decision-making - all having potential for empowering challenges to hegemony.

How did this policy activity emerge? How was it sustained? Analysis of Australia's GEP development presents lessons for activism.

Understanding GEP: discourse analysis and feminist critical policy analysis Feminist Policy Analysis: Assuming that hegemonic policy arenas are managed and

controlled primarily by, and for, white males, feminist critical policy analysis defines how women's needs and perspectives are marginalized. Consequently, policy analysis must ask different questions. With patriarchy embedded in state practices, "the grounding for research, policy, and action is the political choices and power-driven ideologies and embedded forces that categorize, oppress, and exclude" (Marshall, Dismantling 13). Therefore, coming from the margins and from the less powerful, GEP proposals challenge hegemony, upsetting dominant power and privileges.

Asking about feminist policy philosophies*. When looking at gender, different feminist philosophies undergird policies. Each philosophical stance points to policy implications. Whereas "liberal" feminisms assume that governments can correct sexism by eliminating barriers to women's access to opportunity, "power and politics" feminisms recognize that women are placed at the margin of policy arenas.7 "Women's Ways" feminisms focus on women's different values and choices and socialization. Increasingly, feminist philosophies incorporate sophisticated understandings of how race, sexuality, and class biases are intertwined in gender regimes. They further recognize the error of essentializing women, putting all women m a single group (e.g., in policies that suppose that equity for women can be doled out simplistically). Thus, analysis of GEP must identify debates and positions among philosophies.

The special nature of equity policy: Any policy focus on gender, race, and class inequities redistributes goods and benefits; such policies take away ensconced and institutionalized privileges.8 Resistance and backlash will be fierce as policy is proposed and as it implemented.

Analyzing discourse in challenges to hegemony: Policy studies that focus on discourse - the ways words and symbols are mobilized in power plays in policy formulation - can identify ideological politics (Ball 9-10). Hegemonic framing of educational policy issues has defined issues of quality and efficiency as the mainstream issues (e.g., professionalizing teachers, preparing students for the workforce, etc.). Ideologies in the myths and traditions of bureaucracies and policy arenas dichotomize the public and private sphere. While maintaining a rhetoric of individual choice and equality, mainstream ideologies have defined women and women's needs as relational, familial, and belonging to the private sphere, therefore keeping them out of public positions and agendas (Blackmore; Eisenstein; Paterman and Gross). So, when looking for the ideological politics and the discourses surrounding GEP activity, one must look at the margin of the mainstream policy arena. The evidence will appear as counternarratives, among counterpublics: "Members of subordinated groups who invent and circulate counterdiscourse to formulate opposition interpretations of their identities, interests,

1 64 ^ Lessons from Australia



and needs" (Fraser 117). Such politics occur more often in micro-interactions, outside of legislative bodies, and in non-official documents that challenge current governmental practices than in traditional political arenas.

Education policy directs schools, as major socialization instruments, in curriculum, testing, and governance in order to reinforce the hegemonic view. Parents and educators cannot see the limitations of stereotyped views of masculinity and femininity. Instances of girls and women lowering their aspirations because of the informal and formal curricula in schooling are invisible problems; they are "non-events" and areas of silence (Anderson 39). They are not seen as legitimate issues; hegemony places gender issues at the margin, or as belonging to the private sphere, where family, emotion, nurturance, and relationships belong. Words, labels, and symbols are manipulated so that GEP proposals may be viewed as irrelevant, impractical, incompetent, inefficient, irrational and silly. Thus, schooling issues concerning gender may be labeled unimportant by parents, educators, and administrators, although feminist activists continue to assert the relevance of gender issues.

Thus, GEP analysis must ask: What were the counternarratives and counterpublics? What happened as less powerful people challenged from the margins of power? What discourse politics occurred? How did gender equity emerge as a public issue, a real event, unsilenced? Analytic questions, then, are expanded to focus on the following: What feminisms framed policy development? How did counternarratives and counterpublics become more mainstream, more noticed, with visible participants? As one Australian activist said, "Making people talk about gender [. . .] with different groups in key positions forcing that dialogue, will get people aware and making decisions they wouldn't otherwise have made" (Interviews). Analysis for GEP, then, must incorporate feminist debates, politics from the margin, and discourse politics while benefiting from more traditional policy concepts. With these as guiding questions, we can identify the keys to success in GEP activism in Australia.

Lessons learned from Australia: framing a visible, legitimized agenda Understanding the philosophies, techniques, and strategies used by Australian gender

equity activists is useful for imagining possible solutions to gender equity concerns in other countries as well. Given the shift to a more conservative administration in the United States, for example, American gender activists may benefit from lessons learned in Australia. Strategies to be discussed include counterpublics' efforts to legitimate and manage gender equity discourse; the construction of common counternarratives; understanding femocrats, activists, and networking strategies; and anticipating backlash.

As counterpublics applied pressure from the margins, a primary task was to shift perceptions and practices regarding GEP to enhance legitimacy and thus longevity. Educational equity was a concern, along with free abortion, childcare, equal pay, women in educational management, and Equal Opportunity. One result was the establishment of a Women's Affairs Branch in the 1973 government. Another was the Commonwealth Schools Commission report, Girls, School and Society, which recommended strategies for changing attitudes, curriculum, vocational guidance for girls, and the promotion of women teachers.

Increasingly, the issue of girls' disadvantage was framed as a school policy failure (along with the issues around schools and minority groups). With the 1987 NPEGAS, national policy frameworks established that gender equity was a real priority. Femocrats used the framework




to remind implementers of the connections among democracy, social justice, equal opportunity policies, and the cultural backgrounds of aboriginal and ethnic groups.

The National Action Plan's success was ensured when the (male) Director General of Tasmania was chair of the Committee that developed it. As an activist recalled, "he was not seen to be a crusader and he could talk about going through a conversion with other Directors General. Plus that Committee had the expertise and assistance of gender equity activists rather than bureaucrats. It was a kind of brief shining moment" (Interviews).

Although operating under national directives, each state responded to national GEP from its own cultural and political context. South Australia and Victoria were leaders in antidiscrimination legislation, so EO officers and forceful strategies had momentum in the late 1970s and early 1980s while Queensland's movements gained legitimacy only with the 1990 election. During the 1970s, Victoria poured resources into supporting women, and the top two Ministry of Education officials were women, nicknamed the "Petticoat Brigade." As one said, "We really went to town," providing training for the lowest graded staff in the organization who were mostly mature women (Interviews). They committed resources to Adult Education, run by and overwhelmingly for women, and they provided several informal learning centers and neighborhood houses with computers so women could network. Dotted around the state, EO Resources Centers provided support for teachers, again predominantly women, who were trying to change things in their schools, to meet with each other, and to design and distribute curriculum materials.

Constructing common counternarratives Strategies depended on words and symbols, so GEP activists had to agree on which should

undergird their politicking for GEP. Which of the feminisms and which of the rationales for education would work best for GEP? What ideological, philosophical, and strategic stances would create pressure for GEP? If some want girls to gain access to science or math or engineering careers while others emphasize supporting women as mothers, or if some believe in confrontation politics while others believe in co-opting, how could these counterpublics construct workable counternarratives for promoting gender equity? As one informant reflected, the conflicts were never about a right or wrong stance, but over which of the range of issues and approaches should get priority:

Some say that it's more important that we concentrate our efforts on getting women principals if we want things to change. Others say, "Forget that - that's thirty years away, instead worry about getting the young people into a better range of occupations." There's been not a lack of awareness, but probably less emphasis at school level on things like alternative family choices; it has been more focused on careers. (Interviews)

As counternarratives circulated, GEP activists consciously guarded their image, keeping disputes private.

In Victoria, Women's Resource Centers became a place where debates were conducted frankly, avoiding "public spats between different sections of the women's movement [...]. We

feminists acted with great restraint because we didn't publicly define the issues as feminist, although at teachers' gatherings there would be lots of discussions about feminist perspectives.

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We didn't allow their legitimate differences to weaken the overall policy direction" (Interviews). Another recalled:

The feminisms debates were endless. We were careful to create our own space through the Women's Committee, where all the big talk happened, where the philosophies were struggled over. That was [for] women only for quite a while. There was a lot of debate over whether being seen as separate and raising suspicions was worth it. A certain group was concerned about how men perceived them and were keen to emphasize their own heterosexuality, motherhood, and general niceness. Another group, despite sharing the same characteristics on the whole, didn't give a toss about how they were perceived. But it wasn't personal, it was a strategy issue for advancing policy [...]. We had to be very careful who spoke in debates and what tone to adopt. We practiced and trained for it. Some people feed into stereotypes more than others - maybe a high pitched intense way that men perceive as hysterical, radical. Whereas this other tone of the logic and avoiding the personal remarks sounded sensible [. . .] so there was so much attention paid to those sorts of things. (Interviews)

Liberal feminism fit best with educators: "Feminism for schools tended to steer away from stuff that was in the universities about 'all men are evil, systems are run by men, and so get rid of all men and all system,'" one respondent reflected (Interviews).

A teacher union activist opined that liberal and socialist feminists worked well together and used a wide array of strategies rather eclectically:

We were so excited about the alternatives that we didn't have time to fight about which was better [. . .]. We've had separatist programs, women's only programs, we've had targets, we've had dedicated EO positions, we've had mentoring programs. But more than any it's been consciousness raising [. . .] then professional development. We toyed with, simplistically and naively perhaps, accountability [but managerial models and performance measures don't fit] [. . .]. We've been opportunistic [...]. We knew that programs for girls in math, science, technology -

[that] wasn't the only way to go. But it was a way in and through that mechanism they could generalize [...]. We'd always say "yes" and then try to do it whichever way we could get in and take it from there. Sexual harassment opened a lot of doors; it was the draw [. . .]. The issues might be bullying, harassment: I'd connect it to school culture. We had policies about increasing the number of women in trades, in science and technology. We'd have audits done of literatures to ensure that there were women heroes. We had things about girl's toilets, having those blue sanitary bins in every cubicle - silly, but we raised consciousness for looking at girls as a group and as individuals. When we talk about gender-inclusive curriculum we're not just talking about putting girls into the picture; we're actually talking about recognizing, respecting, valuing the different experiences women and girls bring to their learning and also the curriculum, being responsive to the way they learn - it was applicable across the board. (Interviews)

One debate concerned whether men should be GEP activists. The Women's Party excluded men, while welcoming their financial support. Victoria's programs for mentoring women were

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often embattled as men wanted the benefits and funding for professional development; the budgets for women's projects needed vigilant protection. A few femocrats were taking the controversial stand that they needed to involve powerful men to keep GEP alive: "In the early years, the 'women's Mafia' met regularly. Some had excellent networks with male power brokers - so that gave us a very direct influence. For Education, a male Director General decided to have an EO person on every senior committee; he had lots of charisma" (Interviews). In later years, GEP workers manipulated agendas from their positions in bureaucracies, working with men.

Managing the discourse and images GEP activists and femocrats positioned themselves by carefully choosing words, positions,

and behaviors. Initially, GEP activists knew to position their arguments to align with "fair go" in pursuing the feminist agenda, saying, "It just isn't fair to limit the options for young women. Men see their own daughters, they know they've worked bloody hard to get the grades at university, that it isn't fair that they are then locked out [. . .] because there's not childcare or the openings for women who've got a talent for aeronautical engineering" (Interviews).

In talking to groups about gender, GEP activists had clear but differently nuanced views of how to connect. One described her professional development work as:

Doing talks at conferences and running workshops and doing different groups in our department, talking to people. I make them listen to theory and philosophy. I'm past that put up butcher's paper and draw people bullshit. I talk theory to them, I talk about things like liberal feminism, conservatism and the radical models and that kind of thing and then talk about the questions they might have. So I talk to them as philosophers and theorists, and I think that works, positive things. My role is to make them think about things in a different way. Then others work on implementation [...]. So what you can do is give people a wide range of ideas then they can develop their practice from that and they've got some reasons. If you just stand up and give them strategies, if the strategies don't work, or if they get the strategy wrong, then they've got nothing else to fall back on. Some will come up with their own strategies if they're keen. People who are a bit on the edge, if you can get them interested, then they will come along with you. (Interviews) One femocrat knew experienced teachers "want to know something intellectual"

(Interviews). Another knew not to spend a lot of time "buying into people who are resistant, I just say I think you will find that the weight of the research would be against that opinion and let's move on" (Interviews). She usually was asked to talk about behavior management, or staff management or policy development and used this as the vehicle for talking about gender.

If somebody asks me to talk about or do a workshop on models for leadership, I do that with presenting some of the dysfunctional aspects of hierarchical or bureaucratic models and what would inclusive models look like, and then how women are more inclined to do [. . .] such models. Even though that's essentialist, it still is a way of presenting and expanding people's ideas. (Interviews)

She recalled the conflicts in the work of writing the national curriculum:




We had gender equity consultants who had done a lot of theory [...]. When it came to actually being read and approved, that was done by the ministers for education and their senior advisors [...]. They slashed bits out and disbanded the gender group and the whole. Later at the national level they put them back in, but that was a huge debate. Gender equity people would look at the documents and be extremely disappointed about what finally got into them, and the politicians and their advisors would be looking at the documents and thinking "well this is really quite radical and would upset many groups in our community." (Interviews)

Particularly feminist language "would come into the documents quite strongly and then go the rounds and disappear out of the document until the next draft and back in again" (Interviews). Holding together any fragile coalitions and degree of legitimacy for GEP required discourse strategies.

Activists9 associations and motivations With talk and activism for GEP came increasingly organized groups pressuring from the

margin. A femocrat recalled, "It was a convergence of pressures, GEP lobbying and pressures were like any other special interest in which there is a growing amount of dissatisfaction, lobbying, position papers and letters written to Ministers [. . .]" (Interviews). Another recalled, "Very active women in the teachers' union plus those who got good positions in the Department were very vocal and supportive of women" (Interviews).

As GEP proposals moved from the margins of politics to the center, many activists were appointed or elected to positions in bureaucracies and politics where, in some instances, their main task was gender equity. Thus, affiliations and motivations were transformed into jobs.

Femocrats With national, state, local, and union activism, policies and programs, and research for

gender equity came tasks for implementation. Attaining influential positions - with power, budgets, staff, and influence - some GEP activists took on those tasks and were called femocrats (feminist bureaucrats). One informant recalled, "Femocrat was a word that used to say 'she's not a real feminist - she's just using women's stuff to get ahead.' That's softened a bit and now we use it with a bit of pride. Most are in their forties now" (Interviews). Some took the jobs desiring the security of public service positions. There were conflicts, femocrats reported, when activists could not understand "their relationship with bureaucracy and government" and the fact that public servants must make compromises and "ultimately have to go along with governmental directives" (Interviews). There was "a culture shift for those who'd been in the trenches and on the outer in opposition for so long [. . .] sometimes its hard to imagine what its like to be in power," but femocrats made that shift (Interviews).

One femocrat's quote, however, revealed that their highly visible positions could fetter

their actions and talk:9 "I'm very clear about the fact that I am a public servant, it's not my role, maybe others, but not my role to be advocating quite radical changes. I'm working within government" (Interviews). Another had to generate activist support from outsider groups since she had resigned her leadership in AWE.




Reined in as they might be, this quote summarizes femocrats: "you can't underestimate the importance of having governments appoint people with designated responsibilities. If they put in the women and expected them to do nothing [. . .] the women didn't, couldn't do nothing" (Interviews).

Activists' strategies GEP activists understood how to use symbols, careful phrasing, amassed numbers of

people, pamphlets, discussion papers, and scenario-writing to mobilize support and legitimacy for GEP. Knowing and managing the biases and power of their opposition was essential for GEP activists. Activists wrote "scenarios" of how opponents would react to their initiatives. One spoke of the need to "be sure of your enemy - because if you can't be sure of what he or she is going to do, you can't block them" (Interviews). Activists and femocrats created support and network meetings because "being the gender equity officer and the sexual harassment officer makes you isolated [. . .] humiliated, marginalized" (Interviews). Too, a national leader emphasized, "Media's crucial - you've got to get your message across [about women's labor, education, community participation]" (Interviews).

In Queensland the appointment of Eleanor Ramsey was symbolic - a clear statement that GEP was important.10 "She could pronounce things like 'the condition for women in education is appalling,'" recalled one activist (Interviews). Women started applying for positions. Strategies evolved, too. Early strategies were marching in the street and heckling the public meetings. By 1995, "the direct question to the Premier and the Minister about the budget and about the Corporate Plan" centered on the new strategies (Interviews). Activists monitored the bureaucracy:

AWE found out where all the funding was from the Commonwealth, which was earmarked for gender equity. We got the real facts from having moles in all ends of the system [. . .] like the person who operated the computer that ran the accounts. Women in the union would have access to a lot of that information. We actually developed a kit which gave a model of how to write an application we knew was a successful format [. . .] to work in their own schools but also to stir up the system as well. Obstructionists said there was no money for gender equity and then would use the unspent gender equity funds for other issues. They'd deliberately re-channel the money. We wrote letters to the press [. . .] to politicians, the kind of normal political activity [. . .] cultivating the local Member of Parliament. (Interviews)

Another said, "I'm lunching with [a femocrat] to see how I can get the finance training in without the boys knocking us off (Interviews). She would liaise constantly and barter and dine and talk and say "good on you mate, good Aussie stuff' with bureaucrats, but she worried about budget cuts.

GEP in teachers' unions was targeted to alter key structures. Highly organized women teacher unionists created strong platforms and elected an outspoken woman president who "worked hard to keep gender issues alive" (Interviews). They established a deliberate goal to have the union leadership reflect the gender makeup of the union membership - 60% women.

Networks among counterpublics As women shared concerns, counterpublics - with networks and coalitions - emerged. A

Queensland femocrat recalled being motivated, being:




[B]lown away by all those brilliant women from other states where they had equal employment opportunity policies and legislation. The awareness of just how deliberate and strategic women can be, and policy can be, energized me. That was true for lots of women who were all bubbling to go! (Interviews)

Another continued, "Women in all the various level of education are very inter-connected through feminist movements and campaigns. Groups have been very supportive of each other and each others' campaigns" (Interviews). Under Labour Government such political cohesiveness was recognized in a policy group that advised the Minister, called M AC WAG: Ministerial Advisory Committee for Women and Girls. Groups from different sectors met monthly for policy work.

Unions took leadership on the EO and employment issues but integrated them into mainstream curriculum issues, creating training and curriculum materials for teachers and students. Unions worked strongly with the Women's Electoral Lobby and the Remedial Educational Coalition. GEP in Victoria always had a strong union base. Queensland GEP activists visited to observe the programs and action plans when their government was preventing GEP, then "went back and started to do things with the teacher union" (Interviews). Still, teachers were inconsistent. A Queensland Teachers' union GEP activist reflected, "Teachers break your heart because they're 50/50 on every issue, they're impossible to organize. They are conservative in the sense of radical change frightens them but they're not conservative in defense of their own conditions or students. It's a very strong motivating factor" (Interviews). Women's networks among unions and bureaucracies supported active mentoring programs for women in leadership. Also, they made noise: "When the union voice meets a locked door we can send out noise and words through other women" (Interviews).

Anticipating/confronting backlash The sources of early GEP opposition were cultural, structural, and political. Excerpts

from several quotes illustrate the climate framing the opposition: • "Homophobia was the unstated thing behind it until the homophobic

bashings in New South Wales" (Interviews).

• "We're okay when we talk about 'why should girls wear skirts. ' Its sticky ground to say boys should be able to cry and have close relationships" (Interviews).

• "The New South Wales Education Minister is saying Ί am not going to teach boys to do housework'" (Interviews).

Other quotes illustrate anticipated consequences and express fears:

• "Mostly the women are too frightened to appeal [job discrimination] or put in a grievance because they know they won't get another job" (Interviews).

• "Lorraine Elliott [M.P. in Victoria] is brilliant but she's being told that she's marginalizing herself [. . .] she's really kept hammering gender" (Interviews).




Further excerpts illustrate resistance from men:

• "The men are always there, saying what are you doing for us?" (Interviews).

• "Men will whine and whine and then they will not come [for professional development on gender]. Or they come, disrupt, don't listen but just come to get a promotion. With performance appraisal, the men learn to say the right thing" (Interviews).

• "It's been useful to insist that women be appointed as principals, but the backlash on that is that people say well we don't have enough male primary teachers" (Interviews).

Calm helped one to cope: "As I left the stage I heard a union guy say I was competing with a leading male unionist. 'Geeze what's the labor movement coming to when a bit of skirt can beat a unionist?'" (Interviews). This president ignored the comment, reasoning, "I'll be around a lot longer than him" (Interviews). Another recalled, "When the blokes argued reverse discrimination, the second thing they'd argue - which quite appeals to the public - is that people should only be getting there on merit [...]. And then I say 'now look at question time in the Parliament and see if you can tell me that all the men that you see are actually being selected on merit!'" (Interviews). One said, "We've moved past that particular generation of feminists who were seen as humorless; that insistence of political correctness that the media want to discredit and laugh at and see as petty" (Interviews).

Surviving economic rationalism Opposition had new, powerful language by the mid-1990s, when in elections "no one was

talking about justice and equity and we [were] in a vulnerable economic climate where people [running for office were] very dominant middle class and [there was] a stepping back from the responsibility to disadvantaged groups" (Interviews). A Queensland femocrat observed, "Now social reform is pushed aside for an economic rationalism in education" (Interviews). The top education official had asserted to other top officials, "Education is not a social policy area. It is an economic policy area" (Interviews). To argue that girls' mere participation and retention does not constitute equality was difficult in that context.

A subtler form of backlash came from "mainstreaming equity," downgrading and re- deploying government staff who had equity tasks, and from assertions that the problem had been taken care of:

It just irritated the shit out of the boys at the top that there was a whole EO section, the head of which was at equal level with all the other deputy directors and could attend senior officer's meetings where the policy was made with the new Minister behind it. (Interviews)

A femocrat spoke of "surreptitious slippage," explaining that the Queensland Education Department's language had lost the equity words with new talk stressing excellence in learning, productive partnerships, responsible strategic school management, efficiency, effectiveness, and appropriateness (Interviews). She said a key official in Education, behind the scenes, referred to social justice and equity as "educational clap-trap" (Interviews).




By 1995, popular discourse asserted that, for girls, "the ills had been cured" (Interviews). Under the leadership of Peter West ("a hitherto unknown academic"), a "What About the Boys?" backlash campaign was afoot, threatening the funding and attention for girls' equity (Interviews). Although GEP activists avoided being drawn into "a competition between boys and girls," the spate of conservative election victories in states was undermining GEP (Interviews). States were already doing "provocative things like sending males who have no interest or background to speak on gender equity" (Interviews). Further, some of the original activists were burned out, moving into more mainstream positions, and readying for a period of quiescence, while conservative politics prevailed and the appointed leadership was more in favor of working with the male power brokers in educational management rather than challenging them. Powerful GEP leaders who had "rustled feathers [and] named inequities at high levels" were under attack (Interviews).11

"Plugging away" and working with a low profile was a way to survive: "Calling attention would hurt us" (Interviews). As the National Advisory Committee for the Education of Girls became National Council for Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs with a task force on gender "made up of bureaucrats rather than those with expertise," and the national networking was weakened, with weak reporting and accountability statements for gender, GEP workers were finding ways to sustain themselves and their cause. Activists believed the national level was the crucial arena to argue for equity issues, and funding and pressure exerted from outside by other countries kept attention on gender. Gender issues would be continuously analyzed and research would continue because it was not seen as ideological.

Survival meant compromise. Credibility with chief executives was essential, which meant "moving out of the game" several activists who did not agree (Interviews). Predicting that the next Federal Government would put GEP "under some program that just talks about equity generally, which usually means non-English speaking people and Aboriginal kids," the task was to present a Gender Equity framework "palatable to the new political arrangements" (Interviews). After the next election, people doing gender programs might not have those jobs. "Those who'd rather go down in flames and lose everything than be seen to make a political shift [. . .] just aren't politically wise" (Interviews). One activist explained:

The term "gender construction" was being recast, with simpler language, writing the story about the experiences that boys have which led them to believe strongly that they have do be a certain way to be accepted as a boy. So, getting to teaching people what it really means about kids' experiences. I'd like to see a lot more men, whose buttons are pressed, realizing that their experiences and behaviors have not been good for them. But then power is hard to give up [...]. (Interviews)

The Chair of the National Gender Equity Task Force was charged by all the Ministers of Education around Australia to set up a gender equity framework guiding states programs then allocating funding. She wanted very senior women and men with influence in all systems, saying:

[G] ender is not the flavor of the month for any government now. There were task- force nominees who are fantastic women but are not prepared to shift away from the focus on girls and to shift politically. We'll throw out the baby with the bath water. We won't have anything for girls let alone for boys and girls. (Interviews)

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The new move was to "eliminate the victim mentality about girls" and change educators' understanding of gender construction "and the disadvantages and advantages ofthat [. . .] to look at pathways boys and girls take through business and industry and tertiary education, to recognize that it is still a male domain and work on that" (Interviews). The recommendations had to be acceptable to all the Ministers.

Increasingly, women politicians were wary of feminism. Carmen Lawrence was an exception and was under political attack because of her stance. Some female politicians publicly disavowed any connections to the women's movement "even though they're feminists. They'll say women should get ahead by their own bootstraps. Extremely disappointing. But pushing something if it means my political credibility is questioned? - That would be self-destructive," commented a femocrat (Interviews).

Language and symbols were also changing: by 1994, instead of having the National Advisory Groups for the Education of Girls, the name was Gender Equity Task Force, incorporating boys' disadvantages. Liberal-access language was still credible. The term "target" was politically risky but equal employment opportunity, getting women on first base to compete on merit, programs for disadvantaged women and girls or continuing to push the figures about pay for women were viable. "But the messengers will be shot if we're not careful. We need younger women, we need men to be pushing the messages home. The new generation, 20s and 30s, not people from the 70s movement," concluded one informant (Interviews).

The survivors' way of sustaining GEP, then, included avoiding unpopular ideology and words, reframing issues into politically viable strategies, showing how pathways for boys and girls still differ, and finding jobs in which they could implement GEP under different guises. Capitalizing upon dominant values of choice/democracy as "fair go" and as equity/social justice, but blending those values with effectiveness and quality/performance/outcomes for girls and boys, later kept GEP alive as values shifted. The "fair go" social welfare tradition was built upon with the added layer called social justice.

Conclusion GEP policy developments are challenges to patriarchy and hegemony. GEP is politics

from the margin, challenging the dominant values and power structures. The ensuing analysis is organized to show how policy windows opened through the production of documents, the work of grass-roots coalitions, the openness of political systems to outside demands, and the success activists had in moving GEP discourse from the margins to the center. Too, it is organized to show how Australian counternarratives and counterpublics were coordinated and coherent, and how they blunted oppositions' effectiveness in diverting and silencing the challengers.

Equity activists can learn lessons from this analysis of GEP in Australia. First, the (retrospective) lessons of Australian gender activists identify ways to use cultural values, form coalitions, connect to concerns of more established groups (e.g., parents, unionized teachers), manage their image and discourse, maintain networks, and keep disputes private.

Second, once legitimacy and constituency for the equity movement is established, working forcefully within the power centers is the challenge. Femocrats and activists work to maintain visibility for GEP. Subtle tools include maintaining equity staff; widening research, evaluation, and monitoring to expand equity agendas; and maintaining relationships both within policy arenas and externally, with activist networks that still agitate from the margin.

Third, as cultural values shift, as national policy priorities are redefined, and as backlash




against equity occurs, equity workers work with institutionalized structures (e.g., research and monitoring) and find ways to insert equity into new, popular priorities (e.g., quality assurance, "the boys movement"). They modify philosophical stances to fit equity into programs (e.g., anti-violence) which will be funded and supported when gender evokes or provokes that backlash. They move to jobs where they maintain their power in order to find quiet and subtle ways to continue GEP work.

The lessons from Australian GEP activism are useful for all activists who are challenging from the margins, introducing counternarratives. Parents enraged about over-testing, teachers appalled at meager budgets for materials, women disgusted with outdated male models of school administration, and others may learn to construct and manage successful challenges to the status quo.

Why did this happen in Australia but not in the United States? The Australian story reveals hints from its context and from its laws. These elements of the Australian context, contributed: the "fair go" ethos, the array of political parties and educator unions, the history of union activism, and the relative acceptance of national government leadership for education. Feminists and educators were able to capitalize on these elements, which did not exist in the United States. However, the United States GEP movement could have used these supports and strategies:

• finding ways to embed GEP into wider context (e.g., violence against women). • mounting coordinated media blitzes (following the example of when "Listening

to Girls" was released). • creating a power base (as in Australia's Women's Electoral Lobby and Association

of Women Educators). • recruiting powerful sympathetic men from union and bureaucracy. • recognizing the need to represent all women, not just white middle-class educated

women. • being willing to be radical and raucous at times as well as diplomatic and

cooperative. The United States' policies - Title IX and others - lacked some of Australian GEP strengths. NPEGAS, as national policy, had a comprehensive, interventionist stance, with explicit action plans, requirements for reporting of all statistics by gender, requirements for an Equal Opportunity Officer in every school and, importantly, national funding.

The national, government-funded conferences attended by concerned educators, femocrats, scholars, and activists supported crucial networking and solidarity. Finally national, state, and union policy for gender equity in education was constantly being intertwined with other gender- related policies, such as policies against violence and against inequities in the work place. In some instances, the Women's Budget was a tool for holding all government agencies accountable for their efforts to raise the status of women and girls (e.g., as in the state of Victoria). These policy supports did not exist, were not built into United States GEP. Instead, funding, enforcement, supporting, monitoring, and networking for supporting United States GEP was left to initiatives generated and mostly funded by non-governmental groups. Unions, scholars, organizations like American Association of University Women (AAUW), and the National

Organization for Women raised the funds and did the work, without real government support for making anything happen for United States' GEP. Thus, the context of Australia and the




details of the policies made Australia's GEP more forceful than US GER

Endnotes 1 In his study of policy communities, Goodsell notes the necessity of systematic research on the cultures of public bureaucracy, advocating the study of "patterns of speech, written language, internal interaction ... architectural settings, office accouterment, [and] personal life styles" (496). 2 The abbreviation GEP will be used hereinafter to mean gender equity policy or program activity. 3 In Australia, feminist activists who took jobs in agencies and then managed GEP from the inside were called "femocrats." 4 However, I have found US teachers' unions taking responsibility for GEP activism and professional development (Marshall, Taylor, and Gaskell). 5 The Center for Educational Leadership and Policy at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) provided generous "Visiting Scholar" support, and Professors Sandra Taylor, Brigid Limerick, and Leonie Daws of QUT, Lyn Martinez of the Queensland Department of Education, and Jill Blackmore of Deakin University assisted with gaining access to an extensive network of key actors for intensive interviewing. The interview approach protocol veered from usual practice in qualitative inquiry. I provided participants with prior information on my intentions, expertise, and a way of focusing the interview. Also, I used a typology of policy mechanisms to prompt interview attention toward the range of options that are often used in US education policy making, assuming it would have some transferability and utility in Australia. 6 Letters of self-introduction requesting an interview contained a three-page protocol, so participants were well-informed of the assumptions and frameworks. Many supplied policy documents (e.g., budgets, positions statements, curriculum and training materials, government reports, and association and network letters). 7 "Power and politics" feminisms move policy framing away from fixing women, compensating women's deficiencies, and protecting women toward fixing the institutions and societal norms that create barriers to equity and free choice. 8 As Flora Ortiz and Catherine Marshall note, "The judgment of elders and power brokers prevails in determining what is good, correct, legitimate, and valuable in theory, research publication, practice, behavior, and even sentiment. Questioning fundamental values and structures to explain gender inequity could not be expected to occur without extraordinary challenge because of the threat to existing practice and the distribution of power in educational institutions" (136). And, as Dorothy Smith writes, "Because men have the power they have the power to keep it." As equity policy redistributes benefits and access, it often comes from highest levels (e.g., the US Supreme Court or other central branches of government). Equity policies are often ineffective unless enforced through punishments and/or rewarded and supported with resources and training (Stromquist). 9 One said she would have to come to another country to be able to talk to me in an "unfettered way." 10 Eleanor Ramsey was Director of Equity- Workforce and Studies from 1989 to the early 1990s. The position was significant in bringing together employment and student equity issues for a short time. 11 Reducing the debt took precedence, and the conservative, anti social welfare and pro market




competition trends from overseas (US and Great Britain) were viewed as something to emulate societally and politically. In a group interview in Victoria, I asked "What catch words and trends dominated in 1995?" The chorus was: "Leadership vision; managing diversity; quality assurance; market; productivity; enterprise education; violence; benchmarks; restructuring; devolution."

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Lessons from Australia: Strategies for Gender Equity Policy

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