Gender sensitivity in development

The relatively recent emphasis on "women in development" as a separate issue has brought forth many new attitudes and studies on the roles of women in developing countries, but has also in many cases, retained gender-specific\AB stereotypes as to women's roles, priorities and responsibilities. Among the beliefs and practices mentioned are; a vision of the "homogeneity" of women, notwithstanding marital status, educational level, or goals beyond the\AB domestic sphere, an automatic inclusion into the "nurturing and caring" role that targets women as logical receptors of health education while possibly obscuring the roles of men and children, and the delegating of women's\AB participation in projects to a source of cheap labour and exclusion from decision- and policy making. The Water, Engineering and Development Center (WEDC) training programs (in the UK) are promoting women's participation on\AB equal footing with men's participation as managers, technical staff and authors of conference papers. The philosophy presented is that as the proportion of women professionals increases, the policies dealing with gender issues\AB will be automatically improved.