Toward a Gender-Sensitive Approach to Corruption: PSIA Students Co-Author a Policy Brief for the G20 Task Force

When starting a Master’s level class on “Gender and Development in Theory and Practice”, most students do not imagine that they will finish the semester having their policy brief chosen to be presented at a global summit. Yet this is precisely what happened to students Mathea Bernhardt and Laura Dugardin at the Paris School of International Affairs upon completion of their class with professor and researcher Maxime Forest.

Their policy brief, “A Transformative Gender Approach to Fighting Corruption in Low- and Middle-Income Countries,” was selected from a pool of over 600 submissions to be presented at the T20 Italy Summit in Milan in the context of Think20, a group of think tanks that provide research-based policy recommendations to G20 policy makers.

In their policy brief, the two students aimed to disprove gendered myths on corruption, using Latin America and the Caribbean as their regions of focus. Their aim was to provide tangible steps towards fighting corruption using what they call a “transformative approach”, which is to say, an approach that does not hinge upon gendered stereotypes that depict women as inherently less prone to engaging in corruption. As they note in their brief, “Increasing the participation of women should not be regarded as an anti-corruption strategy, but as a fundamental right,” (Bernhardt, Dugardin, Forest p. 10).

They go on to note the ways in which policies that do not take a nuanced understanding of gender and of social structures that form gender presentation into account ultimately fail to enact substantial change when it comes to corruption. Instead, Bernhardt, Dugardin, and Forest highlight the necessity of “a shift from instrumentalizing women in the fight against corruption through the feminisation of public agencies, towards a structural and gender-sensitive approach.” It is precisely this approach that they outline in their policy brief, co-written with Professor Maxime Forest, and which influenced the reflection on corruption at the T20 conference in early October.

In the following interview with PRESAGE, Sciences Po's Gender Studies Programme, Laura Dugardin and Mathea Bernhardt discuss their experiences writing their policy brief and the opportunities that Sciences Po has afforded them.

The Sciences Po Editorial Team

• Learn more about the Paris School of International Affairs’ Master in International Development
• Discover Sciences Po’s Gender Studies Programme - PRESAGE
• Read the policy brief: “A Transformative Gender Approach to Fighting Corruption in Low- and Middle-Income Countries” (PDF, 516 Ko)
• Learn more about Professor Maxime Forest (FR)

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