The advocacy, agency and competency of women activists participating in the Australian environmental movement

Abstract

This feminist sociocultural thesis links theory to practice in its exploration of the gendered roles and work-based identities of women activists participating in the Australian environmental movement. Drawing upon 31 interviews from my qualitative analysis with women working in grassroots organisations, eNGOs, Greens parties, and academia, I investigate participants agency and competency and their ambitions for environmental reforms. Three major areas of intellectual context are women's activism, gender performativity, and, agency and competency in environmental advocacy. I argue that gender is an active performance, in how women's experiences are informed by social relations of power and the negotiation of masculinity and femininity (Butler 1990, 2006; Phillips & Knowles 2012). Feminist, ecofeminist and social/environmental movement studies contextualise the struggles and achievements of women, and such theory provides a lens to my empirical analysis. My goal is to investigate the extent to which the women in my research recognise the patriarchal control of their organisations and also the social elites in governance and industry (Plumwood 1997; Leahy 2003; Cockburn 2012). Gender barriers, in the form of the sexual division of labour and glass ceilings, entail challenges for women's status in the workplace (Mellor 1997; Connell 2009; Mellor 2009, 2012). Within a social hierarchy, the agency and competency of my participants is evidenced through their negotiation of masculinity and femininity as well as strategies of resistance and accommodation towards male power and labels. My qualitative findings reveal contradictions and insights. Women identify with emphasized and resistant forms of femininity. Core insights from my data-driven analysis are 'the boys club', token women and maternal identity in environmental activism. A contradiction was that some participants reject feminist labels, yet gender differences were found across the results. My accounts further illustrate that activism, age and culture can be more of a barrier than gender. This thesis adds knowledge to areas of feminism, qualitative studies and movement scholarship. Thus, my research highlights the activist strategies of women environmentalists across paid and unpaid sectors, and pinpoints feminist and environmental issues that link theory to practice.

Date of Award	2014
Original language	English