Reflections on the Gender Equality Dialogues
Written by Becca Williams
Our third cohort of the Gender Equality Dialogues just wrapped up, and this was my first time facilitating a cohort composed entirely of representatives from sustainable seafood nonprofit organizations. The Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions, FishWise, Ocean Outcomes, and SmartFish signed on to our public gender equality commitments, worked through 12 GED sessions to build their own organizational gender equality commitments, and realized that they were a lot further along in their equity journey than they initially thought.
This was a fantastic cohort to be a part of, especially as this has been a tough year for gender equality work: A year of reassessing, mapping out our next steps, and hoping the pendulum will swing back this way. This GED cohort of likeminded, mission-driven peers reminded me that a lot can get done if people are motivated, and a lot can get done if we move as a collective. Gender equality can feel like a massive featureless monolith that is near impossible to summit, and this cohort reminded me of the immense value in starting, in putting one foot in front of the other.
The GED is based on building gender awareness, conducting a gender analysis, and making an action plan. However, it does not hold all the answers to the big equity questions. Rather, it clears the pathway for seafood companies and nonprofit organizations to more confidently understand and build solutions to the issues they face, and will continue to work through.
In our last session together, we spent some time discussing: What’s one question about gender equality in the seafood sector that you’re still curious about? Here’s a summary of what we talked about:
How can we outfit fishing gear, boats, etc., in order to make the industry more accessible and comfortable for women?
What market and endbuyer levers exist for us to better educate or equip the industry to push more equitable policies or practices down their supply chain?
We tend to think that we know the right way to measure impacts and achievements without necessarily consulting the people most impacted by our work, especially when it comes to equity work. What would it look like if we were to ask first?
When will the seafood industry be ready to move beyond just equality between the binaries of men and women, and into talking about equity among folks of other genders?
How do we involve men into these discussions and get them to join us in these spaces? It’s unfair that the responsibility of the movement often rests on the shoulders of the people who are also bearing the burden of oppression.
When are we going to be able to move beyond celebrating women in leadership - when are we going to get to a point where this is the norm, and it isn’t so monumental?
I was really struck by the groundedness, hopefulness, and straightforwardness of these responses, and they reminded me that while we’ve come a long way, we still have a ways to go - and that the impact of this work can be felt in all corners of the sector.
When I think about the questions put forth, I’m reminded of why it’s crucial that we look at our work and our future success as being gender transformative. We spend a good amount of time in the GED discussing what that means in theory and how that looks in organizational practice. Essentially, it’s a guiding principle that shapes our approach to building an equitable seafood sector by seeking to change the underlying power structures that create and reproduce inequality.
This can feel like a massive, monolithic lens, especially when looking at the underlying elements of “why” in the questions above: Why aren’t boats and gear outfitted for women? Why aren’t men involved in these discussions? Why are our programs deemed “successful” if we haven’t consulted the communities most impacted by our work? Why is it so monumental to have a woman in a leadership role?
The answers can feel impossible, interconnected, and too big. But, if we can shift and look at what’s possible within our scope - our organization, our company, our relationships, our own mindset - we can see that small changes at a hyperlocal level are hugely significant in their own right, and contribute to the larger re-orientation of the sector toward being gender transformative.
