The growing influence of transnational process, institutions and policy communities has contributed to the emergence of a global public policy that is distinct (although not separate) from the national process of policy-making. In this context gender equality and gender mainstreaming have become dominant policy and political narratives for addressing gender injustice. The focus of this paper is on developing the conceptual and theoretical links between global policy paradigms and gender equality and incorporating multi-scalarity, translation and disjuncture into our understanding of the ways in which policies are made, processed and enacted. The discussion begins by extending Hall's concept of policy paradigm as a nationally bounded entity and highlighting the transnational processes and institutions contributing to the emergence of a global policy paradigm and global policy space. It then goes on to highlight the fluidity of policy paradigms and the importance of moving beyond the focus on techno-managerial “order” as the essence of the policy paradigm and indicators of change and instead to bring into sharper focus disjuncture and tensions.

This article addresses conflicts and negotiations about gender equality and diversity within the European public sphere (EPS). It aims to explore the specific constraints and possibilities for realizing gender equality and justice from the transnational European context. Research illustrates that the European Union (EU) approach to gender equality has strengthened the transnational space of mobilization and given actors new possibilities to negotiate about multiple inequalities and direct their claims at different levels. This has at the same time led to a diversification of women's claims and conflicts about the meanings and framings of gender equality and diversity within the EPS. This is illustrated by case studies of the framing of gender equality and ethno-national diversity by political actors in the European Women's Lobby and the European Parliament. The article proposes that the multilevel EU polity can be interpreted as a unique case for reframing justice in a globalized world.

This paper explores gender mainstreaming in the context of health policy and health variations between women and men. Despite the adoption of gender mainstreaming at international, regional and national scales since the Beijing Platform for Action in 1995, gender inequalities in health persist. The paper argues that the translation of gender mainstreaming as a global policy paradigm across and between policy scales has significance for health policies aiming to address gender. The paper suggests that while gender mainstreaming originated to address women's needs, the paradigm is founded on goals that do not translate in health policy; that the representation of the problem of gender in this global paradigm is problematic in a health context; and that the role of global networks in policy translation as part of this paradigm has led to the replacement of transformative ideals with technocratic solutions which shift the focus away from gender relations of power.

This paper examines the extent to which the influence of Confucianism on the welfare of women erects barriers to the gender mainstreaming (GM) of childcare policy in Hong Kong. GM is a global strategy adopted by the Beijing World Conference on Women in 1995. Adopting a context-sensitive approach in understanding the translation of the international concept of GM in the policy formation and practice in Hong Kong, we find that the Confucian welfare model has profound impact on women's welfare and the effectiveness of GM in Hong Kong. First, childcare support for the family is far from adequate due to the perception of childcare as the individual family's responsibility rather than as a citizen right. Second, the gender-neutral discourse commonly accepted by the policy-makers in Hong Kong reflects the inadequate gender-sensitivity training of government officials. Third, GM has been “watered down” as a technical tool instead of transforming gender inequality in the society.

This paper maps the changing nature of European equality regimes in order to establish the extent of variation or convergence across Europe and to evaluate the role of transnational policy paradigms and state-level institutions in shaping the emerging European equality regimes. We identify two significant tendencies in respect to European equality institutional regimes. First, a growing complexity in the institutional arrangements designed to address inequalities, with pre-2000 institutional arrangements increasingly augmented by newer equality institutions that adopt a judicialized approach to dealing with inequalities. Second, a Europe-wide tendency to widen the scope of equality policy thinking from a very small number of privileged inequality grounds (most frequently gender and ethnicity) to a much wider range of inequalities to be addressed by state policies. The overall impact of these two changes has been to create equality regimes characterized by a wide variety of forms and levels of protection for the different inequalities. This suggests that while a transnational policy paradigm has framed the evolving nature of equality regimes across Europe, the implementation of this paradigm is moulded by the power dynamics embedded in national and local equality institutions, creating a fragmented and complex patchwork of equality regimes that defy easy regional classification and complicate overly generalized narratives about the influence of global policy paradigms.

The European Union (EU) was an influential voice in advocating the adoption of gender mainstreaming by the 4th United Nations World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. Since then gender mainstreaming has become a central policy plank of gender justice globally, but progress has been variable and modest. This paper examines the unfolding of gender mainstreaming in the EU, which was one of the early adopters as reflected by its commitment to gender mainstreaming in 1996. The objective is to identify patterns that may have implications for gender justice on a broader scale. The lenses are the European Employment Strategy dating from 1997 and targeted gender equality initiatives dating from the Community Framework on Gender Equality (2001–2005). Drawing on documentary analysis of these sources constraints on moving form aspiration to policy practice and outcome are identified. These are intensified by the multilevel structure of decision-making in the EU, which means that commitments agreed at the EU level are not pursed with the same fervour by all member states. But constraints are inherent in gender mainstreaming because of the contested and vague nature of the concept, the context of cross-cutting inequalities and the structural basis of these inequalities.

The paper is set to examine the state of gender equality in Central Eastern European Countries (CEECs) since accession to the European Union (EU) following the two enlargements in 2004 and 2007, which saw 10 CEECs join the EU. In this context, the paper addresses some implications of transformation, which challenge gender regimes across CEECs. The paper looks at the nature of the policies adopted to ensure gender equality in Central Eastern Europe (CEE) and, in particular, using Hungary's and Poland's family policies as a case study, it evaluates whether EU gender equality measures have had an impact on gender equality and justice in CEE and, more generally, whether they have led to new gender equality paradigms.