This paper was commissioned by UNRISD as a contribution to its ongoing research project on Gender and Social Policy. The paper compares the practice of gender-responsive budget initiatives with the claims and expectations about what they can achieve.

This document is a gender analysis of Uganda's 2003-2004 budget prepared by Forum for Women in Democracy (FOWODE) The report discusses some of the emerging gender issues and concerns in the Ugandan 2003-2004 budget, potential gendered outcomes as well as recommendations for achieving future gender-sensitive budgets.

This briefing paper published by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in October 2010 discusses the factors needed for successful budget reforms after conflicts, using the example of Southern Soudan. The study highlights two factors, in particular, that have influenced the success of Southern Soudan in building planning and budgeting systems after 22 years of conflict between the Government of Sudan and Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM). These two factors are: Strong technical...

Ethiopia has prioritized the advancement of gender equality through the development and implementation of the first National Policy on Women in 1993 followed by the promulgation of Constitution in 1995 that calls for equal rights of women, including Affirmative Action to bridge existing gaps. Ethiopia has revised gender discriminatory legal provisions in the Family Law and Penal Codes, showing a firm political commitment to gender equality and the advancement of women.

The brief paper brings forth a gender analysis of the finance sector in Uganda. The paper underlines the importance of integrating gender guidelines into the budget as the Ministry of Finance Planning and Economic Development (MFPED) strive towards their goal of diminishing absolute poverty to less than 10 percent by the year 2017. Conducting sex-disaggregrated benefit assessments of policies, gender sensitive evaluation of public expenditures and evaluating gender implications of the...

The article discusses the potential for gender budget exercises to address gender issues and more specifically, the capacity for such exercises to address the complexities and dilemmas associated with mainstreaming gender into governance processes. The author draws largely upon the South African initiative and highlights how gender budget exercises must be modulated within a social, economic and political context.