Understanding the Relationship Between Sustainability and Ecofeminism in an Indian Context

Abstract

This article looks closely at the relationship between gender and environment in the context of sustainability. It has been seen that without the inclusion of feminist concerns for gender equality, most environment public policy approaches will be incomplete and may even threaten to intensify women’s subordination. This is illustrated in this article through a case study from Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu, India, wherein local organizations that operate successfully for environmental sustainability and women’s financial inclusion do not achieve gender equality due to the chokehold of patriarchy. The article is theoretically situated in Bina Agarwal’s idea that differences in attitudes to conservation between genders can stem primarily from the gendered division of economic resources, and the gendered division of labor. The article concludes that the relationship between women and nature in the Global South is a political issue that is fraught with power relations that operate at different scales and through different modalities.