Our postdoctural researcher Karmen Tornius has published a new SCRIPTS Working Paper (No. 59):

“Drafting the Gender Equality Script: African Women Between ‘Liberal’ and ‘Liberatory’ Gender Discourses in the 1980s.”

The paper shows how African women were central architects of today’s global gender equality agenda. Their contributions during the major UN women’s conference in 1985 helped move global feminism beyond a narrow focus on legal rights.

African delegates connected women’s everyday realities to broader issues such as apartheid, global inequality, debt, economic reforms, and rural livelihoods—arguing these are core women’s issues. Their activism brought attention to violence against women, land rights, support for girls, and more nuanced, locally grounded debates on harmful practices. 

You can access the paper here