Resistance to Implementing Gender Mainstreaming in EU Research Policy

The European Union (EU) officially committed to gender mainstreaming in the 1990s, fixing the principle in treaty articles, action programmes, and communications, and setting up institutional bodies and mechanisms to promote the incorporation of a gender perspective into policy making. However, the implementation has not reflected these official commitments, with gaps showing in the mainstreaming of gender into the EU's public policies (Bruno, Jacquot, and Mandin 2006; Mazey 2002; Rees 1998, 2005; Rubery 2002; Serrano Pascual and Behning 2001; Verloo 2001) and processes, such as the EU's enlargement to Central Eastern Europe (Bretherton 2001) or its constitution making (Lombardo 2005; Millns 2007).