Economic Policies for Social Justice

Feminist economics

Since late 2023, the regional FES project on Economic Policies and Social Justice has placed a strong focus on feminist economics. Our aim is to connect regional initiatives with FES’s global work on feminist economics, while strengthening local and regional networks that raise awareness, generate knowledge, and advocate for gender-equitable economic policies.

Economic systems shape how resources, opportunities, and power are distributed, yet conventional approaches often ignore the structural inequalities that disadvantage women and marginalized groups. By rethinking economic policies through a feminist lens, it becomes possible to expose and address these imbalances, whether in wage gaps, unequal access to decent work, or the undervaluation of care. Grounded in research, policy dialogue, and coalition building, this work focuses on integrating gender perspectives into macroeconomic and fiscal policy, ensuring that economic strategies foster equity, dignity, and shared prosperity for all.

Our key achievements include:

Launching the first Working Group on Feminist Economics in the region, bringing together academics and activists from across West Asia and North Africa to exchange ideas and explore the links between feminist economics and political and economic developments. This independent platform also hosts webinars and events organised by its own engaged members.
Driving knowledge production by issuing calls for papers, holding academic roundtables, and supporting the creation of the first Arabic lexicon on feminist economics.
Building future expertise: Through partnerships on summer schools, we train and inspire the next generation of feminist economists in the region.
Mainstreaming feminist perspectives: We embed feminist approaches across all our initiatives and collaborations. For example, see our joint work with Noria Research on the Gendered Impacts of Deindustrialization in the MENA Region: Read the report.

Through these efforts, we are building a vibrant, cross-border community committed to rethinking economics from a feminist perspective — and to making gender justice a central pillar of economic policy in the region.