After having evaluated its investment policy according to its impact on the climate, it is in the light of gender equality issues that the ecological municipality of Strasbourg has decided this year to assess its budget.
Objective: to combat the illusion of equality in which public policies are bathed today and to develop a cross-cutting approach in this area of interest to each department of the municipality. “It is not because a policy is addressed to everyone without distinction that it impacts women and men equally”believes Christelle Wieder, deputy in charge of policy in favor of women’s rights and gender equality.
The assessment process carried out by the city led it to qualify more than 60% of its operating expenses and 54.5% of its investment budget for 2023 as “likely to be gender sensitive”. The ambition is to sustainably improve the consideration of this impact in the design of city policies, whether in education, culture, sport or solidarity.
Today, only 0.5% of the operating expenses of the city of Strasbourg (excluding human resources) are thus qualified as positive for gender equality, and 2.9% of investments. Among the latter are the financing of the mission “women’s rights” of the municipality, the green ordinance, a device to fight against endocrine disruptors, for pregnant women or even the work of revegetation of schoolyards. Their reconfiguration makes it possible to fight against an initial imbalance occurring from early childhood, which sees little boys occupy 80% to 85% of recreation spaces, to the detriment of little girls.
Commitment hailed by the opposition
An experiment has already been set up within the city’s sports and citizen participation departments. Agents have been trained in the issue of gender equality and encouraged to change their practices. Strasbourg, for example, has modified its sports license aid scheme so that it concerns both girls and boys, who represent up to 88% of beneficiaries today. The municipality also intends to redirect its grants to sports clubs to further promote high-level practice for young girls.
In the field of citizen participation, the city began by offering a childcare system during neighborhood assemblies and established equality in speaking out. “This has significantly changed these citizens’ assemblies, with a significant impact on the self-esteem of the women concerned”notes Christelle Wieder.
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