From gender blind to gender inclusive higher education in Serbia: Gender mainstreaming action plans

Abstract

Subject of this analysis is the higher education in Serbia, in which the dialectic of patriarchy and emancipation exists in a specific manner. The mentioned dialectic has represented a general locus of gender relations in contemporary time, but, however, has had different manifestations in different societies and various spheres of societal life in each society and globally. The background presupposition is that this dialectic has also been on agenda generally in contemporary higher education, but, again, with significant differences depending on historical-political-cultural specificities of particular educational modalities. Focus will be on the higher education in Serbia, which still has been significantly determined within all its dimensions with a patriarchal matrix. In spite of vivid emancipatory shifts in Serbian higher education, there has obviously still existed horizontal and vertical gender segregation, gender imbalance in governmental structures, gender blind curricula and textbooks for knowledge production. Strategic aims and paths of gender mainstreaming in Serbian higher education are considered in this article. Starting from the statement that this process presuppose all-encompassing structural changes, these authors offer the model of gender action plan (GEP), which could serve as the basis for creating policies of the higher education gender mainstreaming in Serbia. This model is based on action plans which have been developed in projects of European Commission (EC) and European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), and which imply – structural changes from „above“, which then could initiate changes from „below“ for the purposee of gender mainstreaming and essential advancement of the quality of higher education.