Representation of Discursive Conflicts of Gender Equity in Development plans of I.R. Iran

The planning system in Iran is influenced by the ruling political and social discourses, and that what place such discourses hold for subjects and categories is represented in development programs. Among the very important subjects is the subject of “women”. According to the meaning and identity the subject of women has in the discourse of the executive states of the development, the signifier of “gender equity” is either considered to be the same as in the planning system or is left idle . Hence, it is the attention or inattention of the development programs to the gender equity that could lead to its establishment or continuation of gender inequity.
Using the discourse analysis of Luclau and Mouffe, the representation of discursive conflicts of gender equity in the Development plans was investigated.
Findings: Development plans after the revolution, in terms of paying attention to the subject of women, have been by the ongoing discursive conflicts in the political arena. The analyses showed that in the first and second programs, educational justice and the imminent implication of health equity have been taken into consideration. The signs of “increase of occupation chances for women and their occupational promotion”, “paying attention to gender combination of labor force supply”, “promotion of women’s occupational skills” by referring to signified of “economic equity”; and the signs of “essential reforms in legal affairs”, “facilitating the legal and judicial affairs of women”, “legal services”, “protecting the women rights”, “reviewing the rules and regulations” and “legal preparation for removing violence against women”, organize the semantic system of “legal equity” in the reforming discourse. The “Planning for a Health Promotion and Lifestyle Health Education Program” statement is an inadequate indication of health equity and “access to equal educational opportunities ” is a representation of “educational equity” which the discourse of political development has included it in the third and fourth programs. In the fifth program of development, the signs of “promotion of women’s health” and “establishment of the House of Health for girls and women” are taken into consideration as “hygiene equity”. Although “development and the organization of economic-subsistence affairs” represents the “economic equity”, since it emphasizes the female-headed women and the household occupations, it doesn’t contain the whole sense of economic equity. The statements of “supply of the required trainings appropriate to the role of boys and girls” and “guaranteeing the access to equal training opportunities appropriate to gender” refers to the signified educational equity and cover its sense totally. Also, the discourse analysis of gender equity in the sixth program of development indicates that the discourse ruling the sixth program of development is formed with pivotal signs of “gender equity” and with the signified “occupational chances”, “health & hygiene”, “literacy of women”, “reform of legal system” (in the family domine) and “participation in decision-making and decision-taking”(not the opportunity of political equality). These semantic signs contain economic equity, hygiene equity, educational equity, the imperfect implication of legal equity and inadequate political equity.
Regarding the findings, it can be said that gender equity is one of the semantic signs of discourses of reform and moderation, with the conception of equality as analogy. . Hence, the gender sensitivity of the third, fourth and six programs of development should be considered, as if the structural limitations have exposed them to enmities and the critics of the rival discourses which prevents the programs from a complete implementation.