Investigating the Effect of Gender Approaches on Achieving Sustainable Development in Suburb Settlements (Case Study: Surrounding Villages of Karaj Metropolis)

The development thinkers have always agreed on human excellence in all aspects, yet in many countries the issue of gender has become a basis for socio-cultural, economic, political, etc. In inequalities, and this   leads to a serious challenge and dilemma in achieving sustainable development. Rural areas, because of the  dominant sexism, women and their empowerment in various fields, are ignored whereas their participation as well as men’s can facilitate the process of achieving development. Therefore, the present study was conducted to investigate gender approaches to sustainable development in villages around the metropolis of Karaj. The research method in the present study is descriptive-analytical and its type is applied in terms of purpose. Documentary and field methods have been used to collect data. Statistically, it covers the population of 10 villages located in the central part of Karaj city and out of a total of 3987 households living in rural suburb settlements. According to the Cochran's formula, the sample size of 228 households was estimated, and these individuals were selected by random sampling method. To test the conceptual model of the research and to investigate the effect of research dimensions on sustainable development, the partial least squares technique and Smart PLS software were used. According to the results, the coefficients of t between the main variables of the study are above 2.58, and there is a significant and direct relationship. Thus, economic, social, environmental and institutional dimensions have a positive and significant effect on sustainable development. The value of R2 shows that 96.7% of sustainable development is explained by achieving four dimensions, and the economic dimension with a coefficient of 0.88 has a greater effect on other dimensions in a sustainable rural development. Also, the results of t-test with two independent nodes showed that in the study area, gender type was not effective only in economic and sustainable development indicators, but rather was in three indicators of social, environmental and institutional. Therefore, all of these dimensions, in terms of importance and necessity, require well-planned planning and action to improve, neglecting of which can improve the process of improving sustainable rural development and could challenge the positive role of gender approach in it.