Why Gender Mainstreaming Falls Short in Indonesia’s Energy Transition Policies

Abstract

This study examines gender mainstreaming in Indonesia’s energy sector and evaluates gender poverty issues, specifically analyzing why current gender mainstreaming efforts fail to address structural gender inequalities. Using a qualitative policy analysis approach that utilizes document review and literature analysis, the theoretical framework draws from the politics of justice perspective, specifically three tenets of energy justice: distributional, recognition, and procedural justice. Despite its efforts toward gender mainstreaming initiatives, the findings show that Indonesia’s current policies still lack these three tenets, from limited women representation in the energy sector, higher energy poverty prevalence among women, to patriarchy and surface-level empowerment programs. As this study focuses primarily on national-level policies, it may not fully represent regional variations in policy implementation across Indonesia's diverse provinces. However, it contributes to gender and energy studies by providing a critical analysis of Indonesia's energy transition policies from a gender justice perspective, particularly for policymakers, for a more inclusive energy transition in Southeast Asia. Nevertheless, by addressing these issues, the study's novelty lies in its ability to explain the stagnation of Indonesia’s gender mainstreaming efforts in this sector, which further aligns with the implementation of SDG 5 and 7 to a greater extent.