Feminist approach to foreign policy - stakeholder engagement workshops: evidence report

6. Conclusions and next steps

The many activists, organisations, scholars and experts who participated in this consultation process were positive and excited about the Scottish Government’s commitment to a feminist approach to foreign policy and international engagement. This was seen as an area in which the Scottish Government can build progressive alliances and demonstrate its “good global citizenship”.

To move forward, the Scottish Government is recommended to take the following immediate steps, in order to ensure the recommendations for policy and action made in this report are implemented effectively and in a timely and participatory way:

• Put in place a mechanism for ongoing engagement around its feminist approach to global affairs to ensure regular, ongoing, productive dialogue with and feedback from civil society, academia and other experts, including women’s groups and feminist networks. Many of the individuals and organisations that took part in this stakeholder engagement process expressed themselves as ready to be part of such a mechanism.
• Put in place a Global South consultation mechanism around its feminist approach to global affairs, including women’s groups and feminist networks. This might build upon existing structures or be something new.
• Promote and support structures that encourage knowledge sharing on foreign policy issues between civil society groups, women’s groups and feminist networks in Scotland and elsewhere.

Work should, in parallel, be scaled up to ensure that all Scottish Government staff working on all portfolios with a global impact (which includes any departments engaged in procurement of products produced outside Scotland) have training, guidelines, reporting mechanisms and expert support to integrate a feminist approach in their day-to-day work.