Compare methods

	Gender Mainstreaming Assessment	Harvard Gender Analysis Framework
Field	Gender Studies	Gender Studies
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1997	1985
Originator	UN Economic and Social Council (gender mainstreaming, 1997); European Institute for Gender Equality (gender impact assessment methodology)	Catherine Overholt, Mary B. Anderson, Kathleen Cloud & James E. Austin (Harvard Institute for International Development, with USAID)
Type	Policy gender analysis method	Applied gender analysis framework
Seminal source	United Nations Economic and Social Council (1997). Mainstreaming the gender perspective into all policies and programmes in the United Nations system (Agreed Conclusions 1997/2). UN ECOSOC, New York.	Overholt, C., Anderson, M. B., Cloud, K., & Austin, J. E. (Eds.) (1985). Gender Roles in Development Projects: A Case Book. Kumarian Press, West Hartford, CT. ISBN: 9780931816154
Aliases	Gender Mainstreaming, Gender Impact Assessment, GIA	Harvard Analytical Framework, Gender Roles Framework, Harvard Framework
Related	4	4
Summary	Gender mainstreaming assessment, operationalised most concretely as gender impact assessment (GIA), is the method used to put into practice the strategy of gender mainstreaming defined by the UN Economic and Social Council in 1997: assessing the implications for women and men of any planned action — legislation, policies, or programmes — in all areas and at all levels, so that gender equality becomes an integral dimension of policy design rather than an afterthought. As a method it screens a proposed policy for gender relevance, gathers sex-disaggregated evidence, evaluates how the policy will affect women and men differently, and recommends adjustments, with monitoring built in.	The Harvard Gender Analysis Framework, also called the Harvard Analytical Framework or Gender Roles Framework, is one of the earliest structured tools for incorporating gender into development planning. Developed in 1985 by researchers at the Harvard Institute for International Development in collaboration with the USAID Women in Development office, it organises gender analysis around three matrices — an Activity Profile of who does what, an Access and Control Profile of resources and benefits, and an analysis of the Influencing Factors that shape these patterns — and applies them across the project cycle to make women's economic contributions visible to planners.