The globalization of women's status: Consensus/dissensus in the world polity

The amount of attention devoted to women and women 's issues has increased dramatically in the inst five decades throughout the world. ill this article toe examine the cultural construction of women that guided such action by analyzing texts that rc,err produced and activities that were undertaken in relation to women by international organizations from 1945 through 1995, We show that the modernist principles of universalism, liberal individualism, anti rationality provided the cultural framework for tills global project. We compare the ways in which two issues important to women, education and genital mutilation, were constructed by global actors a,tn the implications of this meaning making for action over time. Our analysis reveals an important link between the extent to which an issue is constructed to be consistent with the modernist principles and the extent to which it receives global attention.