The impact of COVID-19 pandemic on double marginalisation of women in Kosovo

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic worldwide has revealed the scale of social inequalities even in some of the most developed economies, exposing the existing vulnerabilities. Particularly, gender inequality and economic empowerment of women were a challenge even before the COVID-19 pandemic. This article investigates the “double marginalisation” effect of COVID-19 pandemic on women in Kosovo, through the analysis of gender implications of COVID-19 and participation of women in the labour market. Double marginalisation is analysed through the prism of the lack of institutional actions to prevent the further marginalisation of women during the pandemic crisis. Governmental preventive and recovery measures have particularly neglected women by failing to recognise the threats and vulnerabilities they are exposed to. Thus, the intentional negligence leads to the emergence and development of the phenomenon of double marginalisation of women. It is also a result of traditional vision of the role of women in society and cultural stereotypes combined with the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.

Keywords

• double marginalisation
• COVID-19 pandemic
• gender equality
• labour market
• Kosovo
• economic empowerment