On 29th September 2015 in Hanoi, Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (VASS) in collaboration with UNESCO Office in Vietnam and UNESCO Hanoi Office held international forum on “Gender dimensions of social exclusion: Towards more inclusive policies for women.” Institute for Family and Gender Studies (IFGS) and Department of International Cooperation (IDC) were assigned by VASS as the forum organizing committee. The forum was attended by about 120 local and international participants who discussed and exchanged academic information and research results on several dimensions of social exclusion as well as policy recommendations for promoting gender equality and social inclusion for Vietnamese women. The participants were i) researchers from UK, France, South Korea, Nepal, Singapore; ii) research institutions and universities on social sciences in Hanoi; iii) policymaking bodies on gender equality, family, ethnic minority people in Vietnam such as Department of Gender Equality (Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs), Department of Family Affairs (Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism), Committee of Ethnic Minority Affairs; iv) mass organisations and non-government organisations such as Vietnam Women’s Union, CSAGA, CEPEW; v) international organisations in Vietnam such as UNDP, UN Women, UNFPA, AusAID, Asia Foundation, SSRC. After opening remarks by Vice President of Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences cum Vice President of Vietnam National Commission for UNESCO Professor Vo Khanh Vinh, General Secretary of Vietnam National Commission for UNESCO Pham Sanh Chau, and Representative of UNESCO Hanoi Office Katherine Muller-Marin, Director of IFGS Associate Professor Nguyen Huu Minh presented the introductory report on gender dimensions of social exclusion, Vietnam policies on social inclusion and delineated the themes for forum discussion. The speeches and introductory report highlighted the significance of international forum and the importance of promoting gender equality to reduce social exclusion and inclusive policies for women and socially excluded groups. The forum focused on three main themes: i) Theoretical issues of social exclusion from gender perspectives in the linkage with the practice in Vietnam; ii) Women’s access to social resources; iii) Healthcare and security of socially excluded groups. 1. Gender dimensions of social exclusion. This session provided theoretical and practical overview of social exclusion which was to guide the discussion for the two next sessions of the forum. There were four presentations in this session, including those from Department of Gender Equality (Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs) which is responsible for state management of gender equality; two presentations of Vietnam and UK researchers on social exclusion of two typical groups in Vietnam – ethnic minority people in the Central Highlands and Northern mountainous provinces; a presentation by UN Women on tendency, challenges and recommendation for inclusive growth of women. The session focused on the conceptual issues of social exclusion and its distinction with other concepts of inequality and difference. Several issues of social exclusion of ethnic minority people, migrants, the elderly, and cultural issues such as early marriage, social norms, and unpaid care work were discussed. 2. Women’s access to social resources. Two international researchers and three local researchers presented in this session on the obstacles women have been facing in their participation in management and leadership, access to developmental resources, vocational training for socially excluded groups of ethnic minority women, divorced women and the comparison with the case of Nepal. The presentations in this session underlined the reality and the influencing factors of gendered exclusion in which cultural factors play key role. The session invited several rooms for discussion such as while Nepal and Vietnam has several similarities in terms of cultural obstacles for women’s political participation, the proportion of Nepal women’s political participation is higher than that of Vietnam despite the fact that Vietnam has a comprehensive legal system; whether gender-based exclusion is geographically different? What are the factors promoting gendered inclusion? 3. Healthcare and security. In this session, there were three presentations from Vietnamese presenters on the situation and solutions to deal with domestic violence in Vietnam; characteristics and social exclusion of disable women and disable men; the obstacles of ethnic minority women in the Northern mountainous provinces in accessing to healthcare service. Also in this session, a Korean researcher presented the case of full-time mothers in South Korea who are excluded from benefiting a healthcare policy and a Singaporean researcher presented on the role of education to adolescents and the burden of childbearing which creates social exclusion of adolescents. Again, the discussion in this session emphasized the role of culture, customs, education and awareness raising in reducing social exclusion of women. After thematic sessions, the participants attended a plenary session looking back discussion of the thematic sessions and emerging issues which were very relevant and comprehensive information for researchers and lecturers on social exclusion and its gender dimensions from a comparative perspective between Vietnam and international landscapes. In his closing remarks, Vice President of Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences, Vice President of Vietnam National Commission for UNESCO - Professor Vo Khanh Vinh highlighted that the forum was the acknowledgment of local and international researchers and policymakers that promoting gender equality would reduce social exclusion. He also emphasized that the forum has provided implications and recommendations for gender-responsive policy making on social exclusion in Vietnam. The discussion of the forum would be a useful reference source on gender dimensions of social exclusion for researchers, lecturers and policymakers. The forum has attained its objective of "helping researchers and policymakers intensify their linkage for the goal of inclusive growth, developing policies and programmes for the sake of women, especially vulnerable women in their access to social resources, healthcare and security in an effort to reduce poverty and narrow gender inequality that creates better balance and inclusive social policies for women" as spoken by General Secretary of Vietnam National Commission for UNESCO Pham Sanh Chau in his forum opening speech. Given abovementioned results, the forum is expected to publish its proceedings to widely disseminate the forum results and knowledge amongst researchers, policy makers and practitioners on gender equality and for the advancement of Vietnamese women.

In order to strengthen the relationship between the Institute for Family and Gender Studies and the Korean Women Development Institute, a knowledge and experience exchange seminar was held by the former in November 16th 2015 in Hanoi. The seminar was attended by many researchers from the two institutes. In addition, staffs from Vietnam Women’s Union and Vietnam Women’s Academy were among the participants. Due to time limit, there were only 02 presentations given by the Institute for Family and Gender Studies and the Korean Women Development Institute in the seminar. The representative of the Korean Women Development Institute performed the presentation entitled “Institutionalizing policies related to gender mainstreaming”. Gender mainstreaming is regulated in the Korean legislation and is implemented in four major fields including (1) education on gender equality, (2) gender statistics, (3) gender analysis and (4) policy making. Thus, gender impact assessment plays an important role in developing policies which ensure gender equality and bring about benefits to all stakeholders. The process of integrated gender into policies and programs was illustrated by vivid examples. On behalf of the Institute for Family and Gender Studies, Dr. Tran Thi Minh Thi – Vice Director gave a presentation on “Some major dimensions of policies for women in Vietnam”. The presentation focused on three groups including policies on gender equality; marriage and family; and care activities. To closing the seminar, the representative of Korean Women Development Institute expressed the wish to continue strengthening the relationship between the institute for Family and Gender Studies and the Korean Women Development Institute as the content of the memorandum of agreement signed by the two partners. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Huu Minh – Director of Institute for Family and Gender Studies affirmed the close association as well as the commitment to enhance research exchange and collaboration activities between the two two institutes in the future.

Based on a three-year research experience, online reports with individual female journalists as well as female leadership, and a personal observation as a female journalist with work experience of fourteen years, the author argues that masculinity has had a significant influence on the small number of female leaders working for media companies in Vietnam. These impacts include that the majority of male and female journalists do not want to work with female leaders, and that female leaders follow traditionally male rules when managing their staffs. Increasing these aforementioned impacts is that men do not want to share their privileges and women do feel powerless to challenge this status quo.

Gender responsive personnel management is crucial to the equal participation of men and women in leadership and management in public sector. Public sector personnel management includes many different components. This article, however, focuses on the review and analysis of regulations as well as policies related to the planning for potential leaders and nomination of public sector officials as these are two key parts necessary to the process of strengthening the representation of women in leadership and management. The article is part of the research results under the project “Research on public sector personnel policy in order to enhance women’s representation in leadership and management within public sector” implemented by the Center for Women in Politics and Public Administration.