Melissa Johnston: Resilient Patriarchies

Timor Leste became independent from Indonesia in 2002, after 24 painful years of Indonesian occupation built on centuries of Portuguese colonisation. Both regimes were deeply violent and extractive, and as my guest today argues, drew Timorese society into different forms of a valorised armed masculinity that would have repercussions well after Timor’s independence. It’s in this post-conflict context that Mel Johnston examines Timor’s gender interventions. Gender mainstreaming is a global set of strategies, interventions and approaches that seek to address the inequality of being a women in policy-making. These set of principals have particular traction in the region. Gender mainstreaming has been mandatory in Indonesia since 2000. In Timor Leste, gender mainstreaming is so important its crystallised in the actual constitution. And yet, Mel went to East Timor to investigate women’s lives after independence, she found deep tensions between the goal of peace on one hand and gender equality on the other. Why would this be so? Did Timor’s independence transform the role of women in Timorese society? How did major gender reforms like microfinance and the law against domestic violence impact ordinary Timorese women? Today we will be talking about Mel Johnston’s prize winning book, Building Peace, Rebuilding Patriarchy

You can listen to Melissa Johnston: Resilient Patriarchies online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Melissa Johnston: Resilient Patriarchies is an episode from Talking Indonesia by Talking Indonesia.

This episode is 00:43:44 long.

This episode was published on Feb 26, 2026.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from Talking Indonesia when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.