Economic Crisis, Gender Equality, and Policy Responses in

At the beginning of the 2007-09 global financial crisis, Canada and Spain developed ambitious economic plans that reflected their governments’ distinctive political values. In Spain, the social democratic government, which took several steps in support of gender equality when in power (200411), devised its Plan E by reference to European Union guidelines. The Canadian minority conservative government, which had begun dismantling gender-equality provisions as soon as it took office in 2006, initially repackaged its massive pre-crisis tax cut program as its Economic Action Plan and only reluctantly agreed to add selected spending measures to this plan when at risk of losing power.