This thesis examines the international cooperation between the Danish organization ‘Ligestilling for alle’ (LFA), and the Jordanian organization ‘Jordansk ligestillings forening’ (JLF). The key elements in this cooperation consist of four social programs that LFA implements in JLF. The purpose of these programs is to increase the gender equality of Jordanian women in different ways, such as protection against gender-based violence, promoting political participation and to give women the same legal rights as men.
The focus has been towards the imbalance of power in this cooperation because LFA is a donor of both economic and political support and JLF is dependent on this support.
There is a risk that JLF experiences violations because of a lack of participation in the cooperation, which can result in western cultural imperialism. To examine this the students traveled to Amman, the capital of Jordan, where they performed semi structured qualitative interviews with the leader of JLF, two program advisors of JLF as well as the program advisor of LFA.
The first part of the research analyzes the organizational framework of JLF by using Edgar Scheins description of organizational culture. The second part focuses on investigating in which degree JLF experience violations or acknowledgment in the cooperation with LFA by using Peter Høilund and Søren Juul’s theory of acknowledgment. In addition to this, the theory of intersectionality has been used to understand whether recognition or violation are dependent on the cultural context. The last part analyzes in which degree JLF is being involved in the cooperation with LFA, where Sherry R. Arnstein’s concept ladder of citizen participation has been used. This part of the analysis is complemented with Peter Høilund and Søren Juul’s definition of different judgments to find out how the program advisor from LFA is navigating between her different judgements and what this means for the involvement of JLF. It is concluded that JLF for the most part experience the cooperation as positive. Additionally, JLF has a strong organizational integrity, which makes them able to withstand direct cultural imperialism. The research also shows that the program advisor from LFA has a big role regarding that JLF experience a high degree of both acknowledgment and involvement.