The world is facing a global waste crisis due to half of the waste produced not being collected, treated or safely disposed of. Waste not managed in a proper way causes air and water pollution and has negative health and social impacts on people living or working close to the waste. Alt- hough evidence shows that implementing gender approaches improves environmental issues, and the majority of waste pickers are women, few organisations focused on waste management are implementing gender mainstreaming into their work. This case study examines gender main- streaming within the organisation Women in Informal Employment: Globalising and Organising (WIEGO) in relation to environmental issues. WIEGO is an international organisation working to increase the voice, visibility and validity of the working poor, with a special emphasis on women, with a core project that supports cooperative waste picker women in Brazil. The study was conducted through two interviews on local and international level and the analysis of 20 documents describing WIEGO and its work. The theories and concepts of gender mainstreaming, intersectionality, Feminist Political Ecology and Environmental Justice were used to analyse the results. The study showed that WIEGO was implementing gender mainstreaming in their opera- tive work, in the policy framework and in the waste picker projects in Brazil which has resulted in physical and emotional improvements for WIEGO employees internationally and waste pick- ers in Brazil. <<< / Världen står inför en global avfallshanteringskris där hälften av allt avfall som produceras inte insamlas, hanteras eller kasseras på ett säkert sätt. Avfall som inte hanteras säkert skapar luft- och vattenföroreningar och har negativa hälsosamma och sociala effekter för människor som lever eller arbetar nära avfallet. Trots att forskning visar att genusperspektiv förbättrar miljö- problem, och att majoriteten av avfallshanterare är kvinnor, fokuserar få organisationer som hanterar avfall på ”gender mainstreaming” i sitt arbete. Denna fallstudie undersöker ”gender mainstreaming” i organisationen Women in Informal Employment: Globalising and Organising (WIEGO) i relation till miljöproblem. WIEGO är en internationell organisation som arbetar med att öka inflytandet, synligheten och validiteten hos fattiga arbetande, med ett särskilt fokus på kvinnor, med ett kärnprogram som stöttar kooperativ av avfallshanterande kvinnor i Brasi- lien. Studien genomfördes med två intervjuer på lokal och internationell nivå och analys av 20 dokument som beskriver WIEGO och dess arbete. Teorierna och koncepten ”gender mainstrea- ming”, intersektionalitet, Feministisk Politisk Ekologi och miljörättvisa användes för att analy- sera resultaten. Studien visar att WIEGO använder sig av ”gender mainstreaming” i sitt opera- tiva arbete, i sitt policyramverk och i avfallshanteringsprojekten i Brasilien, vilket resulterat it fysiska och emotionella förbättringar för WIEGOs internationellt anställda och för de avfalls- hanterande kvinnorna i Brasilien.

Both the theoretical outlines of a solution to the climate and ecological crisis, as well as concrete efforts at environmental reform and energy transformation, often run into the ambivalent role of organised labour, particularly trade unions, in todays growth-oriented, fossil-fuel based economy. On the one hand, trade unions often already formally endorse the ideal of sustainability, on the other hand, in concrete environmental conflicts, they often the side with "jobs" against climate and environmental protections, and thus serve as a support of the growth-oriented fossil economy. The concept of a just transition, embodying the attempts at creating a framework in which the interests of workers and climate protection can be reconciled, thus also becomes ambivalent, serving often as a basis for arguments against more ambitious decarbonization. The aim of this thesis, drawing on the theoretical framework of critical political ecology, is to explore the possibilities of solving this dilemma in the case of Czech trade unions. On the basis of interviews with their various representatives, it will try to answer the questions: 1) what political strategy is shaping the policies of Czech trade unions in the sphere of climate and energy policy, 2) how do these trade unions see their role in the proces of a...