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Report from the event

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To uphold international human rights principles and standards;

Ratify and fully implement state obligations, including extraterritorial obligation under all international human rights treaties, including the Optional Protocols; Withdraw all reservations, enact enabling legislation and strengthen accountability mechanisms that institutionalise and support implementation.

Read the whole statement

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Poverty has affected the lives of millions but the most suffering section of society is the women and children. Because of constraints and discrimination, women have to bear the maximum brunt of poverty.  They cannot afford basic needs like food, clothes, house, education and health-care. Even whatever they can afford is of poor quality. Poverty for them is insecurity, powerlessness and susceptibility to violence and often living without access to clean water and sanitation.

Governments of countries are trying to prove that they are more concerned in framing the women friendly policies and programs to improve their quality of life while the prevailing status of women presents a grim picture. Sources reveal that there has not been any change in their quality of life as is quite evident from their unequal and poor status in the society.
Gender economist, E. Boserup explains that women were not always in disadvantageous position. How they reached the position inferior to that of men has been a long process. During the different stages of economic development, their status deteriorated.
Economic development may have resulted in economic growth but has not resulted in human development, especially since half of the population i. e women seem to have been bypassed in this process. Thus, being poor means that they are resource less, unhealthy, exploited and more vulnerable to sexual harassment.

According to the 2014 edition of the world bank    report, the global target for reducing poverty by half was achieved five years ahead of schedule and the number of poor people – those living on less than $1.25 a day — had halved to 18 percent in 2010 from 36 percent of the population in 1990. Even if the current rate of the progress is to be maintained, around 1 billion people will still live in extreme poverty by 2015.In some developing countries, we continue to see a wide gap between the rich and the poor and between those who can and who cannot access opportunities .Other challenges such as inequality, non effective governance, economic shocks, food insecurity and climate change threaten to undermine the progress made.

According to United Nation’s Millennium Development Goal programme ,270 million or 21.9% people out of 1.2 billion of Indians lived below poverty line of $1.25 in 2011-2012.   According to Tendulkar Poverty Line ,during  the year 2011-12, India had 270 million persons below poverty line as compared to 407 million in 2004-05.These figures indicate that  there is a reduction of 137 million persons over the seven year period.

As per the UNDP report 2014, India ranks 135 in Human Development Index. The number of poor is now estimated at 250 million, of which 200 million reside in rural India. The report states that none of the BRICS countries have made place in the high human development category and India remains at the bottom with lowest HDI value among them. “India is the lowest performing country among the BRICS nations in all categories of the HDI with the exception of life expectancy, which is lower in South Africa as a result of the HIV/AIDS epidemic,” the report says. “Everyone should have the right to education, health care and other basic services. Putting this principle of universalism into practice will require dedicated attention and resources, particularly for the poor and other vulnerable groups,” says the report. “Strong universal social protection not only improves individual resilience, it can also bolster the resilience of the economy as a whole. The Human Development Report lays great stress on global agreements and pacts and how these can   contribute to build a universal system. National initiatives for universal provision of services are more easily enacted when global commitments are in place and global support is available. Global agreements are essential because they can instigate action and commitment and generate financial and other support.

CHALLENGES FACED–

There are several challenges facing India today vis via women’s economic development but some of the big red flags are-
Inadequate economic opportunities is one of the biggest causes of female poverty which is one of the big challenges to the progress of women. In India poverty is multi dimensional social problem.  Causes of poverty are many like-unemployment and underemployment, lack of property rights, dependence on agriculture, high population growth rate, caste system, corruption and above all holding of financial resources in the hands of males. Most of the women are not direct earners. They do not have a direct standing in the credit market, either formal or informal, as they do not own any assets in their name. There were no property rights in family property till 2005. The custom of dowry as a substitute to inheritance gave them the role of 2^nd class members of the family and society. There is no budget for spending on their education. Lack of skills, heavy physical work of different types, long hours of work with limited payment, lack of guarantee of minimum wages, lack of job security and social security, lack of minimum facilities at the work place, lack of income after retirement are some of the factors of the informal sector which contribute to women’s weakness. Also female-headed households are likely to suffer more than male-headed households as they have less access to government development programs, welfare schemes, resources and communal assets. 

Male migration from rural to urban areas is also a big problem. Men migrate to other cities leaving behind women and children, making them further vulnerable since they solely depend on men economically.
Providing the inhabitants  with need based skill training at local level, equipping them with the latest techniques, helping them to access the marketing links, setting up of  small enterprises ,will help to stop migration of the labour force in search of jobs. It will create an infrastructure within the community that will be conducive to women’s economic empowerment. In a country like India, where the gender divide and the inequality between men and women is so wide, providing the skills and the opportunity for women at local level to be economically self sufficient is a must for social and political empowerment.  Even though there is a vast development in agriculture technology, it is yet to reach all the villages.
Women entrepreneurship program, access to credit and ensuring their participation in value chains is critical. Provision to centers of higher learning, vocational and skill based training, technical education will help in increasing economic participation and also reduce occupational segregation.

Lack of infrastructure in rural areas increases women’s contribution to unpaid housework. Even today women spend up to six hours, just to fetch drinking water from the ponds, rivers etc. In making the development process inclusive, the challenge is to formulate policies and programs to bridge regional, social and economic disparities in an effective and sustainable manner.

Although the Government’s schemes and programs are quite promising, yet concerted efforts are required to ensure inclusion and empowerment of women in all the schemes and policies formulated so far. The schemes such as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), Self Help Groups and many others have opened employment opportunities to women but with low remuneration, minimal benefits and uncertain contracts. The recent announced 2015 budget cuts in the health, education and social sector spending are a further detriment to the development and empowerment of women especially in the rural areas.

In addtion challenges in the form of traditional and cultural practices, socio-economic conditions remain and lack of awareness, inadequate implementation of various policy measures and mechanism  continue.

 Bottom up programs and legislations have further hampered the possibilities of grassroots women’s needs being addressed by development interventions. Any development program that ignores the life chances of half the population cannot address the problems of poverty and crisis of sustainability. 

Inadequate social security net system has not proven effective. At present, whatever the pension amount is given by the government is too little even to survive and it covers only a very small segment of women from  the lowest income group. The rate of pension varies from state to state.

As per UNDP Report 2014   “Universal access is vital to protect people from vulnerability”. I think this is the area where we can work together and put our views strongly for universal access, keeping in mind our national interests and initiatives. Our efforts to create a better society should be based on promoting peace through participatory good governance ,creating  accountability and grievance mechanisms at local, national and international levels.

AIWC’s Initiatives-

Education and empowerment of women have been at the core of All India Women’s Conference’s agenda since its inception in 1927.  AIWC has been striving incessantly to promote literacy and skill training to empower women, for the last 86 years, through our wide network of 500 branches spread all over the country.  Over 1.5 lakh voluntary members work with selfless dedication for the cause of women in various fields.  AIWC’s programs in education, health and eradication of poverty are aimed at helping 50% of our population i.e. women. Empowerment of women is an essential ingredient in protecting women’s right and has to be looked at from a holistic perspective. Proper education, economic self sufficiency, self confidence and courage are needed on the part of the women with a matching response from men based on mutual respect.  HE for SHE , A UN program, where men are a support system to their women, and gender equality becomes a primary goal in all areas of social and economic development.

AIWC has initiated programs like socio-economic, skill centered literacy, health awareness, legal awareness, environment friendly income generating activities, leadership training programs particularly for women Panchayat members, adoption of villages ,rural/urban community resource centres which have brought quite encouraging results. To quote a few—our  projects on solar drying of food products for income generation, sanitary napkin making unit , spice grinding units, dairy farming, provisional stores, medicinal herbs units  etc have been very successful and given economic independence to women in their local area. The results are visible as the living standard has improved and women have emerged as empowered women who are making decisions for their lives. Around 50,000 women and girls have benefited from these programs. Since 1995,we have introduced new ventures like renewable energy, environment friendly alternate vocations for women bidi  workers(rolling of tobacco leaves),Herbal gardening for  women as income generation activity etc. 

The following suggestions would go a long way in bringing women out of the morass of poverty:

1. GIVING WOMEN EQUAL ACCESS TO LAND AND OTHER ASSETS

Due to son preference culture and second class family member status of women throughout world, they do not enjoy entitlement rights of land and other family property .They are always treated as a liability by their parents. Therefore, it becomes mandatory to change the traditional tactics of making women landless and resource less individuals by giving them equal access to assets and resources at par with men so that they can gain control over family as well as community resources, increase their bargaining power and enjoy equal say in decision making.

2.     MAKING VISIBLE THE CARE ECONOMY

It is imperative to measure the output from the Care economy  in terms of time  and in terms of money so that women’s work will gain economic recognition and monetary edge by including it in national accounting system. Although, some recent legislations have supported this view that women’s household work as well as child care should be measured in monetary terms and husbands should be asked to pay for their wives services but yet it also waits for enforcement.

3. INVOLVING women in economic decision making

Economic policy making is the domain of politicians who usually happen to be mostly men. At various decision-making levels, gender imbalances can be distinguished in communities even at the earliest stage of development. Women are underrepresented in decision making in govt., business sector especially at senior levels. The irony is that women are not even involved in decisions related to their life like consent at the time of the marriage, and the decision regarding reproductive matters like how many children she should have or how to go for family planning practices? . Therefore, the demand of time is that women being the implementers of the decisions of men need to be involved in framing policies and plans of the society so that they can  be able to address their issues in a much better way.

4. CHANGING GENDER BASED DIVISION OF LABOUR

A universal trend of dividing the household work according to gender has been acting as the main obstacle in the way of women’s suppression and economic backwardness. All the household drudgery from cooking to crop cultivation, harvesting and rare and care of pet animals in homes is performed by women in Indian society as a whole. Women remain busy with performing household tasks and in addition to this perform the most sacred job of motherhood which leaves no scope for her to work in any productive activity. On the other hand, men have kept themselves away from domestic obligations and care of children which are full time jobs at home and they only participate in economic activities which get in cash income (revenue) and thus enjoy command in household as well as community affairs.  Therefore, this uneven and unequal gender based division of labour needs to be changed and men also have to come forward and share the the burden of domestic duties so that women can participate in economic activities.

5. ACCESS TO CREDIT AND FINANCE

Women face a major constraint in availing the facility of credit. Establishing their small scale enterprises to earn their own livelihood and to become self reliant turns into an unfulfilled dream due to lack of financial availability. They can’t avail loans from banks unlike their male counterparts because they don’t have assets and other property in their name that could be kept as mortgage with the bank. Therefore, it is the utmost responsibility of the government and other financial institutions to come to their rescue and facilitate women by providing them easy access to credit facilities and grant subsidies to encourage them to come forward.

6. GENDER BASE DISTORTIONS

There is discrimination against women workers in the  labour market whereby women performing the same work as their male counterparts are paid less. The minimum wages ACT 1948 is not enforced due to lack of knowledge and information. Thus, gender based price distortions lead to false economics. Economic policy makers aiming to improve overall economic efficiency need to count and measure women’s work equally with men’s so that their contribution does not remain hidden and   invisible. Policy makers should focus and work for creating job opportunities for women and only then their problems of   economic dependence, poverty and resource lesness can be addressed properly in a broader perspective.

7. GENDER BASED INSTITUTIONAL BIASES

Women’s work days are longer than men’s in general. Men monopolize the use of new technology and women have to work with traditional labour intensive techniques. Thus, change from traditional to modern methods of production in any sector tends to enhance men’s prestige at the expense of women’s by widening the gap in their levels of knowledge and training. Thus ,need of the hour is to make these institutions bias free so that women can enter the fields so far denied to them for lack of training and exposure.

8.GENDER BUDGETING

Gender budgeting will help govt and civil society to assess the extent to which gender issues are being addressed through budgetary allocations and expenditures so that women may not be only the beneficiaries of benefits of development but equal participants in the process of development.

9.  GENDER STUDIES

Gender Studies need to be promoted in academic curriculum from the initial stages of schooling so that both boys as well as girls will develop sympathy and respect for each other. There is a need to change the male psyche and sensitize men to understand the role and relevance of their opposite gender in their lives. Gender education will help in promoting gender equality and empowerment of women.

10.POLITICAL PARTICIPATION

Women need to be invited in the political domain of societies world over by giving them not only one third representation but fifty percent of their share as per the proportion of population. It is an admitted fact that unless women make their entry into top decision making bodies of the nation, they can’t reshape their destiny.

While cultural, economic and educational inequality in different states make matters more complicated change cannot be escaped, and there can be no standing still. The people of the developing countries must be given opportunity to develop and improve their way of life and make it imperative that all forms of oppression and exploitation should be systematically controlled and ended. It is without doubt in the interests of world harmony and peace that this should be so. How different would our nation be if the ruling party added the concept of economic exploitation of women and girls in their manifesto? The progress of civilization depends on the continuous search for truth and knowledge and that the remedy lies in more liberties, not their suppression, that equal opportunity available to all and all form of gender discrimination ended.

11. STRONG SOCIAL SECURITY SYSTEM

Provision of a robust social security system for women and girls is the need of the hour. Social services – which include universal access to health care and education, full employment and social protection are required for sustainable and resilient human development. Also there has to be a strong social security system especially for women from private and unorganized sector to provide them economic and health security after a certain age in private and unorganized sector.

I  conclude with a quote of Mahatama Gandhi “The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed.” If we limit our greed and share more with the underpriviledged, we can definitely contribute for creating a harmonious society.

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Introduction

This side-event gathered a panel of feminist economists to reflect on how insights from feminist economics can inform policies and contribute to the realization of women’s social and economic rights.

Marilyn Waring‘s pioneer critique of the Systems of National Accounts for excluding women’s unpaid work and the value of Nature:  If Women Counted: A New Feminist Economics, published in 1988, in which she critizized the systems of national accounts for excluding unpaid work and nature, was used by many activists and feminist economists to mobilise and push for ”counting women” as part of the implementation of the Beijng Platform of Action in many countries and communities. A new book, co-edited by Margunn Bjørnholt and Ailsa McKay  Counting on Marilyn, Waring: New Advances in Feminist Economics, explores  the range and impact of Waring’s seminal book, over the quarter decade since its publication, which has been huge.

Today feminist economics has become an academic field of its own, which has become an important source of knowledge, methods and tools for policies and models necessary to end the economic discrimination of women. Unpaid household work is now to some account counted in time use studies and satellite accounts, but it still does not count in economic planning and mainstream economic models. Feminist economics, despite having become an academic field of its own, has not become part of the mainstream economics curriculum, nor does it inform economic policies in the way it should.  However, in Greece, in these very difficult times, a feminist economist, Rania Antonopoulos, has been appointed as the deputy minister of labor and social solidarity in Greece. In addition to a very critical economist Yanis Varoufakis, is now minister of finance.

This panel is inspired by the publication of the book Counting on Marilyn Waring, and it also a tribute to one of the co-editors Ailsa McKay, who very sadly passed away as the book was published in 2014 Ailsa made a remarkable contribution to the field of feminist economics, as well as to the Scottish society and to the world, literally making women count, through her combination of academic work and an active role in society.

She was a founding member of the Scottish Women’s Budget Group, of the European Gender Budget Network and the research group Women in the Scottish Economy WISE at Glasgow Caledonian University and the chairperson of the European chapter of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE).

Ailsa McKay taught us through her life, that economics and politics are not separate. She was incessantly campaigning for including gender into economic models and analyses, as well as for welfare reform, properly funded free universal childcare, and a citizen’s basic income for all – all as means to build a different and more caring world and to provide the evidence to ensure that ignorance would no longer serve as an excuse of the gender pay gap and the heavy incidence of austerity and welfare cuts on women.

Social provisioning as a starting point for feminist economics
by Marilyn Power

Feminist economics emphasizes economic analysis and public policy whose aims are equity and wide-spread well-being, especially for the most vulnerable members of society. To achieve these goals, it is important to find an analytic starting point that illuminates the experience of women, welcomes their active participation in the construction of policy, and challenges narrow and economistic definitions of a successful development outcome. Feminist economists use a range of analytic methods; but they have been increasingly coalescing around a social provisioning approach that includes a number of methodological precepts that can be important in achieving an equitable, sustainable development process. The social provisioning approach includes caring and nonwage labor centrally in their analyses; makes well-being the definition of economic success; emphasizes human agency and processes as well as outcomes; recognizes the validity and importance of ethical judgments; and acknowledges differences by race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and other factors along with gender.

Challenging the Humanitarian/Development Divide Through a Feminist Economics Lens
By Jennifer Olmsted

While considerable discussion has taken place at a theoretical level, challenging the idea of humanitarian and development as binary opposites requiring different policies, in reality sharp disconnects remain between the way humanitarian and development contexts are treated by the UN and other policy actors. This presentation begins by exploring how and why such a sharp division remains between policies that are carried out in humanitarian and development settings. The talk will then explore the implications both for gender equality and more generally for long term sustainability, with a particular focus on how and why to re-envisioning sustainability to be more gender inclusive will also help challenge the humanitarian/development binary.

Women and Gender are Core to the Field
By Edith Kuiper

This presentation makes the point that women and gender are core to the field of Economics. I discuss Feminist Economics as becoming more and more a specialized field of study of its own and the mainstream economic response to an increasing interest in gender issues; this against the background of the current developments in the STEM fields in which researchers are pressed by institutions such as N.S.F. and the European Research Council to support the increase the number of women in their fields. I report on and assesses this development in the US and in Europe, and explore its impact on the field of economic science.

Presenters

Marilyn Power is a professor of economics at Sarah Lawrence College, BA, PhD, University of California-Berkeley. Special interests include economics of gender, race, and class; feminist economics; political economics of the environment; the history of economic thought; and macroeconomics. Author of articles in Feminist Studies, Review of Radical Political Economics, Industrial Relations, Feminist Economics, and others. Co-author of Living Wages, Equal Wages: Gender and Labor Market Policies in the United States (Routledge, 2002). SLC, 1990–

Jennifer Olmsted is currently Professor of Economics and Director of Middle East studies at Drew University. She recently also served as the Gender Advisor at the UN Population Fund (UNFPA). Her areas of specialization include gender, development, globalization, and labor economics. Her research interests include gender, labor markets, poverty and armed conflict, with a particular focus on how gender norms shape and are shaped by economic opportunities and challenges. Dr. Olmsted is guest editor of and also contributing author to a recent issue of Feminist Economics focusing on gender and economics in Muslim communities. Other recent publications include “Norms, Economic Conditions, and Household Formation: A Case Study of the Arab World,” in The History of the Family (2011), and “Motivated migrants: (Re)framing Arab women’s experiences,” in Women’s Studies International Forum (2012).

Edith Kuiper is Assistant Professor at the State University of New York at New Paltz (Ph.D. University of Amsterdam), co-editor of Out of the Margin. Feminist Perspectives on Economics (Routledge, 1995), Toward a Feminist Philosophy of Economics (Routledge, 2003), Feminist Economics and the World Bank (Routledge 2006), Feminist Economics, Critical Concepts (Routledge 2010), editor of Women’s Economic Thought in the 18^th Century (2014), and author chapters in books and articles among which “Invisible Hands. Adam Smith and the Women in his Life,” in Adam Smith Review 7 (2013).

Contact Economics Department & Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, SUNY New Paltz, New York State. kuipere@newpaltz.edu

Margunn Bjørnholt is a sociologist and a senior researcher at Policy and Social Research, Norway. She has published widely on topics including work, family and gender equality, men and masculinities and financial institutions. She was co-editor of Counting on Marilyn Waring. New Advances in Feminist Economics, co-edited with Ailsa McKay, Demeter Press (2014).

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There has been tremendous progress toward gender equality and the realization of the human rights of women and girls. However, many of the gains that women and girls have made are under threat and women and girls worldwide face extraordinary and unprecedented challenges, including economic inequality, climate change and ocean acidification, and rising, violent fundamentalisms. At a time when urgent action is needed to fully realize gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls, we need renewed commitment, a heightened level of ambition, real resources, and accountability.  This Political Declaration, instead, represents a bland reaffirmation of existing commitments that fails to match the level of ambition in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and in fact threatens a major step backward.

As women’s organizations and feminist organizations, we demand a Political Declaration that:

• Expresses unequivocal commitments toward fully realizing gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls. The term “realize gender equality, empowerment and the human rights of women and girls” is used throughout the political declaration. The goal of ensuring the full enjoyment by women and girls of all of their human rights and fundamental freedoms is cross-cutting and emphasized throughout the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, not just in one chapter. In the Beijing Declaration alone, the goal of realizing the human rights of women and girls is affirmed in paragraphs 8, 9, 14, 15, 17, 23, 31, 32. Furthermore, the Platform for Action explicitly recognizes that gender equality is a matter of human rights (para 1) and in paragraph 2 states “As an agenda for action, the Platform seeks to promote and protect the full enjoyment of all human rights and the fundamental freedoms of all women throughout their life cycle.” Governments cannot pick and choose when to respect, protect and fulfil the human rights of women and should not do so in this declaration.
• Commits to accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, along with the outcomes of the 23^rd United Nations General Assembly Special Session, the Beijing+10 and Beijing+15 political declarations, the agreed conclusions and resolutions of the Commission on the Status of Women, as well as regional-level declarations on gender equality and the human rights of women and girls.
• Commits to universal ratification and implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and regional-level treaties on the human rights of women and girls and gender equality.
• Recognizes the critical and unequivocal role women’s organizations, feminist organizations and women human rights defenders have played in pushing for gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls. Without feminist organizations, there would be no Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, nor progress in its implementation. Progress has occurred not because of the benevolence of governments, but because feminist organizations and women human rights defenders have fought for it, every step of the way. The attempt of governments to marginalize the role of feminist organizations these groups is an affront to women, everywhere.
• Commits to create an enabling environment and resources to allow women’s organizations, feminist organizations and women human rights defenders to be able to do their work free from violence.
• Recognizes and commits to address the emerging challenges that are setting back our fight for equality and the realization of the human rights of all women and girls. These include increasing fundamentalisms, violent extremism, increased number of displaced persons, increasing inequalities within and between countries, and climate change and ocean acidification, among others. The evidence is clear: women and girls suffer the disproportionate impact of these challenges and without real commitment to address them, gender equality and the full realization of the human rights of women and girls is a pipe dream.
• Ensures real accountability for governments including detailed measures to reform and strengthen public institutions to address the structural causes of gender inequality; ensuring an enabling economic environment for women’s rights and gender equality beyond sector-specific financing and gender-responsive budgeting; creating national, regional and international systems that hold State and non-State actors, including multilateral institutions, to account for their role in perpetuating gender inequality and violations of the human rights of women and girls; and affirming the principle of international solidarity as the basis for international partnership between States for just, sustainable and equitable development.
• Affirms the strong linkages between Beijing, Post-2015 and the Sustainable Development Goals. Realizing gender equality, empowerment and the human rights of women and girls will be critical for the success of the post-2015 development agenda. The Political Declaration should state unequivocal support for the stand-alone gender equality goal and targets as defined by the Open Working Group; recognize the centrality of gender equality, empowerment and human rights of women and girls for sustainable development; Commit to fully implementing the SDG on gender equality and women’s empowerment and ensuring a gender and human rights perspective throughout the post-2015 development agenda; and commit to gender-sensitive targets and indicators and ensure that gender is integrated into the means of implementation, financing and mechanisms for review, monitoring and accountability.
• Recognizes the links between the human rights of women and girls and development. The Political Declaration must reaffirm the links between the human rights of women and girls and development, particularly as women and girls disproportionately are affected by the consequences of under-development. None of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social or environmental – can be achieved without the full participation of women and girls and without all of their human rights being fulfilled. When 61 million children, more than half of them girls, have no access to education, when 35% of women have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence, and when 1 in 3 girls in the developing world are married by 18, there is a clear failure of development and a serious denial of human rights.

Anything less than the above would be a political failure, at a time when significantly more effort is needed to achieve the goals of fully realizing gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of all women and girls everywhere.

The post Statement on the March 3 Version of the Political Declaration on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women appeared first on International Alliance of Women.

2015 is a very important year for women’s human rights

2015 is a very important year for women’s human rights. The international community will celebrate the 20^th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action (BPfA) and the outcome of the 23th Special Session of the General Assembly entitled: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the 21^st century. The Commission on the Status of Women of the UN will be undertaking the review of progress and obstacles concerning the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action since 1995.

This is a very significant review in a year in which governments through the UN will be adopting the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Agenda.

Political Declaration on day 1 instead of Agreed Conclusions at the end of session

Women’s NGOs and civil society organizations are experiencing a lot of frustration as the CSW is not going to adopt as usual Agreed Conclusions at the end of the session but instead there will be a Political Declaration adopted on the first day of the session.

The reason given is because high level people such as Presidents, Heads of State, etc. will be present on Day 1 and commitments and a reaffirmation of the BPfA will be on the agenda.   Ministers can go home and say that they adopted the Declaration.  Women’s groups and networks therefore will not have real quality space and opportunity to contribute to the discussions, to inform the Political Declaration and to bring forward all the extraordinary issues that came out of their regional reviews.  Any negotiations must be done before March 9 and on the national level.

The President of NGO/CSW, Geneva Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, sent a letter to the CSW Bureau on the timing of the Adoption of the Declaration, stating that the time is very short for communities to review, consult and send in their recommendation.   Further, this simply limits participation to those civil society and women’s networks that have access to internet or other modern forms of communication.  This therefore would result in an exclusionary and elitist process that does not take into account the fundamental inequalities that exist in relation to access to information.   IAW has submitted amendments to reinforce the language of women’s human rights in the text of the Declaration.

The timing of the Adoption of the Declaration is an expression of the backlash on women’s human rights. It also shows that civil society, and in particular women’s organizations, lack decision making power and cannot influence a process that is geared to the amelioration of their lives.

Civil society is experiencing direct and indirect efforts to limit its influence by different conservative and populist forces that are questioning the principle of equality and gender.

The world has changed dramatically since the Beijing Conference. The growing dominance of finance in the economy and in people’s lives has deepened existing inequalities between countries and within countries and between men and women. In this changing context in which patriarchy still persists and legitimises women’s inferiority and the violation of women’s human rights, women have been disproportionately negatively impacted.

Since 1995 no other World Conference has taken place because Governments are against this due to economic reasons. Some of them are not in favour of women’s human rights.  NGOS are also against because they are afraid that the Beijing text would be re-opened and at the end of the day they would find themselves with much less than what has already been achieved.

What has been adopted since 2005 are renewals of commitments of Governments to the Beijing Platform for Action. This is not enough. But 2015 is even worse. The Declaration is a rather watered down text. Although the text will be negotiated until the end of February, I’m not very optimistic about the end result. Moreover women’s organizations seem very discouraged. I am quoting what some of them are saying:

– What is alarming is to re-read the Beijing Platform for Action and note the areas we have actually gone backwards.

– When I read the draft Political declaration on the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women, I was alarmed to see the following in point 8: “to fully realize gender equality, the empowerment of women and the human rights of women and girls by 2030”.  That’s 35 years after the 4th World Conference on Women. This is two generations later. An unacceptable timeline for realizing this goal.

– Those women and children who remain in crushing poverty, slavery, violence and in the horrors of war, cannot wait another year, another day, indeed a minute as their very survival is at hand and their human rights diminished by the absurdity of forwarding a deadline of 2030. Setting a goal of 2030 in and of itself is a form of oppression and adherence to gender based inequality.

NGOs want decision making power

Another important issue that has to do with the limited engagement and participation of women’s NGOS in the work of the CSW is the working methods of the CSW. NGOS do not want only dialogue and a chance to have inputs although they are grateful for chances to send written statements, oral statements and meeting with governments. They want to have decision making power as well.

Review of CSW working methods

The Commission on the Status of Women will be reviewing its working methods in its forthcoming 59th Session. The ways for enhancing the impact of its work were recently reviewed in a report of the Secretary-General (E/CN.6/2014/14).  It is expected that a Resolution on the working methods of the CSW will be adopted at the CSW 59 by the Commission. The text of the working methods will be negotiated until the end of February.

UN Women is keen that the Commission’s consideration of its working methods are informed by the views of civil society.   UN Women has invited civil society to develop key wants/needs and to respond to the document. UN Women has charged NGO CSW/NY with coordinating that document.

The Chair of NGO/CSW NY, Soon-Young Yoon, has written to the Chair of the Bureau of the CSW  seeking more participation by NGOs in the Commission’s work.    Soon Young is requesting:

– that NGOs be allowed to be observers during the negotiations on the outcome document – whether this be the Agreed Conclusion Declaration or Working Methods document – throughout the process

– that the NGO/CSW committees will take responsibility to select at least two observers from each region based on regional caucuses to attend negotiations.

IAW has elaborated a position paper on the working methods of the CSW putting emphasis on the catalytic role that NGOS could play in monitoring the Commission’s Agreed Conclusions at the national level. NGOS can play an important role in holding national and international leaders accountable for commitments made and results achieved.   Civil society should be given access to negotiations to enhance its contribution to the work of the Commission.

IAW is in favour of a resolution as the format to be adopted on the outcome of the negotiations on thematic issues. From an IAW point of view it would be better not to work by consensus because the Agreed Conclusions are necessarily watered down in the process. A resolution would be more action oriented and its format would give an incentive to implement it.

A number of other interesting ideas have been put forward by members of the North America-Europe Caucus like exemplifying experiences from other UN processes:

– The Human Rights Council has an Advisory Board of NGOs formed of independent experts, academics, grassroots representatives etc. Such a body could help us with the monitoring of the  implementation of the outcomes of CSW sessions.

– In the conference of the Parties negotiations around Climate Change in Lima and many treaty processes, NGOS are reserved two places at each plenary session to speak.

The way forward

A Task Force could be created that would work directly on the better functioning of the CSW and prepare an institution building package among others.

It is at the national level that women’s organizations and other networks should be bring forward their redlines both for the Declaration and the working methods of the CSW.

The way forward is a long one.  We should strive to bring changes in the CSW working methods that give decision making power to women’s NGOs in particular access to negotiations over the outcomes of the CSW. These changes will enable them to play a catalytic role concerning the monitoring of the accountability of governments regarding the implementation of the BPfA at the national level.

The women’s movement should try to create a global partnership committed to a global enabling  macroeconomic environment and to promoting and protecting women’s human rights through the full implementation of human rights instruments, especially CEDAW.

The women’s movement should strive for the acknowledgement of the above two priorities as essential structural components of the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Agenda.

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Before the independence of the Democratic Republic of Congo DRC (before 1960), women’s status must  be viewed in the context of colonized peoples, that is to say, of people enjoying limited rights. Women in Belgian Congo did not enjoy the same rights as women in the so-called civilized and independent countries. Access to education and the right to health were not fully guaranteed. Maternal and infant mortality were high. Women were living in poverty and marginalization. Congolese women were largely rural and in that context, they were undergoing customary traditions, which generally were not in favour of their development.

From 1960 to 1990 the situation of the Congolese woman advanced in some respects. Many women had access to education. Women were no longer predominantly rural but became urban, with access to information, training and employment.  Yet, as the period was characterized by a dictatorial regime that impoverished the nation, women did not escape  poverty, which brought the growth of antivalues such as prostitution and promiscuity into the female circle, and these were used to the  delight  of political leaders. In short, the woman of that time was reified in spite of the various programs in her favour, like the program on the empowerment of the Congolese woman, but she  was  mostly used for political gains.

After the 90s, marked by the launch of the democratization process, Congolese women, like all sections of the population, took advantage of this momentum to claim their rights.  Thus gradually, women’s  organizations emerged distinguishing  themselves in areas that were once reserved for men such as politics, the military, the national police, the judiciary and the Bar.

Since 2007 during the release by the AFDL of Mzee Laurent Desire Kabila, the Democratic Republic of Congo has been immersed in a relentless war especially in the eastern part of the country where there are numerous armed groups, who violate, kill and enlist children in their armed groups.  This is in addition to the violence perpetrated against women, which is becoming a common practice in the country. Those last few years many women and children have been violated in the provinces of South Kivu, North Kivu and Katanga by the militias of Maimai Rai Mutomboki the Bakatakatanga  and the FNALU in the province of North-kivu. It is in this framework that the NGO SOFEDEC, fights with all means at their disposal against all forms of rapes and violence against women.

In recent years, the issue of gender-related violence has increasingly become part of the psyche of the States, of civil society and of international justice institutions. In 1998, the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) defined rape (which is a form of sexual violence) in conflicts as a war crime and recognized other forms of sexual violence as individual crimes that can be prosecuted. The majority of perpetrators are men. Women and girls are often the main victims and the survivors of sexual violence since, in case of conflict and crisis, violence against women increases and women and girls are then considered, as “property” and “instruments of war”. The violence perpetuated against them serves to humiliate, degrade and split the family and community ties, which reduces their ability to deal with the opposite side.  Rape is one of the most common forms of sexual violence as a weapon of war, whereas genital mutilation, sexual slavery by abduction or ” forced marriage”, forced pregnancy and sterilization are used to dominate women and, by extension, their communities.

The patriarchal structure encourages and supports insidious manifestations of tradition, culture and socialization of women and men based on gender norms and stereotypes. This structure creates a vision of justice that allows some types of   violence to be considered acceptable or even natural. Gender norms based on a patriarchal system that separates the male and the female, the public sector and the private sector, collective rights and individual rights encourage the notion that women are considered to be the property of men, and their place to be at home, away from the political, social and economic spaces. It is also interesting to note that in times of conflict, of repression or political upheaval, men and women – especially women human rights defenders (WHRDs) – are exposed to sexual violence.

Impunity for sexual violence during and after conflicts is widespread. The fight against sexual violence in conflict requires that states and non-state actors be held accountable for their actions. The programs of the United Nations Security Council and CEDAW, on Women, Peace and Security, as well as certain regional plans and local action, some state policies and other legislations support multiple attempts to end sexual violence. By the principle of “due diligence”, States are obliged to protect and fight against sexual violence, prosecute the perpetrators and provide relief and support to survivors. State actors and non-state actors can be prosecuted under some national laws and regional mechanisms if they exist, according to the International Criminal Court and the principles of CEDAW. International mechanisms such as Resolution 1325 of the UN Security Council advocate and support the inclusion of women’s perspectives in participation processes and organizations during and after conflicts including, when it comes to conflict prevention, peace processes and transitions, missions and envoys responsible for the maintenance of peace and, at the end of conflicts, decision-making bodies such as local councils, national offices, and so on. That said, the root causes of potential conflicts, which are often of an economic and social nature must be addressed holistically, with more emphasis on a culture of peace, of demilitarization, of gender equality and strengthening of economic and social rights for all.

In history, war was considered as a general melee in which the civilians ran the risk of being hurt and where men and boys, who are the main fighters think that they  have rights over all they can dominate as if they were paying tribute to their masculinity by making war. This serves to justify sexual violence against women, children and men.

Why so? Because rape and other forms of sexual violence used during conflicts are ways to control and destroy enemies. However, we must recognize that sexual violence also occurs during relatively peaceful periods

Thus we solicit the support necessary for the financing of the above project as well as a support for the realization of an in-depth study relating to this reflection and the subsequent support for the development of a code of protection and promotion of Congolese women, built up by bringing together the legal arsenal on issues relating to women’s rights and their relationships with the society in the DRC (Family Code, the law on sexual violence, Treaties, resolutions and international agreements on women’s human rights not yet ratified, etc.).

Women’s situation in the DRC remains a major concern. Still, up to now instances can be seen of  houses being burnt down in villages, mass rape of women, men taken by force or as hostages and forced to work, looting and theft of cattle, appalled and overwhelmed children in the bush, people killed, thousands of people including women children and elderly people displaced, massacres, massive violations of human rights, the recruitment of children in  armed groups, abductions , sexual slavery of  women and children, children born from rape abandoned and in great difficulty at school, destruction of social infrastructure (couples, schools, hospitals, etc.).

This brief analysis of the situation of Congolese women from the colonial times up to now makes us realize the progressive degradation of the dignity of women in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

All these tumults, political crises, armed conflicts and successive wars have had an unfortunate impact on the humanitarian, economic, social and psychological situation of

Congolese women and even of their children, hence the need, for the Democratic Republic of Congo, to promote conditions of peace and security, especially in its Eastern part which is often the trigger point of clashes.

For SOFEDEC / DRCongo
Coordinator of SOFEDEC: SIIREWABO MUYUWA Anuarite

Solidarité des femmes pour le development, environnement et droits de l’enfant au Congo

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We therefore strongly support the recommendation that the Bureau reviews its decision on the timing of adoption of the Political Declaration.

IAW Position on the participation of NGOs in the work of the Commission:

Concerning the working methods of the CSW, we are of the view that NGOs can play a catalytic role in monitoring the Commission’s  agreed conclusions at the national level. More emphasis should be put on accountability of governments and other stakeholders. NGOs can play an important role in holding national and international leaders accountable for commitments made and results achieved.International, regional and national policies concerning women’s human rights are implemented  in order to ameliorate women’s lives all over the world. Therefore women should be the first to evaluate what is really happening in the field, why there is no progress or why goals are achieved.

NGOs should be encouraged to participate in the work of the Commission and in the monitoring and implementation process related to the Beijing +20.For that reason they should be allocated more time for interventions during the general and the panel discussions. They can bring forward concrete evidence as well as an evaluation of the impact of actions  and results achieved at the national level in order to help the Commission monitor progress achieved. Therefore they should be allocated specific time to do so, as the working methods of the Commission aim at providing increased opportunities for sharing and exchanging ideas, experiences, lessons learned and good practices. They could participate in review sessions for example through country presentations involving participants from different institutional backgrounds addressed in the agreed conclusions including civil society. Civil society should be given access to negotiations to enhance its contribution to the work of the Commission. NGOs should select a limited number of representatives with knowledge and skills in negotiations in order to fully participate in them.

Themes of the CSW in their next 5 year work plan :

Root causes of gender inequality, feminization of poverty, gender perspectives on climate change, gender stereotypes, gender perspectives on the financial crisis, gender pay and pension gaps, gender violence, child marriage, femicide, engaging men and boys to advance gender equality, gender and the media.

Outcome of CSW :
We are in favour of a resolution as the format to be adopted on the outcome of the negotiations on thematic issues because the text does not have to be adopted by consensus, and as it is more action oriented .

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Your Excellency, Ambassador…….

Subject: Timing for the Adoption of Political Declaration at 59^TH Session of the UNCSW

I am writing on behalf of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women-Geneva, following members meeting of January 13,2015, where I was directed to write to you on this matter.

We have been and remain actively involved in the Beijing Plus 20 process. In November, we convened the largest NGO Forum with almost 700 participants from the UNECE region. We appreciated the collaboration with member states, with UN Women and the ECE in this process. We also received information that the 59^th Session of the CSW will not be adopting Agreed Conclusions at the end of the meeting, but will be adopting a Political Declaration.

While respecting the above decision, we are dismayed with the decision to adopt the Political Declaration during the opening session of the 59^th Session of the CSW. We understand that the rationale for this decision is because a) senior government officials may not stay for the two weeks and b) the essence of the CSW is to focus on implementation. On both points, we expect at least once a year for the Ministers and other senior officials to accord quality time to the commission as it is a singular space for normative and standard setting. It is primary because of the focus on implementation that we expect the political declaration to carry some concrete and specific messages around implementation as its core ethos.

We recommend that such Declaration should be adopted at the end of the CSW preferably or the end of the first week for the following reasons:

1. Significance of Beijing Plus 20. This is a very significant review and in a year in which the governments through the UN will be adopting the Sustainable Development Agenda post 2015. Many women especially young women were unable to participate in the regional reviews and are investing significant resources to come New York for this review. If the Political Declaration is adopted on the first day, many people will not see the need to travel to New York for two weeks without a tangible outcome.

2. Adoption of the Political Declaration deprives the participants and delegates to CSW and meaningful contribution to the ethos of the Declaration. It narrows the space for civil society engagement and participation with the inter-governmental process itself. The rich and dynamic engagement and dialogues with member states in negotiations is the ethos which brings life and collective commitment and ownership of the outcome documents of such inter-governmental processes.

3. While we understand that the Political Declaration will be made available online for civil society input this February, we recognise that the time is very short for communities to review, consult and send in their recommendation. Again this simply limits participation to those civil society and women’s networks that have access to internet or other modern forms of communications. This therefore would result in an exclusionary and elitist process that does not take into account the fundamental inequalities that exists in relation to access to information.

4. The timing of the declaration also places a damper on the CSW 5^TH Session, as it is then not clear as to what the real outcome of the two wk gathering will be and how that will be communicated. Its not clear whether there will be the Chair’s Summary or any other form of communication. A clarification on this point is essential for us to advise our members

We respected the decision of the member states not to hold a 5^th Women’s World Conference, which we had anticipated and we still recommend; and we respect the decision not to have Agreed Conclusions. We therefore feel strong that this decision to adopt the political declaration on first day of the CSW further reduces space for civil society participation. We therefore strongly recommend a review of your decision on timing for adoption of the political declaration.

We continue to value your leadership in facilitating the CSW and the collaboration with us in civil society.

With kind regards
Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda
President,
NGO Committee on the Status of Women- Geneva

Cc:

• CSW Bureau Members
• UN Women Executive Director
• UN Secretary General
• NGO CSW Members

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