Mapping
Progress
A WEDO Report Assessing Implementation of the Beijing Platform
Participation of Civil
Society
Equal Participation
in Decision-Making
Health and Reproductive
Rights
Mapping
Progress
is based on information from governments and NGOs on successes and setbacks in
implementing the Beijing Platform for Action. WEDO's survey, Assessing
Implementation of the Platform Midway to the Year 2000 Review (printed on page
214), went out to all governments that adopted the Beijing Platform as well as
to countries across the world for independent assessments of government
performance. The NGO responses bring a critical voice to monitoring efforts absent
from official reports by governments and United Nations bodies. As with
previous progress reports, WEDO approached governments through their permanent
missions to the UN and also contacted relevant government agencies in country
capitals.
The
survey covered five broad areas: means and mechanisms to implement the
Platform, participation of civil society, specific policy changes and outcomes,
budget for women's programs, and impact of macroeconomic policies such as
structural adjustment, privatization and trade agreements on women's rights. In
focusing attention on the gender impact of macroeconomic policies, WEDO sought
specific information on the effects on women's rights and access to land,
property and credit, employment, the environment, education, health and
housing. Women's perspectives on these areas are covered in the following
sections.
The
national action plan, the first time-bound commitment in the Beijing Platform
for Action (paragraph 297), is a lynchpin that holds the hefty Beijing document
together and is key to translating its objectives into feasible actions defined
by national priorities. To date, 70% of countries that attended the Beijing
women's conference report that they have drawn up national action plans or drafts.
In some countries - Egypt, Israel and the United Kingdom, for example - NGOs
report that although the government does not have a document officially titled
a national action plan, it has either instituted gender-aware policies or
integrated women's policies into its economic development plan.
For
governments, even in countries with constitutional guarantees and longstanding
policies and programs for women, the national action plan can be an extremely
useful tool with which to reassess strengths and weaknesses, set targets,
identify civil society partners and plot future directions in ensuring women's
empowerment. For NGOs, the process of drafting and implementation provides a
means of constructive engagement with policymakers by allowing them a place at
the table. Additionally, by monitoring and evaluating national action plans,
NGOs remind governments that "[they] have the primary responsibility for
implementing the Platform for Action" (paragraph 293). A focus on the
action plan by governments and NGOs thus reinforces the need for political
commitment at the highest level.
Time-bound
targets, resource allocations and national machinery with powers to legislate
are some baseline indicators of political commitment that help distinguish
serious action plans from mere declarations of intent. Here the record of most
reporting governments is patchy. With the exception of Senegal, which
identifies specific targets in female illiteracy and girls' education to be
achieved in the next three years, most responding governments have the year
2000 as an all-encompassing goal to achieve objectives in key areas of concern.
Twenty-seven
(31%) of reporting countries say the budget for women's programs has grown
since the Beijing conference. Increases range from 6% in India to 25% in New
Zealand to 34% in Luxembourg. In an almost equal number (28), the budget has
remained the same.
Eight
countries (9%) report a decrease. Budget cuts since 1995 range from an average
of 20% (Germany) to a crippling 60% (Guatemala). In Canada, the national budget
for women's programs has been cut from $12 million before 1990 to $8.1 million
today, less than $1 per woman and girl. For the most part, the budget for
women's programs is a small percentage of the national budget, ranging from an average
1-3% (Honduras and Lithuania) to an invisible speck of the whole (Dominican
Republic, The Philippines).
Some
governments, the U.S., the U.K. and New Zealand among them, have pointed to the
difficulties of assessing the budget for women's programs because of the lack
of gender-disaggregated data and/or 'mainstreaming' policies that call for
gender-responsive expenditures by all ministries and departments.
On the
other hand, a sectoral analysis of government spending can be quite revealing
of real priorities. In South Africa, budgetary cuts to the department of land
have had a negative impact on land reform, affecting women the most. The
agriculture budget continues to support commercial farmers at the expense of
micro-farmers, who are mostly women. Over half of the energy budget went to the
Atomic Energy Corporation rather than electrification of communities.
Yet
elsewhere, as in Mexico, the women's ministry is part of a larger social
development structure and not in a position to command a proportionate share of
the budget for women's programs. Compounding the tendency of many governments
to accord a low priority to 'women's issues' are fiscal austerity measures
undertaken by countries across the world as part of IMF and World Bank-imposed
restructuring programs, which call for a reordering of government priorities
and spending patterns.
Although
a number of governments and NGOs report that departments and ministries have
'mainstreamed' gender concerns in their policies, this is a particularly difficult
area to evaluate in the absence of gender-sensitive policies as evidence of
such mainstreaming.
Nearly
half of the national machinery structures set up for Platform implementation
report to parliament or the national legislature and have the authority to
initiate legislative actions. Thirty-one (35%) of the reporting countries say
they do not report to legislatures and an almost equal number (30) do not have
the authority to initiate legislative actions.
Participation
of Civil Society
The
Beijing Platform calls on governments to consult with NGOs in planning,
implementing and monitoring strategies to advance the Platform (para 297).
Government responses to this question were sometimes at odds with those from
NGOs, suggesting that notions of the scope of consultation can vary greatly. In
some countries, governments have looked to NGOs as a resource in drafting key
women's policy documents and involved women's activists with definite areas of
specialization as resource persons in implementing and evaluating programs.
NGOs in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Philippines and Senegal are among
those that report a satisfactory participation in the drafting of national
plans. In the U.K. the government women's unit's efforts to reach out to
women's organizations through dialogue and a website have left some NGOs
unimpressed.
At the
other extreme, NGOs in countries as diverse as Guatemala, Mexico, Russia,
Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia and Egypt, to name a few, have found themselves
either peripheral to or shut out of government deliberations on national action
plans. Yet others report meetings a few times each year, that involve no more
than cursory consultation or, as one South Korean NGO puts it, occur in
settings that are "too formal" for frank interchange. In Bulgaria,
Poland and Zimbabwe, changes in the political environment since the Beijing
conference have cooled the government's ardor for NGO partners.
There is no structure for the involvement of women's NGOs in
implementing the national action plan in Croatia. The government did not accept
suggestions from women's NGOs concerning the new family law. Women's NGOs have
no representation in the committee for equality. Nonetheless, women's groups
are willing to cooperate with the committee. - Be Active, Be Emancipated
(B.a.B.e.), Croatia
While
some governments and NGOs specified sectors and areas of expertise by which
NGOs are selected, the majority left unanswered the question of selection
criteria - a critical issue that determines the credibility, openness and
seriousness of 'participation.' Korean women, for instance, point out that
government appoints all the NGO members on the national committee.
NGOs have given the Kim Youngsam administration a
"D" for its overall performance on women's policies. It got the
highest marks for the enactment of the Special Law on Sexual Violence, and the
lowest for the incomplete socialization of maternity protection costs and the
failure to correct a social environment that encourages sexual violence. NGOs
believe that the appointment of women as cabinet ministers and in other senior
positions is an easy way out of the women's question. What is challenging is
the setting up of an effective national machinery to implement the Beijing Platform,
with legislative authority and resources. - Korea Women's Associations United.
The
majority of reporting countries (74%) said NGOs were consulted in the
formulation of the national action plans. Fourteen per cent said NGOs were not
consulted, while 12% did not reply.
On the
question of opinion polls to gauge women's views of whether and how
women-oriented policies have actually changed their lives, more NGOs than
governments have shown initiative. Information gathered from women's NGO
networks in Sri Lanka show that there is an increased awareness of women's
issues and concerns, mainly as a result of increased coverage of activities
related to the Beijing women's conference. In Ghana, baseline surveys show an
increased interest in gender and development issues among women. A poll in
Benin found women more conscious of their rights and seeking better access to
resources and credit. In Iran, women polled were poorly informed about the
Beijing conference. A survey in Tokyo on attitudes to domestic violence found
that 30% of women polled did not seek help in situations of violence.
Equal
Participation in Decision-Making
The
Beijing 'process' has sparked and/or provided momentum for women in a growing
number of countries to enter the political arena. Since 1995, women have been
visibly present in elections in a number of countries - the United Kingdom,
France, Kenya and Iran, among them. Elections in the U.K. in May 1997 brought a
record 121 women into the House of Commons, nearly doubling the number of women
MPs (from 63), with almost 85% of them elected from the winning Labor Party.
Six women were appointed to Prime Minister Tony Blair's cabinet as ministers
and 14 in other posts.
There is a lot of rhetoric about women's issues. Yes, women
are there in [the U.K.'s Labor] government and the policies are being stated.
But we need to monitor their effects carefully. Let us say we are hopeful, but
that the 'jury is still out.' - Women's National Commission, United Kingdom
In
another first, two women were elected as representatives of Northern Ireland's
Women's Coalition to the peace talks in May 1996 after the Coalition
transformed itself into a political party to become eligible for inclusion in
the negotiations.
In the June
1997 parliamentary elections in France, 63 women were elected to the 577-member
National Assembly. This is only 11%, and women senators account for only 5.6%.
Overall in Europe, with the exception of the Nordic countries, women are poorly
represented in government and parliaments. Women's presence in parliaments in
the former Soviet Union and eastern European countries which averaged 30% under
the communist system has fallen drastically during the course of political
transition, and is down to three per cent in many of the newly independent
states. Despite highly visible and effective campaigns, women presidential
candidates in elections in Liberia and Kenya lost to the incumbents, sparking
allegations of irregularities.
The
entry of women in greater numbers to electoral politics is a sign that it is
the beginning of the end of tokenism. In many parts of the world, with
remarkable success in parts of Africa, women have organized caucuses that have
played a catalytic role in consciousness-raising and encouraging more women to
stand for elections. Cameroon's Women's Caucus, the Senegalese Council of
Women, South Africa's Parliamentary Women's Group, Uganda's Forum for Women in
Democracy are notable examples of diverse coalitions of women seizing the political
initiative. In a growing number of countries, governments are being challenged
to act on their commitments by women's caucuses, formed along the lines of
WEDO's Women's Caucus that mobilized thousands of women during the UN
conferences.
Women
have also made use of quota systems in political parties and national and state
legislatures to enter politics in greater numbers. Thanks to South Africa's
African National Congress 1992 resolution of a 30% quota for women among its
candidates, women, all but 20 of them from the ANC, occupy 111 out of 400 seats
in the National Assembly (28%). In Mali, the introduction of a multi-party
system during the 1996 elections enabled women to pressure all political
parties to field women candidates. A record number of 18 women were elected to
the National Assembly, up from three in the previous house. Women also hold six
ministerial positions, handling not only women's and social welfare portfolios,
but industry, communication and urbanization.
NGOs held workshops and staged skits to sensitize the public
on the question of greater women's political participation. People laughed at
us when we demanded that all parties put women on their lists. But we were
serious, and had a strict selection process for the 170 women candidates.
Eighteen were elected. The 30% quota system is not a law but no political party
now dares to flout it. - Naminata Dembélé Sissoko, Technical Advisor to the
Ministry for Women, Children and the Family, Mali.
For the
most part, quotas are unevenly applied. NGOs in Senegal, for example, point out
that the ruling Socialist Party's 25% quota for women is not respected in
practice. Political parties either tend to field men rather than women in safe
seats, thus failing to guarantee the election of a specified number of women
candidates, or disregard quota obligations, as in recent elections in Costa
Rica, despite its mandatory 40% representation of women in party lists.
Perceptions of the benefits and disadvantages of quota systems differ greatly
among parties and women. Yet there is little doubt that quota systems have
challenged male resistance to women in politics and broken down women's
socio-cultural inhibitions about entering a predominantly 'male' domain.
Twenty-two
reporting countries (25%) have adopted laws and policies to advance equal
participation of women in decision-making. Pakistan has a 5% quota for women in
public and private sector jobs. India's constitutional amendment setting aside
33% of all seats in local self-government for women came into force in 1993,
although a similar move in parliament and state assemblies has encountered
stiff opposition from virtually all political parties. Peru has made a 25%
representation of women in party lists mandatory, as have Mozambique's Frelimo
Party (33%) and Uganda (30% in local government seats).
In the
push for gender-balanced and gender-responsive political
representation, there are two encouraging trends. The first is the emergence of
influential women leaders as gender advocates in countries of the South. Some
notable examples are Iran's vice-president in charge of environmental
protection, Massoumeh Ebtekar, who led the country's delegation to Beijing, and
Fatima Hashemi Rafsanjani, member of parliament and head of a women's NGO;
Guinea's Kaba Saran Daraba, a dynamic spokesperson for women at the Cairo and
Beijing conferences and now minister for women and child development, and
Mali's Afoussatou Diarra Thiero, who headed the national coordination of
women's associations and is now minister for women, children and the family.
Second, women parliamentarians with strong ties to the women's movement are
forming alliances and using their advocacy skills to advance women's rights in
the policy arena, especially in health and violence, as in Mexico, Japan, and
the Republic of Korea.
These
trends notwithstanding, women remain grossly underrepresented, even invisible,
in decision-making positions in many parts of the world, except in the Nordic
countries, although they constitute half or more of electorates. Worldwide,
women are no more than 11.7% of parliamentarians.
Of the
180 ambassadors to the UN, only eight are women (4.4%), and women account for
just 24% of staff at the permanent missions of member states to the UN in New
York. Only a fifth of them (36 out of 180) are gender-balanced, with no more
than 60% and no less than 40% of either sex. 'Gender apartheid' reigns in 48
missions, which have no women on staff.
Safety
The
Beijing Platform's sections on violence against women, women and armed conflict
and the human rights of women reflect the considerable progress made by the
international community in its understanding of and attitudes towards this most
pervasive of human rights violations. In addition to the various forms of
violence against women elaborated in the 1993 United Nations Declaration on the
Elimination of Violence Against Women, the Platform specifies acts of violence
such as forced sterilization and forced abortion, coercive/forced use of
contraceptives, female infanticide and prenatal sex selection. It also
recognizes the particular vulnerability to violence of women in minority
groups, indigenous women, refugee women, women migrants, and women in
detention.
Violence
continues to be an oppressive reality for millions of women, however, whether
in the streets or at home, in refugee camps or in state custody. The perception
of domestic violence as something that occurs in the 'private' sphere and is
largely immune from legal sanction, the social license accorded to
wife-beating, and women's economic dependence on men have led to women being
brutalized at the hands of husbands, partners, fathers and other 'guarantors'
of their safety.
Against
this background, the enactment of any laws to curb domestic violence is a
tribute to the power of women's rights campaigns and the commitment of
political will. Twenty-eight of reporting countries (32%) in this survey have
adopted laws and policies against domestic violence, the greatest number in any
category. In almost all of them, notably in Latin America, the laws are a
direct result of women's intense and sustained campaigns to raise the profile
of violence against women among politicians and the public. Women activists
have negotiated with governments, made strategic allies of women
parliamentarians, helped draft legislation, monitored its enforcement by the
police and interpretation by the courts, and lobbied for support centers for
victims of violence.
Women
activists in Mexico and Germany have succeeded in getting marital rape
recognized as a penal offence. In the U.K., life sentences will be automatic
for those convicted of crimes of sexual violence and the Family Law Act has
introduced civil measures to improve women's safety when under threat from
violence. China's Changsha province has introduced the country's first set of
rules to curb domestic violence and spousal abuse. Malaysia has made domestic
violence a criminal offense with penalties, and 90% of its public hospitals
have set up one-stop crisis centers for battered women. An amendment to Sri
Lanka's penal code has increased penalties for rape and criminalizes incest and
sexual harassment. New Zealand's Domestic Violence Act widens the meaning and
scope of violence with provisions that cover psychological abuse such as
threats, intimidation and witnessing violence, and enable all family and
household members, in heterosexual as well as homosexual relationships, to
apply for protection orders.
PULL
QUOTE - In Costa Rica, women victims of violence can now seek an immediate
protective order from a judge to get a violent partner or husband to leave the
home or stay away from children. ===
By
contrast, law and enforcement authorities have abdicated responsibility almost
completely in the arena of armed conflict where the most egregious crimes
against women are committed with impunity. Women are suffering horrific
violence at the hands of the army or militants in several strife-torn parts of
the world, such as Algeria, Afghanistan, East Timor and Sudan, to name just a
few examples.
An
abhorrent aspect of the transnational global economy is the globalization of
the commercial sex industry. With the opening of borders and markets, and the
accentuation of inter-regional and inter-class disparities, growing numbers of women,
and increasingly very young boys and girls, are falling victims to an
ever-widening and deeply entrenched flesh trade. After Asian women, women from
eastern European and former Soviet Union countries are the latest to be bought
and sold in a highly organized and lucrative sex business that now spans the
world. The criminal exploitation of women fostered by the forces of economic
globalization makes a mockery of their hard-won recognition as equal partners
with men in development and peace. Prostitution and violence against women are
also on the rise in areas where there is a strong military presence, as in
Chiapas in Mexico and areas covered by the UN Protection Force in Croatia.
As in
the case of domestic violence, it is the unflagging efforts of women's and
child rights advocates that have led to the criminalization of sexual
trafficking in varying degrees, especially in the Philippines and Thailand. In
Japan, neither the Criminal Code nor the Child Welfare Law recognizes sexual
offense as a serious crime. Women parliamentarians from the majority party are
leading a project to introduce laws to ban child sexual exploitation, as a
follow-up to the Agenda for Action of the 1996 Stockholm Congress Against
Commercial and Sexual Exploitation of Children. New Zealand's Crimes Amendment
Act of 1995 makes the sexual exploitation of children by New Zealanders
overseas an extra-territorial offense. In Cuba, reforms to the penal code in
1997 impose penalties for all those who profit from prostitution and do not penalize
prostitutes.
For the
most part, laws to curb trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation of women
and children, and pornography are marked by timid half-measures and
doublespeak, reflecting the capitulation of many governments to the lure of the
tourism industry, the grip of powerful of mafia interests, and the
commodification of women in the popular media. NGOs in the Philippines,
Thailand, Ukraine and Bulgaria point to these disturbing trends.
Pornography was a criminal offense under the Soviet Criminal
Code. Since the lifting of restrictions on pornography in the new criminal act
in January 1997, the industry has flourished and built a strong lobby. The Duma
in 1997 failed to restrict distribution of pornography. The pornography
industry will soon reach third place in Russia after illegal weapons trade and
drugs. - Moscow Center for Gender Studies
Health
and Reproductive Rights
Progress
in ensuring women's reproductive rights has been at best checkered since the
Beijing conference. Twenty countries in this survey (23%) reported new measures
to protect and advance reproductive freedom, again mostly as a result of
women's campaigns. South Africa's Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act,
passed in February 1997, entitles women and girls to state-financed abortion on
request during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. The Reproductive Rights
Alliance, a national alliance of 30 organizations committed to creating and
promoting reproductive rights, was instrumental in getting this Act passed.
Similarly, in Brazil, the women's health movement campaigned successfully to
kill a constitutional amendment that would have criminalized abortion under any
circumstances.
In too
many countries, however, women's reproductive rights remain hostage to the
vagaries of political and/or fundamentalist, pro-life forces. In the U.S., the
1996 Congress set a new record as the most anti-choice Congress in the nation's
history. In 1997, more than one half of states in the U.S. enacted restrictions
on access to abortion. Women's rights activists in Poland are appalled by the
new conservative government's decision in 1997 to reverse the abortion law,
liberalized only in 1996. Abortion will now be permissible only in cases of
extreme danger to the life of the fetus or the mother, or when pregnancy
results from rape.
In
Japan, feminists are angered by amendments to laws that reinforce the
traditional role of women as mothers and reject the demands of women's groups
to decriminalize abortion. In Mexico, where abortion is a crime in the penal
code except in extenuating circumstances, provisions to make it available are
so unclear as to make it virtually impossible for women to have one, except in
very unsafe or very expensive settings. In a number of countries where abortion
is legal, services lack quality and accessibility, making abortion one of the
biggest causes of maternal mortality.
Measures
to outlaw female genital mutilation are slowly gaining ground, overcoming
entrenched cultural and religious beliefs surrounding the practice. Egypt's
Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling in December 1997 criminalizing FGM. The
FGM Task Force, a network of development, human rights and women's NGOs and
individuals established in 1994, has been instrumental in mobilizing public
opinion on the issue. New Zealand and the U.S. have made the practice illegal.
In Kenya, women's NGOs are popularizing rituals of "circumcision through
words," to save young girls from the dangers of FGM while acknowledging its
cultural significance. The Organization for African Unity pledged at a meeting
in November 1997 to help its 53 member states take legal actions against
traditional practices, such as FGM and nutritional taboos, that harm women and
girls.
Aside
from reproductive rights, women's access to health care as a whole is
endangered by government cutbacks to this and other social sectors as part of
debt servicing requirements and/or fiscal austerity measures in developing as
well as in industrialized countries. Access to health care is one of the most
sensitive indicators of women's well-being because of women's preponderance
among the most vulnerable population groups. Women and girls tend to use a
smaller share of household health expenditures than men and boys, they carry a
greater burden of health problems, both their own and those of household
members they have to look after, they enjoy less freedom in addressing their
health concerns, are less willing to go to male practitioners and are less able
to seek treatment outside because of the household division of labor.
As part of structural adjustment in Sri Lanka, food
subsidies have been replaced by food stamps and not indexed to the cost of
living. This change is cited among other factors as resulting in higher levels
of malnutrition among poor women, in particular among pregnant women.
Malnutrition is manifest in the increased incidence of low birth-weight babies.
- Women and Media Collective
Policies
that have an impact on health services, such as the introduction of user fees
and changing staffing patterns (with more women being retrenched than men as a
result of downsizing in state health sectors), therefore affect women
disproportionately. These patterns repeat themselves in reports from women in
adjusting countries in every region - Zimbabwe, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, South
Africa, Ukraine, Russia, Armenia, Bulgaria, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and
Mexico, among others. In Canada and the U.S., women and girls are beginning to
be badly hit by the layoffs of health care workers, reduction in hospital stays
and privatization of home care and other health services.
PULL
QUOTE - Today women's reproductive rights are still being challenged with
devastating violence, as part of an ultra-right wing anti-abortion campaign. In
the first eight months of 1997 alone there were 12 cases of arson or clinic
bombing. In the last twenty years there have been more than 1700 violent
attacks against clinics. - National Organization for Women, United States of
America
Land,
Property and Credit
Giving
women control in these areas has been among policies that governments admit
having the greatest difficulty with. Two bold measures that stand out are
India's Supreme Court ruling of 1996 giving Hindu widows full ownership rights
over property inherited from their husbands, and Zimbabwe's amendment to the
inheritance law in 1997 to favor neither sons nor daughters. NGOs in Zimbabwe
who worked hard on this issue report that the law may not, however, easily
dislodge society's son preference. The Indian Supreme Court ruling also
enlarged the scope of maintenance for a Hindu widow. NGOs have applauded the
court's decision that seeks to remove the considerable discrimination suffered
by Hindu women in the area of property rights.
The
Dominican Republic, Fiji, Haiti, Honduras, Argentina, Sri Lanka and Kenya
report microcredit initiatives to start off women entrepreneurs in small
business. NGOs in Senegal, Egypt and India are skeptical of the empowering
effect of microcredit schemes in an economic environment that excludes and
exploits women. Despite a 90% loan repayment rate, Pakistan's Women's Bank is
in jeopardy following a government move to privatize it as part of economic
restructuring. Women's groups have stalled the move by challenging it in court.
==
Employment
Twenty-two
reporting countries (17%) have instituted policies and enacted laws to promote
women's equal opportunity in employment. New Zealand's national action plan
identifies as key areas for action research on the gender pay gap and a
time-use survey to collect information on unpaid work and its contribution to
the economy.
Germany,
Poland, Portugal, Spain, the U.K., the Philippines and Guatemala are among
countries that have improved maternity leave and child care provisions for
employed women, some with varying degrees of restrictions. Pakistan, Peru,
Honduras and Fiji have instituted affirmative action policies in public and/or
private sector jobs.
NGOs in
the UK say that the Labor government's proposed national child care strategy is
undermined by its 'new deal' for lone parents, which cuts benefits for newly
unemployed single parents.
Cutbacks
in public childcare and other support services for women, as part of the
transition from a command to a market economy in eastern Europe and Central
Asia has especially affected women's ability to compete in the job market.
Women are a disproportionate number of the unemployed also because of their
preponderance at lower levels which are the first to be trimmed for
'efficiency,' the preference for men at higher and skilled levels of employment
and closures of factories under privatization. Women's unemployment averages
70% in Armenia, Ukraine, Russia, Bulgaria and Croatia. Further, the state's
failure to finance benefits under new laws that seek to provide support for
mothers and pregnant women in the workforce, as in Croatia and the Ukraine,
have made women too expensive to hire.
Cutbacks
in expenditures in the public sector, one of the few areas where women have
access to full-time and unionized jobs with decent pay and benefits, are having
an impact in industrialized nations, too. Women in public sectors have suffered
massive layoffs and/or loss of benefits in Canada and the U.S., with women from
ethnic and aboriginal minorities hit the worst.
The
globalization process has increased job opportunities for women in certain
sectors, but women are also the first to experience its negative consequences.
Women's access to equal opportunity and equal pay in work, labor and organizing
rights have been severely eroded in the global economy. Nowhere is this more
evident than in the export-processing zones that have mushroomed in adjusting
countries and have a preponderance of female workers. This feminization of
employment, often interpreted as a positive outcome of structural adjustment,
is in fact a result of international and local demand for cheap and docile
labor that can be used in low-skill, repetitive jobs in unsafe and insecure
conditions without minimum guarantees. NGO accounts from Malaysia, South Korea,
the Philippines, India, Sri Lanka, Egypt and Mexico illustrate the plight of
women exploited by the global market. Sri Lanka's NGOs point out that trade
relations with importing countries have a direct impact on the employment
opportunities of women, particularly those in the FTZs and in industries that
produce goods primarily for exports. The increase in taxes for exports to
countries such as the United States, for example, makes the situation of these
workers very vulnerable.
Entire
economies, such as that of the Philippines, profit from the earnings of women
migrant workers overseas, who suffer gross violations of their human rights,
ranging from inhuman working conditions to physical violence, and even rape and
murder.
The feminization of the labor force begins with women being
dispossessed of land and other means of production and being left with only
their energy, which cannot be used in their home countries. This marginalization
intensifies under the process of globalization and migration, resulting in the
feminization of poverty. - Tenaganita, Malaysia
Education
Since
the Beijing conference, education policies have changed in a number of
countries to reflect the needs of girls. Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland, made
changes in school admission policies to benefit girls. In Pakistan, the
introduction of co-education in primary schools in 1996-97 led to sharp
increases in girls' enrollment, especially in rural areas. By contrast, in
Iran, it is sex segregation policies that have had the same result. Segregation
in primary schools has dented the opposition of parents in rural areas to
sending their daughters to school. Today, 95% of female children go to primary
school.
As in
health and employment, the education sector has suffered drastic cutbacks under
structural adjustment, with grave implications for girls. Where primary and
secondary school education was previously largely subsidized by the state, the
introduction of school fees under cost-recovery programs has meant that
families must now choose between work and school for their children, with girls
being the majority of drop-outs. Reports from Ghana, Zimbabwe, Kenya and
Armenia attest to this trend. In India, a 14% cut in the government expenditure
on primary education has forced many schools to seek private funds. The growing
privatization of schools has made education an expensive proposition for poorer
households. At the same time, a 17% budgetary cut for non-formal education has
led to the closure of many night schools and adult education programs which
have large numbers of working women.
In India, the Integrated Child Development Services program
was universalized in 1997, with girls accounting for nearly 50% of
pre-schoolers. The education of girls is a focus of government initiatives to
increase education expenditure to reach 6% of GDP by 2002. As a special
incentive for girls who are unable to attend formal schooling, the ratio of
girls-only centers to co-educational ones under the non-formal educational
system has been increased to 40:60. - SIDDHI-ENDA, India
Conclusions
Governments
that attended the Beijing conference committed to create national plans to
advance the Platform for Action in their countries. Where national action plans
remain more plans than action, the reasons for lack of progress are many: the
weakness of democratic political institutions, the absence of a vigorous civil
society, the resurgence of rightwing forces implacably opposed to women's
rights to equality and freedom, profligate defense spending, the devastation of
armed conflicts and the aftermath of war, and the constraints imposed by a
voracious global economy and austerity measures for debt servicing.
Macro-economic policies such as structural adjustment, privatization,
export-oriented growth policies and agricultural 'reform' have exacerbated
women's inequality in a number of areas, although only a small minority of
responding governments acknowledge the fact and fewer still have programs to
offset such impact.
At
bottom, it is political will - or the lack of it - that will determine the
future of the promises made in Beijing. NGOs are aware that political will does
not exist in a vacuum. As this report shows, it is pressure from intense
advocacy by women activists that has moved governments to enact laws in the
difficult realms of violence, health and inheritance in many countries, and to
integrate women's priorities in national policies (in combating poverty and
meeting basic needs) in others. The advocacy has been effective to a certain
extent in the national context, as shown by women's successes in influencing
laws in safety and health. But it has obvious limits when faced with external
constraints (such as the debt crisis and structural adjustment) and the forces
of economic globalization, which have targeted women for employment and
exploitation. As NGO accounts in this report show, the phenomenon of globalization
has failed to significantly improve women's economic advancement over the long
term. Agreements such as the proposed multilateral Agreement on Investment now
in the final stages of negotiation by the Organization of Economic Cooperation
and Development countries take policy-making powers away from governments and
hand them to multinational corporations. Policies that favor women's
advancement could be considered discriminatory under MAI provisions - a looming
threat that women's and other people's organizations need to address.
This
report is an effort at strengthening the capacity of the women's movement to
demand accountability from governments and other policy-makers for
people-centered and gender-aware policies at all levels that affect women. By
providing NGO voices an independent forum to critique government performance, Mapping
Progress opens the space for political dialogue at the national and
international levels. Placing NGO critiques alongside government reports is one
way of ensuring that government statements do not go unchallenged. A framework
for critical assessment helps NGOs build a political perspective and hone their
advocacy skills - thus encouraging vigilance by civil society. Finally, the
report links international advocacy with national efforts through information,
solidarity and effective alliance building. It is therefore a potentially
powerful tool to strengthen the capacity of the women's movement to build a
political constituency nationally and across borders that is key to creating
political will for change.