Women Making a Difference

Fact Sheet No. 2

Numbers are a necessary but not sufficient condition for women’s full, equal, active and informed participation in economic, social and political decision-making. There is evidence however, that when there is a critical mass (at least 30%) of women in policy-making bodies, not only are women’s issues prioritized in the policy-agenda but they are more likely to be acted upon by policy-makers.

1. In Sweden, where women occupy 149 of the 349 (42.7%) seats in Parliament¹ and 9 of the 11 (82%) cabinet ministries including the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Justice and Agriculture, issues such as child care and equal opportunities have gained importance.

• The Swedish Child Care Leave Act and the National Insurance Act for Parental Benefits provide for a total of 450 days leave in connection with child-bearing and childcare, half the time for the mother and half for the father. The compensation level is 75% of gross income for 350 days. All fathers are entitled to a 10-day leave of absence with parental benefit when a child is born.²
• The Swedish Parliament passed the Equal Opportunities Act which promotes equal rights for men and women with respect to employment, working conditions and opportunities for personal development at work.³

2. In Norway, where women hold 60 of the 165 (36.4%) seats in Parliament⁴, the "politics of care" has developed which particularly addresses the state's responsibilities to provide opportunities for women to combine the obligations of motherhood with the right to economic independence.⁵ Such politics include:

• Increases in publicly-sponsored childcare services, extensions of the parental leave period
• Options for more flexible work hours through work/time budgeting
• Improved pension rights for unpaid carework
• Increased child benefits for families that do not use public childcare services

3. In South Africa, where women have 120 out of the 200 (30%) seats in the National Assembly⁶ and 8 out of 29 cabinet positions (27.58%), women parliamentarians have played a key role in lobbying for the⁷:

• Ratification of CEDAW without reservations in December, 1995
• Recognition of the importance of National Women's Day (August 9) and declaring it a public holiday
• Establishment of structures to promote and protect gender equality including the Commission on Gender Equality, Office on the Status of Women, the Parliamentary Committee on the Improvement of Quality of Life and Status of Women, and the Parliamentary Women's Caucus.
• Enactment of the Choice of Termination of Pregnancy Act and the Domestic Violence Act.
• Introduction of the "women's budget process" which aims at analyzing the government's budget from a gender perspective in order to pressure governments to allocate money for women's empowerment and development.

4. In India, where the Panchayat Raj Act reserves 33% of the three-tiered panchayats for women (village council, council of cluster of villages, and the district council), there are now close to a million elected women leaders at the village level.⁸

• In the Dehra Dun district of northern Uttar Pradesh-India's largest state with a population of 170 million people---there are 119 women chairpersons, 34 of whom are illiterate while another 40 never got beyond the 8th grade. But this is not a serious handicap. They have obtained funds to build a network of concrete roads and drains in Enfield Grant.⁹
• A recent assessment of women in the Panchayati Raj conducted by Professor Susheela Kaushik of the Women's Studies Centre at Delhi University reveals that corruption has gone down and transparency greatly increased because of women's participation in panchayats.¹⁰

Sources

1. "Women in National Parliaments, Situation as of Novemebr 10, 1999," InterParliamentary (IPU) Union Data.
2. Women in National Parliaments, Situation as of November10, 1999, Datas de la Union Interparlamentaria (IPU) www.ipu.org
3. Kalliope Migirou, "Towards Effective Implementation of international Women's Human Rights Legislation, En "Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers", pp. 208-209
4. Ibid.
5. IPU Data www.ipu.org
6. Hege Skjeie, "Credo on Difference-Women in Parliament in Norway," in Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers, p. 186www.womensnet.org
7. IPU Data www.ipu.org
8. Mihloti Mathye,"Participation in Elections as a Strategy -The South African Eperience", Case Study written for WEDO
9. Suchita Vemuri, "The Panchayats of India"
10. Ranjit Dev Raj, "Empowering Women from the Grassroots Up," Choices, the Human Development Magazine," March, 2000, pp.20-21.
11. Ibid.