Women: Half the World, Barely Represented

1. Women: Half the World, Barely Represented Meghan Wicks, Brendan Good, Nathaniel Vogt

2. Acronyms

3. Inequality within the UN • United Nations • Complex bureaucracy • Difficult to navigate • Intricate paths of power • Glass Ceiling exists • Qualified candidates globally are shut out of leadership roles • Power is concentrated in the hands of a few men

4. Human Development Report • List of the bottom countries according to the United Nation’s Development program “Human Development Report” in terms of equality towards women

5. Millennium Development Goals • End Poverty and hunger • Universal Education • Child Health • Maternal Health • Combat HIV/AIDS • Gender Equality …the only mention of gender inequality: “Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015” • No other indices of women’s advancement? • No MGD goal for sexual and reproductive rights • HIV/AIDS as a possible vehicle for sexual and reproductive health.

6. UN Gatherings on Equality • Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), 1979 • No enforcement mechanisms in place for countries to uphold • Four important gatherings: • World Conference on Human Rights. Vienna 1993 • International Conference on Population & Development. Cairo 1994 • World Summit for Social Development. Copenhagen 1995 • Fourth World Conference on Women. Beijing 1995

7. Challenges • Lewis: “Once consensus is reached and activists disperse, no major international body steps up to maintain the cohesion and sustain the momentum. The gap between rhetoric and reality remains a yawning chasm.” • UN and the gender agenda • Women are 33% of professional staff, typically in lower professions • Men head the majority of the UN programs • 11/191 ambassadors are women- 5.7% • UN does not contain an agency to represent women

8. Advocacy for Women’s Rights In UN • United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) • Does not receive adequate funding or staffing • United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) • Addresses some relevant issues, but scope is far too narrow • Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW) • Senior position is Assistant Secretary-General • “Did not want any prominence for UNIFEM and played interference wherever possible” • “UNIFEM was operational and DAW was conceptual and so rivalries should never have existed, but such is the nemesis of UN functioning”

9. Recommendations Made by Lewis • To construct an agency that has the sole purpose to “advance the position of women” • Support women to to make their own such entity • Every aspect of civil, economic, social, and political life should be equal • UN should ensure that the governments of Africa are protecting women’s rights

10. UN Women • Merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system. • Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW) • International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW) • Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement for Women (OSAGI) • United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) • Main Roles: • To support inter-governmental bodies in their formulation of policies, global standards, and norms • To help Member States to implement these standards, standing ready to provide suitable technical and financial support to those countries that request it and to forge effective partnerships with civil society.

11. Discussion • What are realistic strategies for enforcing ratified UN covenants in African and other negligent nations? • Do we strive for respect of culture, tradition, and religion, possibly sacrificing women’s rights or do we heavily sanction and penalize for violation of these rights? • How do we incent female African leaders to stay and champion the cause of their people in the face of such institutionalized misogyny? • How do we adequately incent female leaders from less disparate nations to invest themselves in women’s rights in Africa?