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The
concept of human development has been championed by
UNDP for two decades. One of its basic tenets is
that development requires more than economic growth
alone. The fight against poverty is not a campaign
of charity -
- it is a mission of empowerment.
This is especially true as regards women, given
that, of the world’s one billion poorest people,
three-fifths are women and girls. Gender equality
and women’s empowerment - as set out in the
internationally agreed Millennium Development Goals
- is, therefore, crucial to development.
In three days time, Chile will inaugurate its first
ever woman president, Michelle Bachelet. The
inauguration will mark the latest chapter in a
remarkable twelve months of ‘firsts’ for women in
politics: in November 2005, Liberians elected
Africa’s first woman President, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf,
and in the same month Angela Merkel became the first
woman Chancellor of Germany. There are now 11 women
Heads of State or Government in countries on every
continent.
In this context, the selection of this year’s theme
for International Women’s Day, ‘Women in
Decision-Making,’ could not come at a more
appropriate time. There are and have been women in
power before, but what is happening today in many
ways goes deeper and is built on more solid
foundations. As the above examples illustrate, we
may be witnessing a shift in the balance of power at
national and international levels, where women are
finally being recognized as equals and as leaders.
Despite these successes, however, progress towards
the goal of gender equality and women’s empowerment
still trails conspicuously behind. The sad truth
remains that seventy percent of the 130 million
children who are out of school are girls. Women
account for two-thirds of the 960 million adults in
the world who cannot read, which greatly impedes
their ability to participate in the political
process. With notable exceptions, such as the Nordic
countries, women are too often absent from
parliaments, making up, on average, only 16 percent
of parliamentarians world-wide.
If women do not have
power equal to men, they will remain behind. That is
the bottom line. For this reason, UNDP is committed
to working with its
partners to empower women at all levels of the
decision-making process.
At the local level, UNDP works to
ensure women have the right, and the capacity, to
vote. In December 2005, in the Democratic Republic
of the Congo (DRC), for example, UNDP partnered with
UNIFEM and the United Nations Mission in the DRC to
provide technical and financial support to the
Independent Electoral Commission to ensure women’s
participation in the country’s constitutional
referendum. As a result, 60 percent of all voters
were women. In Yemen, recognizing that cultural
norms and strictures can still make it difficult to
register women to cast their ballot, UNDP supported
voter education efforts to counter a misleading
message that religion banned women’s participation
in politics. The number of registered women voters
subsequently doubled between
1997
and 2003 from 1 .7 million to 3.4
million.
In addition, UNDP
assists women in working effectively inside the
political system. In Pakistan, for example, 27,000
locally elected women councillors participated in
UNDP-supported political participation and rights-
based training programs to improve their
participation in local governance. In Georgia, UNDP
supported the creation of a national Gender Equality
Council within the parliament to provide leadership
to women and introduce laws to both empower them and
protect their rights.
At the global level,
more than half the countries that held elections in
2003 used affirmative action to increase women’s
representation in office. These took the form of
gender quotas and reservations, which have proven to
be the most effective policy tools. In Honduras,
UNDP’s support for the National Policy of Equal
Opportunities paved the way for two landmark pieces
of legislation — a law on equal opportunities and an
electoral law reserving 30 percent of seats for
women. Honduras now joins a small but growing number
of countries in developing mechanisms to ensure that
a minimum number of women take part in
decision-making bodies.
Women around the world need the opportunity to share
the type of experiences illustrated by the examples
above. With this goal in mind, UNDP recently
initiated a project in cooperation with the
International Institute for Democracy and Electoral
Assistance (IDEA), UNIFEM and the National
Democratic Institute to create a global electronic
forum to exchange information on strengthening
women’s political participation, creating a
‘one-stop shop’ of mutual support for women across
borders.
Within UNDP itself I am committed to ensuring that
‘we practice what we preach’ on gender equality. We
are investing resources in placing gender as a
central consideration of all our programmes and
policies and will hold staff accountable for
results.
Without women’s equal
participation in political life, all members of
society will suffer. As world leaders made clear in
the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document, “progress
for women is progress for all.” Equality is not just
a worthy goal, but a proven way of accelerating
human development. Whether working to ensure equal
access to water and energy services, to
strengthening the response to HIV/AIDS, or building
lasting peace processes, women need a strong voice
at the table so that they can determine their
future.
Newly-elected women
leaders give hope to women worldwide that from the
highest political level to the most personal,
equality between women and men is a goal that can be
achieved. On this International Women’s Day, UNDP
reaffirms its commitment to ensure that we help to
provide women with the capacity to make this goal a
reality. |
