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Empowering Women in the Muslim World
›December 2, 2010 // By Wilson Center StaffOriginally featured in the Wilson Center’s Centerpoint, November 2010.
For decades, women in the Middle East have actively struggled for equal status before the laws of their respective countries. They have strived to attain equal participation in politics and society, and progressive justice throughout the region. While they have made progress in some parts of the region, many challenges remain. The Wilson Center’s Middle East Program recently held three meetings to discuss challenges as well as progress to empowering women across the Muslim world.
A Modern Narrative
The American Islamic Congress (AIC) recently published a report, “A Modern Narrative for Muslim Women in the Middle East: Forging a New Future,” that highlights past and present triumphs and difficulties – economic, legal, political, religious, and social –for women’s rights throughout the region. On September 30, the Middle East Program co-sponsored a meeting with the AIC to review the status of women in Saudi Arabia and Jordan, based on findings in the AIC’s report.
Fawziah Al-Hani, manager of the Gherass Center for Social Education in Saudi Arabia, expressed frustration about the progress women have made in her native Saudi Arabia. She said women there are perceived as second-class citizens by the country’s legal, economic, political, religious, and social institutions. Women’s issues are rarely discussed in Saudi political and social spheres, and women are not represented in government or the business sector. She said if women are allowed to be active outside the home, they are mostly restricted to educational and health activities.
While she is frustrated about these restrictive Saudi policies toward women, Al-Hani said she maintains hope, as changes take place within the society and government through new initiatives and movements.
Rana Husseini, a human rights activist, author, and journalist, detailed the changes to the status of women in Jordan over the past 20 years. Husseini, whose human rights activities over the past two decades in Jordan have focused on honor crimes and other women’s issues, said Jordan has made substantial progress on women’s rights as a result of intense media and civil society activism. While there is room for improvement, she said women are now participating in government and significant reforms have been made to the judicial system.
Though the effectiveness of quotas for women in government may be debated, Husseini noted that quotas facilitate women’s participation in elections and government service. In fact, she said, there are some 50 women judges in Jordan. She noted that honor killings, except in extreme cases, are becoming rarer, and harsher sentences are being imposed for honor crimes.
With constant pressure on the government and society, reforms will continue, said Husseini, who is optimistic about the future for women rights in Jordan and in the Middle East as a whole.
Demographic Realities
Why do many Middle Eastern women not enjoy the same economic opportunities as women of other regions? Can they be empowered to participate at a greater level? Nadereh Chamlou, a senior adviser at the World Bank, attributed the gender inequality to restrictive social norms. She said the region’s women must be empowered to participate in a more significant way if their countries are to effectively exploit, instead of squander, the current economic “window of opportunity.”
At a September 13 discussion, Chamlou said the good demographic news is that there are high numbers of working-age people and thus the potential for rapid economic growth. However, Middle Eastern countries have the highest dependency rates in the world, a fact that Chamlou attributed to the low economic participation of Middle Eastern women relative to female citizens’ participation in other parts of the world. This reality means the Middle East’s demographic composition will not be exploited to its full potential.
Increasing economic opportunities for women will require changing social norms, said Chamlou. She cited a study conducted by the World Bank in three Middle Eastern capitals – Amman, Jordan; Cairo, Egypt; and Sana’a, Yemen – that revealed the biggest reason for the poor representation of women in the workforce is the negative male attitude regarding women working outside the home. Notably, social norms and such negative male attitudes proved to restrict women’s participation far more than the need to attend to child-rearing duties. Despite the successful efforts of most Middle Eastern states to improve education opportunities, conservative social norms still pose a barrier to female empowerment.
Some simple changes could have a substantial impact. Chamlou recommended focusing on educated, middle-class women, undertaking more efforts to bring married women into the workforce, and emphasizing changing attitudes – particularly among conservative younger men – toward women working outside the home.
Lessons from Tunisia
In Tunisia, the progress of women’s empowerment can serve as a model for the region, noted women’s rights advocate Nabiha Gueddana, president and director-general of the National Agency for Family and Population in Tunisia.
Speaking at a September 8 meeting, Gueddana said the Arab world can learn much from her native Tunisia regarding the positive effects of empowering women. Gueddana, also a candidate for undersecretary-general of UN Women at the United Nations, described how Tunisian women have been empowered politically, economically, and socially, and how this empowerment has benefited Tunisian society.
Tunisia has undergone substantial changes since achieving independence from France in 1956. Tunisian women had second-class status in the years prior, a time Gueddana described as one that relegated them to a life of constant child-rearing, illiteracy, and economic dependence.
Yet Tunisia has become a beacon for other Muslim societies: the country’s labor code allows full female participation in the economy and education is open equally to boys and girls. Family planning programs and important strides in health have considerably lowered the birth rate and lengthened the life expectancy of the average woman. Gueddana also noted that Tunisia’s economic growth is now five times greater than the growth rate of its population.
Measures to empower women in Tunisia have benefited not only women but Tunisian society as a whole, with significant shifts in men’s attitudes regarding women’s rights and roles in society. Gueddana indicated that her efforts extend beyond Tunisia, as she strives to help empower women throughout the world. She said such efforts will persist so long as women anywhere find themselves disadvantaged, dependent, and living as second-class citizens.
Women’s empowerment in society rests increasingly not in the political but in the economic and business domains (Editor’s note: one could add that women’s empowerment has the potential to considerably impact the environmental domain as well). While women have made considerable progress in the political arena, economic power is still male-dominated throughout the region.
Gueddana said the discussion of women’s rights should take place within the broader context of human rights. Violence against women, particularly sexual violence, is a widespread phenomenon across all societies and, unfortunately, often considered taboo for discussion. She said all citizens benefit when all have equal rights and can use them to expand their opportunities and achievements to enhance their societies.
Dana Steinberg is the editor of the Wilson Center’s Centerpoint.
Photo courtesy of Centerpoint. -
World AIDS Day 2010: Not Yet in a Position to Say “Mission Accomplished”
›December 1, 2010 // By Schuyler NullToday is World AIDS day. More than 33 million people are currently living with HIV around the world, according to the UN, and the vast majority of them (22 million) are located in sub-Saharan Africa.
“We have halted and begun to reverse the epidemic. Fewer people are becoming infected with HIV and fewer people are dying from AIDS,” said Executive Director Michel Sidibé in the 2010 edition of UNAIDS’ annual report.“However we are not yet in a position to say ‘mission accomplished.’ Growth in investment for the AIDS response has flattened for the first time in 2009. Demand is outstripping supply. Stigma, discrimination, and bad laws continue to place roadblocks for people living with HIV and people on the margins.”
Particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, “people on the margins” often means women and children. As a result, there has been more and more integration of HIV/AIDS programs with gender and maternal health. The environmental community has also worked closely with HIV/AIDS interventions in places where the destruction of natural resources makes certain populations more vulnerable than others and valuable conservation efforts are threatened.
As development efforts become more cross-sectoral, it’s important to keep in mind and maximize these connections between community, economic, and environmental health.
Check out The New Security Beat’s coverage of HIV/AIDS integration with other health and environment programs including coverage from the Global Health Initiative’s “Integrating HIV/AIDS and Maternal Health Services” event last year, a sit-down interview on the challenges facing HIV-positive adolescents with Harriet Birungi of the Population Council in Kenya, and an examination of how gender-based violence contributes to women’s vulnerability to HIV.
Sources: Population Reference Bureau, UN, World Wildlife Federation.
Map Credit: World AIDS Campaign. -
IGWG’s K4Health Gender and Health Toolkit Is a One-Stop Shop for Integration
›November 30, 2010 // By Ramona Godbole
Addressing and analyzing gender norms, roles, and relations is increasingly viewed as critical in the development of equitable, effective, and sustainable health care. However, there has been relatively little integration of gender into health policies, programs, and systems.
The Interagency Gender Working Group (IGWG) – founded in 1997 as a way to bring together NGOs and parts of USAID to share best practices – has partnered with K4Health to create a Gender and Health Toolkit specifically designed to bridge this gap.IGWG’s Gender and Health Toolkit provides access to hundreds of tools, databases, training modules, websites, and publications in one place. Broadly divided into sections including program design, implementation approaches, capacity building, monitoring and evaluation, health systems, best practices examples, and even country-specific case studies, the toolkit provides nearly everything needed to begin integrating gender into new or existing public health programs.
Practitioners can also post questions and comments about the toolkit through an integrated discussion board. The toolkit even has a database to share gender-related photos.
While designed primarily for gender and health specialists and practitioners, the scope of the toolkit extends beyond typical public health issues like maternal health, family planning, HIV/AIDS, and reproductive health. The toolkit links to resources and training modules covering a wide range of cross-cutting topics including gender-based violence; nutrition and food security; integrated population, health and environment; and conflict/post-conflict humanitarian assistance.
The accumulated wealth of knowledge presented in the IGWG Gender and Health Toolkit is an impressively comprehensive resource, and it should be bookmarked by environment, health, and gender specialists and interested policymakers alike.
Image Credit: K4Health. -
Former Botswana President Champions Health, Governance Issues
›November 16, 2010 // By Wilson Center StaffOriginally featured in the Scholar Spotlight, Centerpoint, November 2010.
His Excellency Festus Mogae, who served as president of Botswana from 1998–2008, recently spent several months at the Wilson Center as a public policy scholar. During his stay, he conducted research, networked with senior policy officials in the U.S. government, the United Nations, and with NGO representatives in Washington and New York, and attended Wilson Center seminars related to health and governance.
Since leaving office, Mogae has advocated for governance reform in Africa, notably presidential term limits, and efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change. Another critical initiative he is pursuing actively is HIV/AIDS prevention across Africa.
Mogae is the founder and chairman of Champions for an HIV-Free Generation, a group that assists current African presidents in dealing with the AIDS pandemic. This year, the delegation visited South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique, and Swaziland and, most recently, Zambia in October. The group seeks policy and attitude changes among the leaders of these nations and also advocates for increased financing for AIDS prevention in their health budgets. “If [these countries] allocate their own resources, the donor agencies will see they are serious about this problem” and match funds, said Mogae.
“We take the view that a more outspoken leadership must come from the continent regarding the AIDS epidemic,” he said. “African leaders must not only care but also be seen by donor countries and agencies as leading from the front on these matters.”
The group includes Mozambique’s Joaquim Chissano, Tanzania’s Benjamin Mkapa, Zambia’s first president Kenneth Kaunda, former Vice President of Uganda Speciosa Wandira, and former Chairperson of Kenya’s National AIDS Control Council, Miriam Were. Also in the coalition are two notables from South Africa, Nobel Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Constitutional Court judge, Justice Edwin Cameron.
The Champions coordinate with local health representatives based in Africa, from UNAIDS, the World Health Organization, PEPFAR, and the Gates Foundation, which prepare country reports on the status of AIDS. Then, armed with this research, the group meets with African leaders, including the presidents, finance and health ministers, local government and parliamentary officials, private sector, union, and civil society representatives, and church groups to lobby for policy changes.
“We highlight success stories on the continent so others can emulate them,” Mogae said. “We are calling for social behavioral change, but that can only happen if advocated and led by the top religious and traditional leadership.”
One particular challenge has been mother-to-child transmissions. He said in sub-Saharan Africa, in 2000, 40 percent of children born to HIV-positive mothers got infected but by 2008, the figure was down to three percent. The target is zero, he said.
Another major initiative chaired by Mogae is the Coalition for Dialogue on Africa, or, CoDA, a joint venture among the African Development Bank, the African Union Commission, and the UN Economic Commission for Africa. This global effort focuses on education, agriculture and conservation, energy and natural resources, and helping women. CoDA currently is organizing a symposium on women’s empowerment, he said, that will focus on education, and reforming land ownership and marriage laws.
These and other organizations with which he is affiliated aim to help shape policies and set priorities for Africa. He said, “We can’t ask the international community for help unless we first help ourselves.”
Dana Steinberg is the editor of the Wilson Center’s Centerpoint.
Photo Credit: AIDS sign in Gaborone, Botswana, courtesy of flickr user cordelia_persen. -
No Peace Without Women
›November 11, 2010 // By Kayly OberOn October 31, 2000, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1325, which calls for women’s equal participation in all efforts to maintain and promote peace and security. The resolution sought to exorcise the demons of the 1990s, when genocide took over 800,000 lives in Rwanda, thousands of women were raped in Bosnia, and millions more were displaced. However, the truth is that little progress has been made over these last 10 years and women remain on the periphery when it comes to post-conflict reconstruction and development.
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John Bongaarts on the Impacts of Demographic Change in the Developing World
›“The UN projects about 9.1 billion people by 2050, and then population growth will likely level off around 9.5 billion later in the century. Can the planet handle 9 billion? The answer is probably yes. Is it a desirable trajectory? The answer is no,” said John Bongaarts, vice president of the Policy Research Division at the Population Council, in this interview with ECSP.
Although family planning was largely brushed aside by international policymakers following the 1994 UN International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, Bongaarts said he is hopeful because it is now enjoying a higher profile globally – and receiving greater funding.
“I am optimistic about the understanding now, both in developing and developed world, and in the donor community, that [family planning] is an important issue that should be getting more attention,” Bongaarts said. “And therefore I think the chances of ending up with a positive demographic outlook are now larger than they were a few years ago.”
The “Pop Audio” series is also available as podcasts on iTunes. -
Demography and Women’s Empowerment: Urgency for Action?
›Why do Middle Eastern women participate in economic life at a rate lower than that of female citizens of other regions? According to Nadereh Chamlou, a senior advisor at the World Bank, restrictive social norms are to blame. At the Middle East and Environmental Change and Security Programs’ “Demography and Women’s Empowerment: Urgency for Action?” event, Chamlou argued that the region’s women must be empowered to participate in a more significant way if their countries are to effectively exploit, instead of squander, the current economic “window of opportunity.”According to Chamlou, the region is facing a “demographic window of opportunity” where its relatively high numbers of working-age people create the potential for rapid economic growth. However, Middle Eastern countries also have the highest dependency rates in the world. Without opening more economic opportunities for women, the region’s demographic window of opportunity will not be exploited to its full advantage.
Chamlou disputed the commonly held assumptions regarding the historic lack of female participation in the Middle East’s economic sphere, such as the belief that women abstain from joining the workforce because they do not possess the necessary education and skills. She cited statistics showing that the region’s women are represented at a near-equal level as men in secondary school, and to an even greater degree at the university level. They are also studying in marketable fields, disproving the theory that they are not acquiring employable skills.
A survey conducted by the World Bank in three Middle Eastern capital cities — Amman, Jordan; Cairo, Egypt; and Sana’a, Yemen — showed that negative male attitudes regarding women working outside the home were the most significant reason for poor female representation in the workforce. Notably, negative male attitudes restricted women’s participation far more than child-rearing duties. Despite the successful efforts of most Middle Eastern states to improve female education, conservative social norms that pose a barrier to female empowerment remain in place.
Chamlou concluded her remarks with three policy recommendations: 1) Focus on medium-educated, middle-class women; 2) Undertake more efforts to bring married women into the workforce; and 3) Place a greater emphasis on changing attitudes, particularly among conservative younger men, towards women working outside the home. Such changes could more effectively utilize the Middle East’s demographic window of opportunity.
Luke Hagberg is an intern and Haleh Esfandiari is director of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center.
Sources: Population Reference Bureau.
Photo Credit: Adapted from “Obey Stikman,” courtesy of flickr user sabeth718. -
Tamara Kreinin on Women’s Empowerment, Population Growth, and Sustainability
›“We know that when that when we empower women – whether it’s giving them control over their bodies and access to family planning or whether it’s by including them in planning around climate change – their agency can make huge leaps for us,” said Tamara Kreinin, executive director of women and population at the UN Foundation, in this interview with ECSP.
Seventy percent of the world’s poor are women and they’re also the members of the household most likely to be responsible for food, water, and firewood collection.
“At the same time, we know that women are often not at the table,” she said. “They’re not at the table in country when countries are creating aid to adaptation strategies around the environment and climate change, and they’re not at the table at places like Copenhagen and some of the big climate change meetings.”
The “Pop Audio” series is also available as podcasts on iTunes.
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