The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) today reviewed mainstreaming a gender perspective into all policies and programmes in the United Nations system, holding a panel discussion in the morning on “Leadership, coordination and accountability: Evaluating the United Nations system’s work on gender equality and women’s empowerment” and another in the afternoon on “Countering gender discrimination and negative gender stereotypes: Effective policy responses.”

Thomas Stelzer, Assistant-Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, presented the report of the Secretary-General on the role of the United Nations system in implementing the internationally agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and the empowerment of women. Mr. Stelzer said the report covered the enhanced coordination of gender related activities through UN Women. Progress had been made by the United Nations system on addressing cross-cutting gender issues, although much work needed to be done to achieve the wide-ranging objectives.

Michelle Bachelet, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said UN Women’s overarching vision was that of a world in which societies were free of gender-based discrimination and where women and men had equal opportunities. Much remained to be done in mainstreaming a gender perspective systematically and effectively into all programmes across the United Nations system. Ms. Bachelet introduced the report of the Secretary-General on “Mainstreaming a gender perspective into all polices and programmes in the United Nations system” that emphasized that United Nations entities recognized that gender equality and empowerment of women contributed strongly to development.

Abulkalam Abdul Momen, Vice-President of the Economic and Social Council, said the panel discussion on “Leadership, coordination and accountability: Evaluating the United Nations system’s work on gender equality and women’s empowerment” provided an opportunity to discuss ways to strengthen the United Nations system’s coordinated approach to gender equality and empowerment of women. Within the context of UN Women’s new leadership role, the panel provided an opportunity to assess how it could contribute to more effective mainstreaming of gender perspectives.

Sigrid A. M. Kaag, Assistant Administrator, United Nations Development Programme, speaking as a panellist, said that there had been significant political progress since the 2010 Annual Ministerial Declaration. The Declaration and its focused programmes empowered United Nations actors to take further action on gender equality and women’s empowerment. The United Nations Development Programme was working to address the vulnerability of women and children in conflict and was accelerating its support for democratic governance programmes that targeted female parliamentarians.

Flavia Bustreo, Assistant Director-General, Family, Women’s and Children’s Health, World Health Organization, speaking as a panellist, said the issue of gender empowerment was addressed through its link with health at the World Health Organization. The World Health Organization focused on the issues of maternal mortality and gaps in women’s health, but needed to work further on collecting data on women’s health and moving beyond considering women simply as a vessel for reproduction.

Mari Simonen, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, speaking as a panellist, said one of the areas focused on by the United Nations Population Fund was establishing a niche on women’s issues in the organization. New development plans or mid-term reviews of strategy plans could incorporate women’s issues and help to clarify further the comparative advantage of each organization. From the Fund’s perspective, progress had been made on: collecting better data and better analysis, reproductive health and human rights, gender-based violence, reaching out to boys and men and reaching out to youth.

Ann Tutwiler, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, speaking as a panellist, said that a recent report on the state of food and agriculture published by the Food and Agriculture Organization documented the effects on poverty if women were provided with the essential factors for agricultural production. The Food and Agriculture Organization had drafted a document on land tenure to address key issues and challenges confronting women in agricultural production. Without land tenure, women did not have access to finance, contracts and many other factors important for economic production.

Geeta Rao Gupta, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, speaking as a panellist, said improvements in life expectancy, women’s health and primary education had been seen, but there was a long way to go in terms of secondary education, livelihood opportunities and political representation. Reaching adolescent boys and girls remained one of the biggest challenges. It was necessary to intervene before the adolescent period. Sharing operational experiences would be useful to illuminate successes which could incentivize efforts throughout the United Nations system.

During the interactive dialogue, speakers emphasized that progress had been made in gender equality, mainstreaming and cross-cutting cooperation. The creation of UN Women had represented a significant step forward in clarifying the agenda and consolidating political support. However, significant challenges concerning cooperation, coherence, effective implementation, and monitoring and accountability, among others, remained. Furthermore, the creation of UN Women should not be taken to mean a diminished responsibility for other agencies and actors concerning their responsibility to the gender agenda. When working with national governments, it was important to take into account national priorities, but at the same time, raising awareness among governmental officials and promoting the gender dimension more clearly fostered better national understanding and policies of gender equality.

In the interactive discussion, Mexico, the European Union, Chile, Venezuela, Norway, Brazil, Kenya, Ghana, India, the United States, Cameroon and China took the floor.

In the afternoon panel discussion on “Countering gender discrimination and negative gender stereotypes: effective policy responses,” Mr. Abdul Momen, Vice-President of ECOSOC, said that gender stereotypes were present in many facets of society. Women were underrepresented in education, business, academia and the public sector. Governments should provide the environment and conditions needed to create a level playing field.

Lakshmi Puri, Assistant Secretary-General for Intergovernmental Support and Strategic Partnerships, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), speaking as a panellist, said UN Women had found that stereotyping reinforced structural and historical patterns of discrimination. Men were also casualties in this because they were held to male stereotypes. These stereotypes affected the enjoyment of human rights. Stereotypes needed to be combated in the media, education, businesses, the government and other forums. UN Women was committed to supporting the efforts of States and the international community to combat stereotypes.

Sagufta Yasmin, Honourable Whip and Member of Parliament, Bangladesh, speaking as a panellist, said gender stereotyping produced sexism and prejudice against women across nations and began at the household level. Education was the most important tool or weapon for fighting against gender inequality and reducing stereotypes. Bangladesh had become a stand-out performer in the race for women’s empowerment and removing gender discrimination in recent years. In terms of the United Nations goal of promoting gender equality and empowering women, Bangladesh had become a success story, but much more work was needed to reverse stereotyping.

Dorcas Coker-Appiah, Executive Director, Gender Studies and Human Rights Documentation Centre, Ghana, speaking as a panellist, said with constant education and awareness-raising and the increasing economic independence of women, a jump in women’s participation in politics could be envisaged. It was difficult over time to see whether discriminatory practices were religion-based, or culture-based and supported by religious justification. New text and teaching was needed, and further reinterpretation of religious texts was available. Law reforms in discriminatory areas, such as divorce, marriage and inheritance should be undertaken to take first steps toward gender equality.

Jane Connors, Chief, Special Procedures Branch, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, speaking as a panellist, said stereotypes could constitute discrimination if institutionalized into discriminatory practices by promoting inequality and discrimination. Stereotyping and discrimination in many cases compromised other rights, such as the right to a fair trial. There was no shortage of recommendations on what needed to be done. The issue was implementation, and the actor with the primary responsibility was the State which had to refrain from stereotyping itself. Civil society had a key role to play as well.

Sarah Cook, Director, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, speaking as a panellist, said many barriers to equality existed. Some barriers were masked by analytical frameworks, particularly economic frameworks that most people bought into. The reproductive or care economy was not measured in most economic analyses. Lack of recognition of the value of reproductive care constrained women’s access to monetary resources, work, public and political spaces, bargaining power, and social welfare and support. Expanding a conception of the economy to incorporate the reproductive and care economy was required and could be the basis for boosting a gender equitable social protection floor.

Jane Hodges, Director, Bureau for Gender Equality, International Labour Organization, speaking as a panellist, said negative stereotyping manifested easily in the workplace. It was also one of the environments where prevention could take place. Having a clear mandate and aim was crucial to ensure that policy and operational action were not blurred and time wasted. In this regard, the corpus of international labour standards generally stressed the importance of eliminating stereotypes that hindered free choice and equal treatment of women and men. Affirmative action was an important measure. Financing remained a challenge for ensuring the sustainability and success of initiatives.

In the interactive discussion, speakers said equality between women and men was a fundamental right. It was important to address gender stereotypes from early childhood. Combating discrimination against women remained one of the main priorities of the United Nations and the international community. Every State had the right to develop its own strategy in this regard and many had put in place successful policies to combat discrimination and enhance women’s rights. Elimination of gender disparity in primary and secondary education was crucial in increasing the capacities of women to participate more in social, economic and political decision-making.

The European Union, the Russian Federation, the Bahamas, Cameroon and India took the floor in the interactive dialogue.

The Economic and Social Council will reconvene at 10 a.m. on Thursday, 14 July, to continue its discussion on coordination, programmes and other questions, and mainstreaming a gender perspective into all polices and programmes of the United Nations system. It will then take action on draft resolutions E/2011/L.29, regarding implementing the Ministerial Declaration of the High-Level Segment of 2010, and E/2011/L.30, on mainstreaming a gender perspective into all policies and programmes of the United Nations. In the afternoon the Council will open the Operational Activities Segment of the Council and hold a panel discussion and interactive dialogue on “2012 quadrennial comprehensive policy review of the General Assembly – what are the expectations: Issues, process and outcome?”

Documentation

The Council has before it the report of the Secretary-General (E/2011/85) entitled the role of the United Nations system in implementing the internationally agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and empowerment of women which addresses ways in which
the system can strengthen its capacity to ensure coordinated action, with the United
Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women)
in the leadership role. It then reviews progress made by the United Nations system
on the cross-cutting issues identified in the ministerial declaration. Recommendations on both aspects are included in the final section of the document.

The Council has before it the report of the Secretary-General (E/2011/114) entitled mainstreaming a gender perspective into all policies and programmes in the UN system which assesses progress made in the implementation of the gender mainstreaming strategy within the United Nations system, focusing on the areas design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation. It places a special emphasis on assessing progress in mainstreaming gender at the country level and in particular through the United Nations Development Assistance Framework process. The report reflects on the advances made in terms of United Nations staff capacity development and on the coordination strategy of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women). Recommendations on further progress are also included for consideration by the Council.

Panel discussion I on “Leadership, coordination and accountability: evaluating the United Nations system’s work on gender equality and women’s empowerment”

Opening Statements

THOMAS STELZER, Assistant-Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, introducing the report of the Secretary-General on the role of the United Nations system in implementing the internationally agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and the empowerment of women, said that the report was the result of an extensive consultation process with United Nations Women and the United Nations system agencies and proposed two angles to take stock of the situation: the enhanced coordination of gender related activities through United Nations Women; and progress made by the United Nations system on the cross-cutting issues identified in the Council Ministerial Declaration as leverage to fill the implementation gap on gender issues. Recalling that the adoption of the 2010 Ministerial Declaration coincided with the establishment of United Nations Women by the General Assembly, the report reviews how the new architecture would contribute to promoting attention to gender issues across all areas. The report also focused on efforts by the United Nations system to close the implementation gap in gender equality and the empowerment of women, emphasizing how the United Nations system used a number of cross-cutting issues as a leverage to accelerate progress and to proceed in a coordinated manner. These cross-cutting issues were: discriminatory attitudes and gender stereotypes; ending all forms of discrimination and violence against women and girls; measures to ensure the full empowerment of women, including equal participation of women and men in decision-making; the full integration of women into the formal economy and measures to ensure that women and girls with disabilities are not subject to multiple or aggravated forms of discrimination; and the recognition of the crucial role and contribution of rural women, including indigenous women. The report assessed the level of engagement by the system and highlighted major actions taken and interesting cooperation arrangements put in place. Concerning institutional and substantive issues, the report also proposed key messages that the Council may wish to take into account in a possible resolution. The Council would also consider the annual report on mainstreaming a gender perspective in all United Nations system activities at its Coordination Segment this year since the present report did not address this dimension.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said when the General Assembly created UN Women in July 2010, it decided to transfer to the new entity the mandates and functions of several offices, divisions and institutes – with the additional role of leading, coordinating and promoting accountability of the United Nations system in its work on gender equality and the empowerment of women. The General Assembly decided that support of gender mainstreaming across the United Nations system would be an integral part of the work of the new entity. The General Assembly also decided that UN Women should provide, through its normative support functions and operational activities, guidance and technical support to all Member States at their request on gender mainstreaming, gender equality and the empowerment and rights of women and girls. UN Women’s overarching vision was that of a world in which societies were free of gender-based discrimination and where women and men had equal opportunities. This vision was of a world where gender equality and the empowerment of women were achieved and where women’s rights were upheld in all efforts to achieve development, human rights, peace and security. UN Women stood ready to support the United Nations system in honouring its responsibility to deliver on gender equality and the empowerment of women.

Ms. Bachelet said that it was a privilege to introduce the report of the Secretary-General on “Mainstreaming a gender perspective into all polices and programmes in the United Nations system.” The report of the Secretary-General showed that most United Nations entities incorporated the gender dimensions in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes. At the country level, the context of system-wide coherence and the Delivering as One approach had generated opportunities for a greater number of joint programmes for gender equality. The report emphasized that United Nations entities recognized that gender equality and empowerment of women contributed strongly to development and that gender mainstreaming remained a most viable means of advancing the goal for gender equality and the empowerment of women. However, much more remained to be done to mainstream a gender perspective systematically and effectively into all the programmes across the United Nations system. The report of the Secretary General also noted weak linkages between the intergovernmental normative work on gender equality and the development and implementation of programmes at the country level. UN Women was developing a coordination strategy in which it sought to work through existing coordination mechanisms to ensure that gender equality was undertaken in a coherent manner at the international, regional and country levels. UN Women encouraged and supported other entities in expanding their investments, programmes and staffing for gender equality.

ABULKALAM ABDUL MOMEN, Vice-President of the Economic and Social Council, said that the United Nations General Assembly took a historic step towards accelerating the goals on gender equality with the establishment of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. Its creation came about as part of a broader United Nations reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. At the High-Level Segment of its substantive session in 2010 the Council adopted the Ministerial Declaration on implementing the internationally agreed development goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and empowerment of women. Indeed, it was fitting that a year after its adoption, the Council took stock of the efforts undertaken by the United Nations system in regard to the provisions of the Declaration. This panel discussion provided an opportunity to discuss ways to strengthen the United Nations system’s coordinated approach to gender equality and empowerment of women, within the context of the UN Women’s new leadership role, and how it could contribute to more effective mainstreaming of gender perspectives in all areas.

Statements by Panellists

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), speaking as moderator of the panel discussion, said the establishment of UN Women coincided with the 2010 annual Ministerial Declaration of the Economic and Social Council which focused on gender equality and empowerment of women. While implementing international commitments on gender equality and empowerment of women remained the major responsibility of governments, UN Women stood ready to support governments and all parts of the international system to meet these goals. In supporting gender equality, eradication of poverty and full enjoyment of human rights, the full involvement of all stakeholders was important. UN Women would work with all stakeholders, including other parts of the UN system, to strengthen efforts to meet these goals, which was a challenging task. Today’s panel was an opportunity to explore these issues more in depth, ask key questions, discuss ways to strengthen the United Nations system on this issue, and consider how UN Women could support mainstreaming of gender equality and women empowerment throughout the United Nations system. Ms. Bachelet asked what progress had been made in advancing women’s empowerment, what gaps and challenges remained and what could be done to address these issues.

SIGRID A.M. KAAG, Assistant Administrator, United Nations Development Programme, speaking as a panellist, said that there had been significant political progress and that the Ministerial Declaration and its focused programme empowered United Nations actors to take further action. The United Nations Development Programme was accelerating its investment by addressing issues of democratic governance, including programmes that targeted training of female parliamentarians in local contexts, empowering leaders and providing individual support to those who wanted to be active. The platform for implementation had been provided by United Nations local coordinators and local teams. The Declaration allowed doing much more and there was an increasing interest in achieving these gender related agenda items. The United Nations Development Programme also addressed women and children in conflict contexts in line with the renewed emphasis on vulnerability. The existing gaps were similar to those relevant to overall planning, specificity of the data and how to translate it into policies that were effectively funded and implemented. There were opportunities to accelerate and replicate these efforts and an important potential to move further. Responding to a question on the actual meaning of gender mainstreaming, given that in many cases it was hard to pinpoint specified responsibilities, Ms. Kaag said that mainstreaming meant placing the issue in the centre and giving it a high level of importance.

FLAVIA BUSTREO, Assistant Director-General, Family, Women’s and Children’s Health, World Health Organization, speaking as a panellist, said the issue of gender empowerment was addressed through its link with health at the World Health Organization. Last year was a landmark year in this regard, as world leaders of governments and civil society had made key commitments on maternal mortality and health. Decisions related to access to care were fundamentally about women’s empowerment and equality. The Secretary-General had established a global strategy for women and children’s health, which had elicited significant financial commitments. The World Health Organization particularly focused on maternal mortality and gaps in women’s health. The World Health Organization needed to work on collecting data on women’s health, not only in terms of reproduction, but also on other issues, in moving beyond considering women simply as a vessel for reproduction.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said the world was evolving, women lived longer than men, and the population was growing. More people would be on the planet, which would be less healthy and perhaps not richer. Women could not be looked at just as mothers; all elements of women’s health needed to be taken into consideration.

MARI SIMONEN, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, speaking as a panellist, said one of the areas focused on by the United Nations Population Fund was establishing a niche on women’s issues in the organization. New development plans or mid-term reviews of strategy plans could incorporate women’s issues and help to clarify further the comparative advantage of each organization. From the United Nations Population Fund’s perspective, progress had been made on: collecting better data and better analysis, reproductive health and human rights, gender-based violence, reaching out to boys and men and reaching out to youth.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), indicated that the capacity and resources of UN Women were unevenly distributed across country offices; for instance, it had a large presence in Afghanistan working on specific projects. Therefore, concerning coordination and division of labour there was no one-size-fits-all approach. Depending on the capacity at the country level, different priorities and tasks were distributed and synergies between different agencies were developed.

ANN TUTWILER, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, speaking as a panellist, said that a recent report on the state of food and agriculture published by the Food and Agriculture Organization documented the effects on poverty if women were provided essential factors for agricultural production. If women were given access to them, and in particularly to land, they could make a significant contribution to reducing poverty. For this reason, women should be seen also as an economic actor and not only as a social one or from a rights-based approach, as important as these approaches were. Addressing some of the burning issues and providing important obstacles to the achievement of goals was important. In particular: gender, nutrition and climate change should be targeted. The Food and Agriculture Organization had taken the lead and drafted a document on land tenure, and key issues challenges confronting women in agricultural production, for without land tenure they did not have access to finance, access to contracts and many other factors for economic production.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), indicated that the report was useful and emphasized the importance of avoiding duplication of tasks by promoting synergies among several players and scaling up initiatives, for instance empowering rural women using a multi-level perspective. If several agencies coordinated they could become more relevant and have a bigger impact on women’s lives. Gender mainstreaming was often not properly understood within the United Nations system. Why was it seen as such a challenge and how could specific indicators for success and failure be established. Even though work was being done to mainstreaming gender in government it was really hard to show results.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, speaking as a panellist, said that before diving into the challenges and difficulties, it was important to acknowledge the success of establishing UN Women. A global commitment to gender equality had been established in 1995, but creating UN Women allowed for coordination across the United Nations. The success could only be measured in assessing improvements in the lives of girls and women and reductions in gender inequality. These should be the measures of success. From this perspective, improvements in life expectancy, women’s health aspects and primary education had been seen, but there was a long way to go in terms of secondary education, livelihood opportunities and political representation. From the perspective of the United Nations Children’s Fund, reaching adolescent boys and girls remained one of the biggest challenges. Access to services, nutrition levels and other issues had just been analyzed across age groups. When girls and boys hit adolescence, from the ages of 15 to 24, the impact of gender roles and norms took effect and girls started to get left behind. Girls often got married too young and their trajectory was put off course. It was necessary to intervene before the adolescent period as it was difficult to reach girls once their trajectory was shifted. Sharing operational experiences would be useful to illuminate successes which could incentivize efforts throughout the United Nations system. Learning was better achieved through doing than through talking.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, asked how staff capacity could be built throughout the UN system.

FLAVIA BUSTREO, Assistant Director-General, Family, Women’s and Children’s Health, World Health Organization, said that the World Health Organization had a strong mandate to consider gender as an element in health and to mainstream gender throughout the organization. In recent years, capacity building and staff development had been put in place. Gender units had been established at headquarters and in regional offices. Introducing and ensuring gender health and awareness was promoted when new recruits were brought into the organization. Reading materials were also made available to staff. Gender mainstreaming needed to be brought to another level of coordination in the United Nations. Because of the existence with gender units, the tools were left to them and were not used by all. Gender mainstreaming was weakest at the country level because offices had least capacity and interface with Governments and social norms were the most challenging and had not worked in a coordinated way. The World Health Organization welcomed leadership to strengthen capacity at the country level.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), indicated that recognizing the concrete and particular challenges for women was necessary for successful policy development and achieving goals. Neutral policies were not effective, particularly in developing countries or least developed countries, given that women faced many obstacles; for example, climate change did not impact women and men exactly the same way. Also gender mainstreaming should effectively reach policy making on many areas and translate into concrete actions. UN Women was currently working with staff, Governments and ministries and partners, in order to promote concrete actions which emphasized the different access of policy on men and women. For this reason gender mainstreaming was so important.

MARI SIMONEN, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, said that necessary factors had to be put in place to ensure successful results at gender mainstreaming, including high-level political will and leadership, institutionalization into an agreement with a concrete mandate; organizational culture that provided a place where the tools and organizational elements could be put in place; competency and capacity; accountability, it was necessary to have organization systems to monitor and hold units and staff accountable; and finally sufficient financing and technical expertise. At the country level agents faced similar dynamics and could only achieve a little if they were not working with others. It was therefore important to provide sufficient recognition to the work of others as well as learning to work in teams and taking a back seat without giving up on gender issues, in other words, building coalitions for change. Country level mechanisms and programming instruments and their gender theme group could also help achieve positive results. Finally, there were important challenges; given that progress took time and resources, patience and perseverance were important, while promoting a sense of ownership. It was important to track progress and produce tangible results. In the context of the pressure to produce results, it was important to recognize that contexts were different and there were no one-size-fits-all technical solutions to gender problems.

SIGRID KAAG, Assistant Secretary-General and Assistant Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme, said she found it ironic that while gender mainstreaming was being discussed, women were central to all aspects of development. Women were considered as a side issue rather than a central one in agriculture. This was an issue of cognitive or behaviour change. The objectives on hunger and malnutrition would not be met if women were not given an elevated status in terms of considering agriculture. Many people recognized this intellectually but they did not know how to pursue implementation.

MICHELE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), asked how a culture of accountability could be established and asked panellists for their experiences related to improving accountability.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, said to ensure gender mainstreaming, all the pieces had to be in place, such as a strong mandate, substantial resources, capacities, et cetera. At the United Nations Children’s Fund, a lot had been done in this regard. Gender benchmarks and gender equality markers had emerged from a review of work on gender equality at the United Nations Children’s Fund. Progress on incentives needed to be considered. This did not mean punishing those that had not done well but a way to identify staff or programmes that needed additional support. Successful work, where gender was mainstreamed well and good outcomes were produced, should be identified. Reviews had to be done to look at ingredients of success. Those agencies that were more strategic, opportunistic and thereby successful should be considered in looking at programmes and staff and, eventually, be used to produce a positive feedback loop.

SIGRID A.M. KAAG, Assistant Administrator, United Nations Development Programme, said coordination at the country level required assessing capacity and leveraging that for the team. United Nations agencies could be bolder, but this did not mean there had to always be direct programmes. It should be recognized when gender work could not contribute something meaningful. There was a tendency in the global community to work with the organizations and individuals that were well known and thus, organizations often missed the chance to be effective by working with champion institutions. On gender equality, organizations needed to be encouraged and be held accountable. Organizations needed to ensure they did not depend on false results, as certain results could be misleading.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), concerning coordination, said that there was a great need for coordinating work on gender equality, and inquired how to do this, what gaps should be addressed and by what actors, and how could UN Women contribute to this end. All agencies were facing problems of financing; in this context the need to coordinate work as one sometimes required leaving the branding outside. It was important to recognize and address the fact that, on the ground, sometimes agencies were fighting for the same resources.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, emphasized that coordination also implied an efficient use of resources. Recent examples of better coordination with regard to gender mainstreaming were available and should be taken into account.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), indicated that UNICEF and UNHABITAT worked together on a safe cities programme. They built on each others’ experiences in order to become more efficient. This was an example of how agencies could do better things together.

ANN TUTWILER, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, reiterated the importance of comparative advantage. Agencies should recognize them and follow their main line. Concerning the need for joint programming and cooperation among agencies, demonstrating by doing could help get over competition for resources. Furthermore, focusing on competitive advantage should facilitate fundraising.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said that donors and contributors feared the ghost of duplication in agencies’ programming. If there was duplication, it had to be very little since expected results were lagging behind. However, donors and contributors continued to be concerned about this issue. Was there any evidence to whether this was a real problem?

FLAVIA BUSTREO, Assistant Director-General, Family, Women’s and Children’s Health, World Health Organization, said, in relation to a global strategy for women and children in health, several agencies had come together to work on women issues to advance the Millennium Development Goal 5. It had not been easy and there had been serious transaction costs, but in terms of cooperation between governments and organizations in advancing this agenda it was successful. Working as one had attracted funds. Several governments had expressed interest in supporting the work of the group. This was a good example of working together within the United Nations. Regarding duplication, even on the panel, duplication was evident but each agency had a different approach. UN Women could help to reduce duplication by working to set the standards and benchmarks for United Nations organizations.

MARI SIMONEN, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, said as the gender framework was developed, many components were held in common. The trick was to pull everything together so the information could be considered together. Reducing efforts in searching for specific information was valuable. Joint fundraising was not easy but should be reinforced and incentivized. A good example of collaboration was present in Mozambique, where civil society, United Nations organizations and the Government worked together to ensure better gender mainstreaming in United Nations plans and government work. In Viet Nam, the United Nations Country Team performed a gender audit and convened a retreat on planning as one on gender, which resulted in drafting a strategic plan with the Government and national partners and added resource tracking and gender targeting to the United Nations Country Team work.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, said it was not duplication across agencies but duplication over time that was a problem. The things produced today had probably been produced ten years ago. One area for increased coordination was generic gender training, which was less effective than when it was particular to a specific sector. Developing sectoral training guides would be enormously useful.

SIGRID A.M. KAAG, Assistant Administrator, United Nations Development Programme, said that when looking at delivery as one it was important to look at lessons learned at coordinating; agencies should recognize its importance for achieving better results in the context of the many limitations. While the urgent need to do more was noted, it was important to recognize the limitations and being selective and focused were therefore important factors of success. Concerning sustainability it was important to recognize that donors’ contributions were catalytic at best. Therefore, it was necessary to look for additional sources of financing and coordination should use smart lenses.

ANN TUTWILER, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, reiterated the importance of focus and specialization. Leverage was part of being catalytic. There was also the need to reach out to the private sector so that they understood the importance of giving women equal access, explaining to them why this was an important issue for them and how they could address it. More focus was necessary to see where the necessary resources could be found.

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, said that UN Women worked with the private sector in a number of areas and said that a discussion on how to be consistent with policies was needed. What they saw as evidence, for instance from data from the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, was the importance of 50 to 70 per cent of the agriculture force-work being women. There was a lack of coherence between the situation on the ground and where the money was going, and thus better targeting was necessary. This raised questions concerning focal programming, how it could be better used to promote coordination and results, and how it could be replicated and scaled up.

MARI SIMONEN, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, suggested that joint programming should be the first option for agencies, since this was at heart a good business practice, savvy programming and contributed to reaching targets and saving money. It also clarified inter-agency common approaches. Joint programming would not always lead to joint programmes, nevertheless it would help clarification, a better division of labour and the implementation of strategies on the basis of a coherent plan. There were numerous examples, part of the challenge of knowledge sharing and knowledge management would be to disseminate them. The United Nations Population Fund and UNICEF had for example worked together in preventing genital mutilation, each agency brought its specific competencies working together to achieve results.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, said one issue not thoroughly discussed was the importance of collecting and analysing sex aggregated data for ensuring progress. It was also not possible to hold anyone responsible without providing them with the resources for getting the job done. More resources should be raised for UN Women to fulfill its mandate.

MICHELE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said one of the priorities of UN Women was producing statistics and disaggregating data.

FLAVIA BUSTREO, Assistant Director-General, Family, Women’s and Children’s Health, World Health Organization, said when talking about accountability, in health, accountability was possible with counting. Countries were not counting births and maternal deaths and the World Health Organization was forced to estimate these rates. Transparency on the assumptions used for these estimates was necessary for accountability. The World Health Organization had created an independent expert review group to assess work on women’s health.

MICHELE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said that the impact and relevance of this work needed to be assessed and indicators were required to measure progress. This was a gap and challenge.

Discussion

During the interactive dialogue delegations reiterated the progress made in gender equality, mainstreaming and cross-cutting cooperation to achieve the goals. The creation of UN Women represented a significant step forward by clarifying the agenda and consolidating political support. However, significant challenges concerning cooperation, coherence, effective implementation and monitoring and accountability, among others remained. Furthermore, the creation of UN Women should not be taken to mean a diminished responsibility for other agencies and actors concerning their responsibility towards the gender agenda and the importance of remaining committed to the task. In this respect, the need to ensure that other agencies and actors remained committed to gender mainstreaming, accountability and effective monitoring mechanisms was needed.

Greater coordination and coherency in terms of empowering women and achieving gender equality across agencies and within Governments was needed. A large set of stakeholders and other United Nations bodies which sought to address discrimination against women also had a role to play. Cooperation activities, moreover, should incorporate gender equality dimension. For this reason, consistent work towards strengthening the institutional machinery was important and the United Nations system was needed. Similarly, accountability mechanisms should be placed not only to track individual initiatives or agencies but to provide system-wide accountability and performance indicators; given the increasing importance conceded to joint programming, the possibility of a coordinated accountability mechanism should be explored. Furthermore, speakers posed the question on how the Council could increase its relevance not only on the issue of human rights, but also on gender mainstreaming. A social and economic council which did not do this would not fulfill its goal; in this context a more systematic review of the work of agencies and progress made could contribute.

The real challenge and ultimate goal was to lead to real improvements in the lives of women on the ground, to this end the international architecture should lead to tangible results. In this context, it was important to recognize that the more the country faced poverty the more vulnerable women were; and consequently, among other development indicators, including those concerning women, equality and the status of women were essential. The United Nations needed provide strategic support to low- and middle-income countries, taking into account their specific circumstances. Gender equality and women empowerment were necessary for achieving internationally agreed goals and depended on the capacity of the international community to empower women and address violence against women and girls and to accelerate the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, particularly 3 and 5. Speakers said that when women were put at the centre of policy there were particular positive results in social development, but questioned how to ensure that recommendations were implemented. It was noted that many practical challenges remained concerning women’s sexual and reproductive health, addressing inequality, and bringing holistic societal change; and in many cases women continued to suffer aggravated marginalization due to multiple disadvantages.

There was a body of standards, recommendations and resolutions on the matter of gender; but it was necessary to help States to better implement them. Governments needed to improve and implement national policies; at the national policy making level there was not always a common understanding of what gender meant, particularly in the developing world. The United Nations was uniquely positioned to advance the underlying normative case necessary for achieving effective results in the promotion of gender equality and women empowerment; and its agencies should show leadership in advancing the gender agenda and to avoid duplication. While working with national governments, it was important to take into account national priorities but at the same time raising awareness among governmental officials and promoting the gender dimension more clearly in order to foster better national understanding and policies.

Speakers recognized responsibilities of the international community to mainstream gender issues in all programmes of the United Nations. It was a key political responsibility that however must be operationalized. It was also important to employ a holistic approach, including political and cultural factors. Concerning coordination and institutional changes, some expressed the view that UN Women should lead the efforts to tackle systematically issues of gender equality and empowerment. Concerning all policies and programmes of the United Nations system, while the agencies had expressed commitments to support gender mainstream, this was not monitored by accountability mechanisms in place. In this context, coordinating quantification and accountability mechanisms were also necessary and the Council should help disseminate the examples of the work being done. Speakers inquired what UN Women planned to do to achieve better coordination and accountability, targets, indicators, and what the role of the Council should be. Furthermore, an incentive system within the United Nations agencies could contribute to achieve better accountability at the staff level, including incentives for individual officers and managers in units to take gender mainstreaming as part of their own performance criteria.

Representatives of Mexico, the European Union, Chile, Venezuela, Norway, Brazil, Kenya, Ghana, India, the United States and Cameron took part in the interactive dialogue.

Concluding Remarks

MICHELLE BACHELET, Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said country ownership was important because it was the only way to ensure that policy was implemented on the ground. Ms. Bachelet saw UN Women as a supporter of national partners, who were the main responsible parties. Ownership and sustainability were required. Work had to be demand-driven. Within the normative areas, policies and resolutions, ownership needed to be assured because that would result in political will. Good ideas needed to be translated into action, and so resources were required. The evidence was strong and many spoke very enthusiastically about the issues, but what happened in reality was very far from achieving the set objectives. It was necessary to make a strong case that investing in women was not only the right thing to do but also the smart thing to do. If the evidence was not strong enough, more efforts needed to be allocated to producing data and arguments to support action. Producing good arguments would help policy-makers to make good decisions. Communication should be enhanced and women needed to be made more relevant politically. Regarding strategic work and accountability, UN Women was working on these issues and an accountability framework would be presented to the Executive Board.

GEETA RAO GUPTA, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund, said the work of the United Nations Children’s Fund had to be done locally and nationally. It had to be implemented on the ground in partnership with local actors and thus the United Nations Children’s Fund could not do mainstreaming right if it stayed within the United Nations system and gender mainstreaming was not translated to partners. In terms of primary education for example, significant success had been made in encouraging ministries to make curriculum and school facilities more girl friendly.

SIGRID A.M. KAAG, Assistant Administrator, United Nations Development Programme, said mutual accountability was required in developing policies. Applying the normative framework meant the results framework could not be narrow. There had to be a way to measure results so that achievements and lack thereof could be assessed. Ensuring that women were economic agents at all levels and that inclusive growth was pursued should be carried out by all programmes.

MARI SIMONEN, Deputy Director-General, United Nations Population Fund, said that working on age four-plus was important to accountability, results, policy and working with national parties. At the country level, national commitments were specific to each country and important to changing national situations. Results-based work plans augmented accountability at the national level and enhanced the coherence of the work of United Nations bodies at the country level.

ANN TUTWILER, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, said that the Food and Agriculture Organization had put in place accountability measures for managers and senior managers for delivering on gender equality and women empowerment outcomes. Gender specialists had also been placed in the budget office to ensure funds were allocated to gender equality issues.

ABULKALAM ABDUL MOMEN, President of the Economic and Social Council, thanked the Chairman for putting together this dialogue and the panellists for the discussion. Promoting gender equality and women empowerment was an important issue and considerable efforts were being made in the United Nations system. In order to illustrate its importance, a traditional saying served as a powerful analogy: in the same way it took two wings for a bird to fly, humanity needed two halves to move ahead. The mainstreaming of gender should move from these lofty grounds to the actual grounds, the stereotypes and practices.

Panel discussion II on “Countering gender discrimination and negative gender stereotypes: Effective policy responses”

Opening Statements

ABULKALAM ABDUL MOMEN, Vice-President of the Economic and Social Council, said that gender stereotypes were present in many facets of society; there were root causes of discrimination in schools, workplace and society at large, and they must be tackled systematically. A well-educated society was essential in order to effectively deal with the issue of gender discrimination. Measures must be taken to raise awareness of the issue in schools, including gender-neutral educational materials, sensitization of teachers, and exposing both girls and boys to role models in a wide spectrum of fields, with a focus on merit and achievement rather than gender itself. In Africa and South Asia women lagged behind men in access to higher education, while in some countries in Europe, women now matched or surpassed men in terms of advanced degrees. The obstacles in the workplace were most apparent in science and technology, where few women led scientific institutions or large technology companies. Women were also underrepresented in academia, the public sector or private companies in the field of research and development. Those countries that had not achieved gender parity in access to education must strive to provide equal access; countries that were grappling with gender discrimination in the workplace must encourage their institutions and companies to hire qualified women through awareness raising as well as relevant legal instruments such as legislation prohibiting discriminatory hiring practices. Gender stereotypes that relegated the main responsibility for household care-giving to women acted as hurdles for women’s empowerment and participation in the workplace. Governments must provide the environment and conditions needed to create a level playing field, including the elimination of discriminatory legal provisions in family, electoral and penal codes and the provision of a basic level of physical and social security and access to essential services. Governments were increasingly recognizing that they could no longer continue to develop and prosper without fully engaging one half of their populations.

LAKSHMI PURI, Assistant Secretary-General for Intergovernmental Support and Strategic Partnerships, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said the 2010 Ministerial Declaration identified discriminatory attitudes and gender stereotypes as cross-cutting issues that needed to be addressed in order to achieve gender equality goals and other development objectives, such as the Millennium Development Goals. Stereotypes were understandings of people based on oversimplified notions of who they were according to specific traits. These were socially constructed norms, practices and beliefs. Social, religious and cultural aspects contributed to these stereotypes. Stereotypes and perceptions were often rigid but could be changed over time. This was where the opportunities laid. These stereotypes affected the enjoyment of human rights. When these attitudes were translated into policies they could cause harm and prejudice to women. Denial of promotion, increased causalities of women, feminization of poverty, violence against women at home, work and public places, honour killings, female infanticide and lower levels of education were examples of the symptoms and impact of stereotyping.

UN Women had found that stereotyping reinforced structural and historical patterns of discrimination. Men were also casualties in this because they were held to male stereotypes. These needed to be combated in media, education, businesses, government and other forums. There was also the issue of the cosmography of gender inequality. This was language that emphasized certain qualities as gender based. At the international level, norms needed to be built that chipped away at these stereotyped perceptions and the policies and practices that supported them. Certain temporary and permanent measures, such as laws, policies, representation in work and legislative bodies, tax incentives, educational mechanisms and other means, should be supported by the international community and national governments. UN Women was committed to supporting States’ efforts in advocacy, strategic partnerships, provision of technical and advisory services, and fostering and encouraging role models and championing best practices. Ms. Puri asked the panellists which forms of gender stereotyping were most prevalent in their experience and what role education had played in combating these stereotypes.

Statements by Panellists

SAGUFTA YASMIN, Honorable Whip and Member of Parliament, Bangladesh, remarked that South Asia had produced world-class female leaders such as Indira Gandhi and Benazir Bhutto. Gender stereotyping produced sexism and prejudice against women across nations and it began at the household. In many rural areas a male son was considered a blessing for the family, while girls were even considered as a burden as they would eventually marry and leave the family. It was also wrongly perceived that a girl would not be able to live in the world without a man. Bangladesh was one of the most densely populated nations in the world, with a total population of over 150 million, where females comprised almost 50 per cent of the total population. Despite the socio-economic progress and the Constitutional guarantee for gender equality, gender discrimination and stereotypes still existed in Bangladesh as they did elsewhere. Education was definitely the most important tool or weapon to fight against gender inequality and reduce stereotypes. The present Government had therefore formulated a very focused education policy with specific emphasis on girls’ and women’s education and had adopted the Education for All agenda.

There was a strong political will under the leadership of the Prime Minister and a bill had been presented to Parliament adopting a comprehensive women policy in line with the Beijing platform for action; it included an integrated approach, including education along with issues such as the right to property. Measures had been taken to make primary education available to girls. In secondary schools stipends and facilities were being provided to girls, 56 per cent of girls in the areas covered by this programme were enrolled in secondary schools. The Government had also initiated various scholarships and financial aid for women for higher education. Bangladesh had initiated more and more awareness campaigns all over the country, especially in the rural areas. Bangladesh had become a stand-out performer in the race to women’s empowerment and removing gender discrimination in recent years. Women constantly had been the most politically involved since the last decade. Girls in the 15 to 24 age group had higher literacy rates than boys. Not only was the Prime Minister of Bangladesh a woman, but important ministries such as those dealing with foreign and home affairs were held by women. Female employment in professions often misrepresented as not suitable for women such as defense, police, and pilots had risen significantly in recent years. In terms of the United Nations goal of promoting gender equality and empowering women, Bangladesh had become a success story but much more work was needed to reverse stereotyping with regards to women’s role and empowerment.

DORCAS COKER-APPIAH, Executive Director, Gender Studies and Human Rights Documentation Centre, Ghana, said there were challenges in the secondary and tertiary levels of education in Ghana, although parity had been achieved at the primary level. Politics, however, were seen as a male domain. With constant education, awareness-raising and the increasingly economic independence of women, an increase in women’s participation in politics could be envisaged. Religious texts were affected by the social and cultural context of the period that they were developed in. It was difficult over time to see whether practices were religion-based or culture-based and supported by religious justification. Citing one phrase in scripture was often employed to support a specific practice, but this ignored the whole of religious texts. Both the Bible and Koran had phrases supporting equality between men and women. Under Islam, women had rights to education, equal representation and economic independence but these rights were not enjoyed in practice. Ms. Cocker-Appiah asked how this old order could be changed. New texts and teachings were needed, and further reinterpretation was available. But this reinterpretation was largely marginalized. Citing re-interpretative texts or phrases supporting gender equality could help to make a religion a positive influence in women’s lives. Law reforms in discriminatory areas, such as divorce, marriage and inheritance, should be undertaken to take first steps toward gender equality.

JANE CONNORS, Chief, Special Procedures Branch, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, said stereotypes might constitute discrimination if institutionalized into discriminatory practices, promoting inequality and discrimination; for example when enshrined in laws that conferred on husbands the power and responsibility to financially sustain the marital home and conferred on wives the right and obligation to care for children and the marital home. Ms. Connors presented illustrative cases of how stereotypes could impinge on the enjoyment of human rights by women and men. Stereotyping and discrimination in many cases compromised other rights, such as in some cases the right to a fair trial. Stereotypes affected both women and men, but often irrespective of whether they related to women or men, had a particularly negative effect on women, assigning them subservient roles in society and devaluating their attributes and characteristics. Stereotypes, especially those concerned with family life had proven to be resilient.

Ms. Connors said that international instruments on human rights allowed addressing the persistence of stereotypes, for example, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women had identified the obligation to address the persistence of gender-based stereotypes as one of the obligations central to the achievement of the Convention’s object and purpose. It had spelled out measures that needed to be taken and those who should take them in its concluding observations, general recommendations, decisions on petitions and its single inquiry. These ranged from the enactment and reform of legislation, capacity building for judges, and law. In sum, there was no shortage of recommendations on what needed to be done by whom. The issue was implementation and the actor with the primary responsibility was the State which must itself refrain from stereotyping, ensure that its agents and officials and those acting on their behalf refrained from stereotyping and exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate, punish and remedy gender stereotyping by private actors. Civil society, including national human rights institutions, had a crucial role to play both at the national and international levels, including through use of the mechanisms of the Human Rights Council, including the Special Procedures and the Universal Periodical Review, as well as the human rights treaty bodies. Faith based organizations, and particularly religious leaders must be addressed, particularly as they were frequently responsible for the continued entrenchment of stereotypes. Further research into the way in which gender stereotyping affected individual men and women, and how it was perpetuated was also required.

SARAH COOK, Director, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, said she would talk about the success achieved through gender awareness raising campaigns and thus would start by discussing the structural reasons for discrimination. The implications of stereotypes were wide-ranging, where access to resources or political and cultural participation could be circumscribed. Attitudes, beliefs and practices were often well-entrenched and attached to political, social, cultural and religious norms. However, these could be altered. These were often cross-cut by other aspects such as class. Changes in gender discrimination had been the result of feminist movements, activism and mobilization that raised knowledge and awareness of the rights of women. Increased gender awareness, in order to be effective, had to be mobilized by changes in legislation, international conventions, anti-discrimination laws and other mechanisms with respect to the protection of human rights. This allowed women to actively pursue and protect those rights. Relatively little was understood about how certain issues got on the agenda. The gender revolution had used radical language and legal action to combat discrimination globally. Progressive States, more advanced States and States with more developed welfare systems often went beyond ensuring basic rights for women.

Many barriers to equality existed. While some barriers and discrimination were overt and recognizable, others were not and awareness was not enough. Some forms were hidden and embedded in economic, social and political life. They were masked by analytical frameworks, particularly economic frameworks that most people bought into. This was critical because they underpinned policy-making. This was a question of how reproduction and care were placed in the economy. The reproductive or care economy was not measured in most economic analyses. When the work women did on a daily basis was not valued, women were sometimes, by extension, not valued. Women then based their value on different norms, which had implications for the well-being and status of women and girls. The economy could not function without this work. This work reproduced labour and the economy benefited. Lack of recognition of this value constrained women’s access to monetary resources, work, public and political spaces, bargaining power, and social welfare and support. Expanding a conception of the economy to incorporate the reproductive and care economy was required. This could mean paying women or men for work in the household. Finding ways to socialize the burden of reproduction could be even more beneficial, particularly in low-income countries. Moving the responsibility out of the household could reduce the burden of households with few resources and could be a core element in boosting a gender equitable social protection floor. The conception of the economy needed to be put on the agenda.

JANE HODGES, Director, Bureau for Gender Equality, International Labour Organization, concerning the issue of stereotypes in the workplace, said that the workplace was where negative stereotyping was easily manifested and felt and one of the environments where prevention could take place and referred to the International Labour Organization mandate. Decades of International Labour Organization research and experience showed that success depended on mobilizing agents for change; for example its tripartite structure meant involving representatives of ministries responsible for employment and labour, labour unions and of business. The International Labour Organization and the European Union had recently concluded a project in Ukraine on gender equality in the world of work, which achieved a gender sensitive review of the current and new draft labour code, training of labour inspectors on gender equality, gender mainstreaming in collective bargaining and on equal pay, and established an advisory centre and hotline for workers on gender issues, and training for women on starting and improving business opportunities. Having a clear mandate and aim was crucial so that messages of policy and operational action were not blurred. This avoided the wasting of time, brainwork and funding through duplication. In this regard, the corpus of international labour standards generally stressed the importance of eliminating stereotypes that hindered free choice and equal treatment of women and men. The International Labour Organization worked to achieve for the ultimate goal of gender equality. Previous experience and research underlined some factors of success such as a holistic approach, wide-reaching awareness campaigns for prevention, improved statutory protections and training on those rights, better enforcement through national machineries, labour administration institutions and judiciary, user-friendly systems and redress mechanisms, and using the workplace whether multinationals, growing firms or micro business so that women and men in the formal and informal economies were covered. Affirmative action was an important measure to this end and furthermore, men and boys should be involved in eliminating stereotypes. In employment, social protection, principles and rights at work, social dialogue, and gender equality were formal recognized and measured cross-cutting issues, under the 2008 Social Justice Declaration and the Action Plan for Gender Equality. Financing remained a challenge to ensure sustainability and success of initiatives.

Discussion

Speakers said equality between women and men was a fundamental right. Rigid gender roles could hamper an individual’s choices and restrict his or her choices. It was important to address gender stereotypes from early childhood. Combating discrimination against women remained one of the main priorities of the United Nations and the international community. Every State had the right to develop its own strategy in this regard and many had put in place successful policies to combat discrimination and enhance women’s rights. The media could also play a role in countering gender stereotypes. One speaker noted that men made up the panel on financing for development yesterday, while the panel on women was composed only of women. These discussions could have been enriched by including men on the panel on women, and women on the panel on financing for development.

Lack of access to education, fair wages, skill development and ownership of property were discriminatory practices that impacted women. Elimination of gender disparity in primary and secondary education was crucial in increasing the capacities of women to participate more in social, economic and political decision-making. Education was key to breaking the vicious cycle of ignorance and discrimination against women. It lowered infant mortality and fertility rates. Gender budgeting was also an important way to mainstream gender concerns in programmes, projects and legislation. Violence against women such as rape, honour killings and sexual harassment needed to be addressed by legislation, court action and other mechanisms. Women also perpetrated stereotypes, which should be recognized.

Speakers asked how, based on innovative initiatives taken in the field of health, effective data collection and analysis of the multiple factors affecting gender discrimination could be developed to establish appropriately targeted public policies. Speakers also asked how to increase the engagement of men and boys to counter gender discrimination and negative gender stereotypes. Speakers asked how the interaction between the Economic and Social Council and other United Nations bodies could be ensured. Speakers inquired how the role of the Economic and Social Council in combating discrimination against women could be assessed. Speakers asked if it was easy to fight against stereotypes and discrimination against women when these stereotypes were deeply rooted in cultures, as a product of national laws.

The European Union, the Russian Federation, the Bahamas, Cameroon and India took the floor in the interactive dialogue.

Concluding Remarks

LAKSHMI PURI, Assistant Secretary-General for Intergovernmental Support and Strategic Partnership, United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), said that gender disaggregated data was needed to further address the issue; similarly data was also needed on violence against women and whether legislation was capable of effectively deterring this violence and leading to successful convictions. UN Women was very much engaged in establishing basic data. Even in terms of the basis for assessing progress, baseline indicators were needed and constituted a basic challenge, and more resources would be needed to this end. UN Women worked closely with partners to increase the country and subject-data coverage and assured that gender disaggregated data was generated and employed to generating solutions. Where there were laws on prohibiting domestic violence, the perception of domestic violence as prohibited grew and more reporting of domestic violence was seen. These were important correlations and constituted the basis for suitable solutions. Concerning the question posed by Russia on the interaction between the Council and other intergovernmental bodies, Ms. Puri said that UN Women mainly interacted with two intergovernmental bodies, including the Commission on the Status of Women, where the intergovernmental normative policy making took place. In this context the Council played a crucial role concerning norm setting and policy making, it constituted an important forum for norm setting and policy making. The other intergovernmental body was the Executive Board of UN Women that approved the operational activities of UN Women but also approved the strategic plan; there was currently a process of establishing a mechanism between the Commission and the Executive Board, this could contribute to aspects such as information exchange and coherence. Concerning the Financing for Development framework, the concept of gender inclusive financing had been advanced and characterized as necessary for development. Concerning the question of fighting against stereotypes and underlying power relationships that prevented the substitutions of deeply rooted stereotypes in society, modern communications and media facilitated this task; modalities such as awareness raising education and other tools had been identified; a positive cycle between perception, laws and action was also needed. Special targeted measures were necessary in the context of entrenched interests, for instance in the context of parliaments and judicial systems. The role of international norms and State adherence to them had been recognized and all of these issues had an important role to play. While the media could play a positive role, it had in many cases negatively contributed to the commoditization of women and the reproduction and dissemination of traditional gender stereotypes.

DORCAS COKER-APPIAH, Executive Director, Gender Studies and Human Rights Documentation Centre, Ghana, said that in some developing countries, civil society organizations had tried many strategies to engage men and boys. In some countries, organizations like Men Against Violence Against Women played a role in speaking out against violence against women and reaching their peers. This made a difference in how the message was received. A key champion for women’s rights in Ghana was Professor Sy. When he spoke about reproductive rights, female mortality rates and other issues, everyone listened. People well respected in communities had an important role to play. It was not easy to fight gender stereotypes, particularly because in some countries these stereotypes were based on customary law. Establishing statuary laws could combat the impact of customary law and then other strategies, such as multimedia, could work to reach stakeholders on the issue. However, attitudes could not change over night. A consistent, long-term approach was required. Women should encourage other women but women should not beat each other up on the issue. This was a human problem. Men were guilty of it as well.

SARAH COOK, Director, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, said that, from the point of view of research institutions, it was important to work with operational agencies within the United Nations system and to integrate these insights into their approach. Placing the conversation on stereotypes within a context was a starting point to begin to address individual issues, including of men and boys in these processes. There were some serious issues which required research as much as active intervention. In industrialized societies, the role of men which had been traditionally defined as bread winners was often undermined in the context of unemployment. The issue of inequality required more data and careful analysis. There were also a number of issues concerning the type of data and the analysis carried out, efforts should be made to sustain longer term research. There were different biological needs between men and women and an important question concerning whether clinical research in the health field could actually be gender neutral had been overlooked. Ms. Cook mentioned the importance of education beyond primary level to continue to address stereotypes. Also research concerning social protection showed that in Asia housing and women’s access and control over housing had made a huge difference in, for instance, preventing domestic violence. Finally, concerning social media, Ms. Cook said that the Arab spring had shown that women were actively engaged and this was a positive development which could remain active and inclusive, although it was still necessary to see how it would play out.

SAUGFTA YASMIN, Honourable Whip and Member of Parliament, Bangladesh, said that in spite of programmes and plans, governments failed to achieve gender equality because stereotypes were conceived at a very young age. Divorce was not well accepted in Bangladesh. Mental strategy and condition were most important. Religious explanations and interpretations produced perspectives on gender that were biased against women. The period between the ages three to seven was the best time to build up resistance to these stereotypes through a number of measures, including diverse teaching environments, employing equal numbers of male and female teachers, training teachers, exposing children to non-traditional gender roles, using gender neutral terms, and striking a gender balance in children’s stories.

JANE HODGES, Director, Bureau for Gender Equality, International Labour Organization, said that progress had been made and people were aware of it when they reproduced stereotypes. Concerning progress and challenges in dealing with members of the International Labour Organization, she indicated that it seemed that every time there was an achievement there were also setbacks; persistence and passion were necessary to continue this work.

JANE CONNORS, Chief, Special Procedures Branch, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, reiterated the work that the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women had done for 30 years; this showed that addressing stereotypes was not easy. Stereotypes were persistent and would often reassert themselves even after significant progress had been made. For this reason, it was important to engage both men and women. Carrying on with some of these stereotypes also cut men out of rights they would like to enjoy as much at it affected women. It was important to raise awareness on how stereotypes affected everyone equally and detracted from their capacity to fully enjoy human rights.

ABULKALAM ABDUL MOMEN, Vice-President of the Economic and Social Council, said the Council had tried to obtain specialists in the areas discussed to participate in panels, but availability was an important factor. Funding, the role of the media, and laws and regulations were important for reducing gender stereotypes. Enforcing laws and regulations and creating public awareness were also vital. Specialists and country governments had informed the Council about the challenges and achievements made on gender equality and women’s empowerment so that the Economic and Social Council could support cooperation and other efforts in this regard.

For use of the information media; not an official record

ECOSOC11/014E