average earn just half as much income as men over their lifetimes.3 Yet in all regions women work more than men: on average they do almost two and a half times as much unpaid care and domestic work as men, and if paid and unpaid work are combined, women in almost all countries work longer hours than men each day.4 This Report focuses on the economic and social dimensions of gender equality, including the right of all women to a good job, with fair pay and safe working conditions, to an adequate pension in older age, to health care and to safe water without discrimination based on factors such as socio-economic status, geographic location and race or ethnicity. In doing so, it aims to unravel some of the current challenges and contradictions facing the world today: at a time when women and girls have almost equal opportunities when it comes to education, why are only half of women of working age in the labour force globally, and why do women still earn much less than men? In an era of unprecedented global wealth, why are large numbers of women not able to exercise their right to even basic levels of health care, water and sanitation? As the Report shows, these inequalities are not inevitable. Economic and social policies can contribute to the creation of stronger economies, and to more sustainable and gender-equal societies, if they are designed and implemented with women’s rights at their centre. Across the world, gender equality advocates in civil society, ministries, parliaments, the media and universities have demonstrated how to make women’s rights real. And they have won significant victories: examples include the domestic worker alliance in New York that refused to accept poor conditions, and so mobilized nannies and carers in parks, streets and churches to push through the most progressive bill of rights for domestic workers worldwide; the feminist researchers and policy makers in Egypt who joined forces to design an empowering cash transfer programme that puts money in the hands of women; the feminist bureaucrat in Brazil who collaborated with women’s
organizations to provide sugarcane workers with a powerful understanding of their own rights as well as vocational training in non-traditional occupations for a sustainable route out of poverty; the organizations of unpaid caregivers in Kenya who, after years of advocacy, finally have their place at the policy table when it comes to health and welfare decision-making at the local and national level; and the male policy maker in the Ministry of Finance in Morocco, who insisted that his country’s policies would only be legitimate if all budget decisions were assessed for their impact on women and girls and has opened up space for women’s organizations to influence change. These visionary advocates for change have refused to accept the status quo, have rejected the idea that poverty and gender inequality are a fact of life and have recognized that progress for women and girls is progress for all.
A CHALLENGING GLOBAL CONTEXT FOR WOMEN’S RIGHTS The world has changed significantly since the Beijing conference in 1995. The rise of extremism, escalating violent conflict, recurrent and deepening economic crises, volatile food and energy prices, food insecurity, natural disasters and the effects of climate change have intensified vulnerability and increased inequalities. Financial globalization, trade liberalization, the ongoing privatization of public services and the ever-expanding role of corporate interests in the development process have shifted power relations in ways that undermine the enjoyment of human rights and the building of sustainable livelihoods. The world is both wealthier and more unequal today than at any point since World War II. The richest 1 per cent of the world’s population now owns about 40 per cent of the world’s assets, while the bottom half owns no more than 1 per cent.5 The gap between rich and poor women remains huge both between and within countries. A woman in Sierra Leone is 100 times more likely to die in childbirth than a woman in Canada.6 In the least developed countries, a woman living in a rural area is 38 per cent less likely to give birth with a
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