Tag: Gender

What Now for Civil Society? — Global Issues

Credit: Mohamed Afrah/AFP via Getty Images
  • Opinion by Andrew Firmin (london)
  • Inter Press Service

LONDON, Oct 12 (IPS) – Ahead of the presidential election, Solih faced accusations of irregularities in his party’s primary vote, in which he defeated former president Mohamed Nasheed. The Electoral Commission was accused of making it harder for rival parties to stand, including the Democrats, a breakaway party Naheed formed after the primary vote. The ruling party also appeared to be instrumentalising public media and state resources in its favour. Solih’s political alliances with conservative religious parties were in the spotlight, including with the Adhaalath Party, which has taken an increasingly intolerant stance on women’s and LGBTQI+ rights.

Big beasts battle for influence

If the two candidates seemed similar in their attitudes towards civil society, they stood on opposite sides of a geopolitical divide. In recent years Maldives, a chain of small Indian Ocean islands with a population of around half a million, has become a major site of contestation in the battle for supremacy between China and India. The location is seen as strategic, not least for control of shipping routes, vital for the transport of oil from the Gulf to China.

Civic space under pressure

Solih quickly conceded defeat and thanked voters for playing their part in a democratic and peaceful process. It’s far from rare for incumbents to lose in Maldives: there’s been a change at every election since the first multiparty vote in 2008. But there are concerns that Muizzu will follow the same course as former president Abdulla Yameen, leader of his party, the People’s National Congress.

Yameen, in office from 2013 to 2018, wanted to run again, but the Supreme Court barred him because he’s serving an 11-year jail sentence for corruption and money-laundering. Critics question the extent to which Muizzu will be his own person or a proxy for Yameen. Perhaps there’s a clue in the fact that Yameen has already been moved from jail to house arrest on Muizzu’s request.

The question matters because the human rights situation sharply deteriorated under Yameen’s presidency. The 2018 election was preceded by the declaration of a state of emergency enabling a crackdown on civil society, the media, the judiciary and the political opposition. Judges and politicians were jailed. Protests were routinely banned and violently dispersed. Independent media websites were blocked and journalists subjected to physical attacks.

Ultimately, Yameen was roundly defeated by a united opposition who capitalised on widespread alarm at the state of human rights. Some positive developments followed, including repeal of a criminal defamation law. But many challenges for civil society remained and hopes of significant progress were largely disappointed.

A restrictive protest law stayed in effect and parliament rejected changing it in 2020. Police violence towards protesters continued, as did impunity. Civil society groups were still smeared and vilified if they criticised the government. Activists have been subjected to smears, harassment, threats and violence from hardline conservative religious groups. Women’s rights activists have been particularly targeted.

In 2019, a prominent civil society organisation, the Maldivian Democracy Group, was deregistered and had its funds seized following pressure from religious groups after it published a report on violent extremism. It now operates from exile.

Ahead of the presidential election, Solih faced accusations of irregularities in his party’s primary vote, in which he defeated former president Mohamed Nasheed. The Electoral Commission was accused of making it harder for rival parties to stand, including the Democrats, a breakaway party Naheed formed after the primary vote. The ruling party also appeared to be instrumentalising public media and state resources in its favour. Solih’s political alliances with conservative religious parties were in the spotlight, including with the Adhaalath Party, which has taken an increasingly intolerant stance on women’s and LGBTQI+ rights.

Big beasts battle for influence

If the two candidates seemed similar in their attitudes towards civil society, they stood on opposite sides of a geopolitical divide. In recent years Maldives, a chain of small Indian Ocean islands with a population of around half a million, has become a major site of contestation in the battle for supremacy between China and India. The location is seen as strategic, not least for control of shipping routes, vital for the transport of oil from the Gulf to China.

India has historically had close connections with Maldives, something strongly supported by Solih. But Muizzu, like his predecessor Yameen, seems firmly in the China camp. Under Yameen, Maldives was a recipient of Chinese support to develop infrastructure under its Belt and Road Initiative, epitomised in the 1.4 km China-Maldives Friendship Bridge.

India has come to be a big issue in Maldivian politics. Under Solih, India established a small military presence in Maldives, mostly involved in providing air support for medical evacuations from isolated islands. But the development of a new India-funded harbour prompted accusations that the government was secretly planning to give India’s military a permanent base.

This sparked opposition protests calling for the Indian military to be expelled. Protests faced heavy restriction, with many protesters arrested. In 2022, Solih issued a decree deeming the protests a threat to national security and ordering them to stop. This high-handed move only further legitimised protesters’ grievances.

Muizzu’s campaign sought to centre the debate on foreign interference and Maldives’ sovereignty. He used his victory rally to reiterate his promise that foreign soldiers will be expelled.

In practice, the new administration is likely to mean a change of emphasis rather than an absolute switch. Maldives will still need to trade with both much bigger economies and likely look to play them off against each other, while India will seek to maintain relations, hoping that the political pendulum will swing its way again.

Time to break with the past

International relations were far from the only issue. Economic strife and the high cost of living – a common issue in recent elections around the world – was a major concern. And some people likely switched votes out of unhappiness with Solih’s failure to fulfil his 2018 promises to challenge impunity for killings by extremists and make inroads on corruption, and to open up civic space.

Neither India, where civic freedoms are deteriorating, nor China, which stamps down on all forms of dissent, will have any interest in whether the Maldives government respects the space for civil society. But there’s surely an opportunity here for Muizzu to prove he’ll stand on his own feet by breaking with both the dismal human rights approach of Yameen and the increasingly compromised positions of Solih. He can carve out his own direction by committing to respecting and working with civil society, including by letting it scrutinise and give feedback on the big development decisions he may soon be taking in concert with China.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

© Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service

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Mexico on the Rights Path — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Ines M Pousadela (montevideo, uruguay)
  • Inter Press Service

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, Oct 10 (IPS) – Mexico’s Supreme Court recently declared abortion bans unconstitutional, effectively decriminalising abortion throughout the vast federal country, so far characterised by a legislative patchwork.

The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by a civil society organisation, Information Group on Reproductive Choice. It forces the Federal Congress to repeal the Federal Penal Code articles that criminalise abortion. Effective immediately, those seeking abortions and those providing them can no longer be punished for doing so. The ruling also enshrines the right to access abortion procedures in all institutions of the federal health system network, even in states where the crime of abortion remains on the books.

Global trends

Mexico is part of a global, long-term trend of progress in sexual and reproductive rights. According to the Center for Reproductive Rights, the vast majority of countries that have changed their national abortion laws over the past couple of decades have made them less restrictive. Only four countries have gone the other way: El Salvador, Nicaragua, Poland and the USA.

Several Latin American countries have been swept by the ‘green tide’ that originated in Argentina, increasingly liberalising abortion laws. Before the 2010s, abortion was legal in only one Latin American country, Cuba. It was legalised in Uruguay in 2012, and eight years later in Argentina. Colombia decriminalised abortion in February 2022, and other countries, such as Chile and Ecuador, have since made it legal on limited grounds, notably when pregnancy is a result of rape – which women’s rights organisations see as a milestone on the road to full legalisation.

Globally, abortion is currently legal on request in 75 countries, often until 12 weeks into pregnancy. Around a dozen more allow it for broad socio-economic reasons. Many more permit it for specific reasons such as health grounds or to save a pregnant person’s life.

But abortion remains banned under any circumstances in 24 countries, and overall 40 per cent of women of reproductive age live under restrictive abortion laws. These restrictions have a significant impact on women: it’s estimated that unsafe abortions costs the lives of 39,000 women and girls every year.

A legislative patchwork

The trend towards decriminalisation in Mexico kicked off in 2007 in Mexico City, and it took 12 years for another state, Oaxaca, to follow its lead. Change accelerated in recent years, with Hidalgo and Veracruz legalising abortion in 2021.

In September 2021, the federal Supreme Court issued its first-ever decision on abortion rights, unanimously recognising a constitutional right to safe, legal and free abortion services within a ‘short period’ early in pregnancy, and on specific grounds later. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit against the state of Coahuila, which imposed prison terms of up to three years for voluntary abortion.

Although this ruling only applied to Coahuila, it had a wider impact: judges in other states were no longer able to sentence anyone for the crime of voluntary abortion in the early stages of pregnancy.

Two days after this judgment, the Supreme Court addressed another lawsuit concerning the state of Sinaloa, issuing a ruling that declared it unconstitutional for state laws to redefine the legal concept of personhood by protecting ‘human life from conception’. And soon after, it declared invalid the principle of conscientious objection for medical practitioners in the General Health Law. A couple of months earlier it had ruled unconstitutional the time limits set by some states for abortions in cases of rape.

By the time of the Coahuila ruling, only four federal entities allowed abortion on demand up to 12 weeks. But several have changed their laws since, and by the time of the latest Supreme Court ruling, abortion on demand was already legal in 12 of Mexico’s 32 states. All states also allowed abortions for pregnancies resulting from rape, most allowed abortion when necessary to save a pregnant person’s life, and several allowed it in cases of risks to a pregnant person’s health or severe congenital foetal abnormalities.

Regional experience however suggests that making abortion conditional on exceptional grounds that must be proven tends to result in denial of access. Additionally, in Mexico, access by particularly vulnerable women has often been restricted through resistance in bureaucracies and medical institutions, even in states where abortion is legal.

Now Congress has until the end of its current session, which runs until 15 December, to amend the Penal Code clauses that criminalise abortion. But even after this, abortion will continue to be a state-level crime in 20 states. This means that abortion complaints will continue to be filed in those states. In most cases judges will ultimately have to dismiss the charges – but women will continue to be subjected to unnecessary barriers and uncertainty. For this reason, the women’s rights movement is pushing locally for decriminalisation in every Mexican state.

Effective access the next struggle

Mexican women’s rights groups are getting ready for what promises to be a long battle for effective access. They feel confident, for now, that thanks to decades of hard work public opinion is on their side. But they know that, while there may be less up-front resistance than before, there are still powerful forces against change. Resistance manifests in the imposition of barriers to prevent effective access to what is now recognised as a right, particularly for people from the most excluded groups in society.

Denial of access can take many forms: long waiting times, the need for multiple doctors’ appointments and parental or marital consent, disinformation and the extension of conscientious objection from individual health personnel to entire institutions.

Sexual and reproductive health, including abortion procedures, is basic healthcare and should be easily accessible to all. Mexican feminists know this, and will continue fighting to change both policy and minds so nobody is denied access to their rights.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Senior Research Specialist, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.


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To End Child Marriage in Southern & East Africa, Governments Need to Strengthen Laws & Implementation — Global Issues

Nafissa, 17 from Niger, was married at 16. Three months after marrying she became pregnant. She gave birth to a still born baby. Credit: UNICEF/Marieke van der Velden
  • Opinion by Divya Srinivasan (geneva, switzerland)
  • Inter Press Service

The UN commemorates International Day of the Girl Child on October 11 — an annual and internationally recognized observance that empowers girls and amplifies their voices.

New research reveals that while some SADC countries have taken commendable action to strengthen legal protections in this area, other Member States have made little or no progress.

These findings feature in new policy briefs produced by Equality Now in partnership with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Southern African Development Community Parliamentary Forum (SADC PF). Ending Child Marriage In Southern Africa: Gaps And Opportunities In The Legislative Frameworks and Domesticating The SADC Model Law On Child Marriage analyzes laws across the 16 SADC countries and identifies positive legal advances, best practices, and challenges.

A third brief, Ending Child Marriage in Eastern and Southern Africa: Challenges in Implementing Domestic Laws and the SADC Model Law on Child Marriage, examines the implementation of domestic and regional laws on child marriage, focusing on Malawi, Uganda, and Zambia as case studies.

While the SADC Model Law is having a positive impact, its success depends on effective implementation and enforcement by states. To assist governments, the briefs also provide recommendations on strengthening elimination efforts through good application of child marriage laws and policies.

SADC Model Law

Child marriage severely harms girls and exposes them to various human rights violations. It impedes their right to education, as marriage often entails being forced to drop out of school to assume adult responsibilities. This lack of education perpetuates a cycle of poverty, limiting girls’ opportunities for personal development and financial independence.

Early marriages increase the likelihood of early pregnancies, posing significant health risks to girls whose bodies aren’t mature. This can result in complications during pregnancy and childbirth and is associated with higher maternal and infant mortality.

Moreover, child brides are often subjected to domestic violence and marital abuse as they lack the power to assert their rights, and alternative safe spaces are rarely available.

The SADC Model Law defines a child as any person below the age of 18 and recognizes that child marriage violates children’s rights, including the right to education, health, and protection from harm. It calls for prohibiting child marriage, creating prevention and response mechanisms, and promoting birth registration. Other components include supporting child brides and their families and ensuring access to education and healthcare.

The Model Law sets 18 as the minimum age for marriage for both boys and girls without exception and is applicable to all types of marriages – whether under statutory, religious or customary law — with marriages involving a child declared null and void.

To address the complex root causes contributing to child marriage, the Law promotes a comprehensive, multi-sectoral approach based on coordination and collaboration between legal, education, healthcare, and social services sectors.

Inconsistencies and weak implementation of laws

It is important to recognize that some progress in reducing child marriage has been achieved in Eastern and Southern Africa. However, progress is too slow as the prevalence rate has only reduced from 39% to 32% over the past 25 years, while other regions have made much faster progress.

At the current trajectory, it is estimated that child marriage in the region won’t end until 2240.

Concerningly, most progress in Sub-Saharan Africa has occurred amongst the wealthiest families, while in poorer communities, there has been a rise in child marriage. This perpetuates an unacceptable and deeply entrenched divide along socio-economic lines and demonstrates how governments need to focus more on prioritizing elimination of child marriage.

Problems include a lack of adequate resourcing to programs addressing child marriage and a general lack of effective implementation of laws and policies, which feeds into low prioritization of decision-making and lack of action on child marriage.

Out of the 16 countries in Southern Africa, only six countries – DRC, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles, and Zimbabwe – set 18 as the minimum age of marriage for both boys and girls, with no exceptions.

Five countries – Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Madagascar, and Namibia – set the minimum age as 18, but allow exceptions for customary and religious marriages and for marriage with consent from judicial or other government officials.

Statutory law in the remaining five countries – Eswatini, Lesotho, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia – provides for a minimum age ranging between 15 and 18. These are different for boys and girls, with the boys invariably having a higher age limit.

In addition, all five countries allow for judicial or parental consent to lower the age of marriage even further, and in Eswatini and Lesotho, there are exceptions for customary law that permit marriage from the age of puberty.

These domestic laws violate the international and regional human rights standards that SADC countries have signed on to. Deeply entrenched cultural practices, poverty, and limited access to education and sexual and reproductive healthcare are slowing progress and hindering reform efforts.

Such is the case in Tanzania. In 2016, the Tanzanian High Court gave a landmark ruling that struck down sections of the Marriages Act of 1971, which set the marriage age at 18 for boys and 15 for girls, with additional exceptions allowing marriage at 14 with court approval.

Despite the ruling being upheld by the Court of Appeal in 2019, Tanzania’s government has thus far failed to amend the law accordingly.

However, there is encouraging progress elsewhere.

In Zimbabwe, the Constitutional Court ruled in 2016 that child marriage is inconsistent with the Constitution. A new Marriage Act enacted in 2022 prohibits marriage for those under 18 in all cases, including for customary marriages, and allows up to five years imprisonment for offenders.

In addition, the country’s National Action Plan and Communication Strategy to End Child Marriage requires registration of all marriages.

In February 2023, the Constitutional Court of Uganda issued a ground-breaking decision in the case, Kirya Martins & Aboneka Michael v. Attorney General, striking down provisions of customary and religious law, including in Hindu and Muslim family laws, that conflicted with the minimum age of marriage set out in the Constitution.

Prioritizing legal reforms to end child marriage

Contradictory provisions in different laws on child marriage create confusion in the application of the law and the inconsistencies make jurisprudence difficult to interpret and implement. All SADC countries must prioritize legal reform and enact robust legislative and policy frameworks that comply with international and regional human rights obligations. This means setting the minimum age of marriage at 18, without any exceptions.

While legal reform is crucial, governments must close the divide between legal approaches and those aimed at influencing social and community norms. Prosecution and punishment of perpetrators should be accompanied by a multi-sectoral approach with an ample budgetary allocation.

Community awareness-raising is key and requires comprehensive sexuality education and behavior change campaigns that foster understanding about the negative impact of child marriage on girls and the wider society.

So too is the empowerment of girls through education and other opportunities that increase their agency and decrease their vulnerability to human rights violations.

Child marriage prevention must also be fully integrated into climate change mitigation and disaster response strategies. Africa is bearing the brunt of global warming, with extreme weather events, prolonged droughts, and food shortages intensifying economic hardships, conflicts, and forced migration.

Girls are especially vulnerable, as families may view marrying daughters as a strategy to cope with financial difficulties and as a way of protecting them from the heightened risks of sexual violence and exploitation found in unstable environments.

Having the right laws in place is the foundation upon which access to protection and justice is built. But only through a multifaceted approach championed by governments can we create a future where every child and young woman in East and Southern Africa can reach their full potential, free from the shackles of child marriage and early motherhood.

Divya Srinivasan is Global Lead for End Harmful Practices at Equality Now.

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Setting the Record Straight — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Saima Wazed (dhaka, bangladesh)
  • Inter Press Service

DHAKA, Bangladesh, Oct 09 (IPS) – This year, three of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) six regions elect new Regional Directors (RD). The South-East Asia Region (SEARO) is composed of only 11 Member States, yet is home to over a quarter of the world’s population. Two SEARO Member States, Nepal and Bangladesh, have nominated their candidates to contest for RD.

I have the privilege of being Bangladesh’s nominated candidate.

The SEARO RD election has generated a surprising amount of attention and news coverage, and several prominent regional & international publications have published pieces expressing alarm at my candidacy, and doubts about my suitability for the role.

In building their argument these articles rely on damaging biases, and perpetuate harmful stigmas and stereotypes.

The first contention is that because my mother is the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, my nomination must be fuelled by nepotism.

While I accept it is inevitable that there will be greater scrutiny of me due to my mother’s position, what is unfortunate is the erasure of my years of work, study and accomplishments.

Despite being in the public domain, the articles avoid mentioning my work with Chatham House’s Global Health Program or their Commission for Universal Health.

They ignore that I have been an advisor to WHO’s DG on Mental Health & Autism, or that I have been a member of the WHO’s Expert Advisory Panel on Mental Health for almost a decade.

They do not mention that I am Chief Advisor to Bangladesh’s National Mental Health Strategic Plan, or that I was a Technical Expert for Bangladesh’s National Mental Health Act of 2018.

They ignore any of my teaching engagements, and do not inform their readers that the WHO awarded me in 2014 for Excellence in Public Health.

The articles also neglect to mention that I am currently finishing my Doctorate in Education (EdD) in Organisational Leadership. This is a practitioner-doctorate for complex problem solving to improve the performance of organisations and individuals.

As countless women around the world will attest, we are sadly used to differing standards when being compared professionally to men. The overt and intentional erasure of my experience, and the attendant reduction of me to being simply my mother’s daughter, is sexism and must be called out as such.

The articles proceed to cast doubt as to whether my chosen area of study and work – psychology – is a suitable specialisation for one vying for the role of RD.

When I started my career, I knew that a lot of work needed to be done to mainstream matters of mental health. The persistent stigma which dogged mental health was dangerous and damaging, and I set about to try right this. In the context of South Asian cultures, open and honest discussions about mental health were unfortunately taboo. Over many years of hard work, we have been able to change this somewhat – but I acknowledge that there is still much work to be done.

This stigma is what commentators feed in to when they insinuate that other aspects of medical science are preferable over mental health specialists in this election.

The WHO itself reminds us that it “continues to work with its partners to ensure mental health is valued, promoted, and protected,” and that “one in eight people globally are living with mental health conditions.”

Given this reality, it is highly irresponsible of these articles to continue to minimise the work of psychologists and other related specialists.

On behalf of my broader profession I would like to state loudly and unequivocally – mental health specialists are in no way inferior or unsuited for leadership roles in public health. In fact, I contend that it is desirable for one with such a background to have a seat at the leadership table alongside the existing technocrats and bureaucrats in the WHO.

Finally, some of the reporting on the SEARO RD election makes unfounded claims that Bangladesh is waging a political campaign of arm-twisting and coercion to ensure victory for its candidate.

Quite frankly, the lack of faith that these commentators have in the SEARO Member States is appalling. Each Member State has the agency and independence to assess the candidates and make an informed choice. No amount of scaremongering will change that.

Instead of political pieces focusing on individuals, a responsible writer would correctly frame the choice in this election as that of a policy choice between Bangladesh and Nepal’s candidates.

This would lead to a more reasonable consideration about which of these two countries has better public health outcomes, and therefore more likely to make better choices for the public health of the region. I am proud of the many public health successes of my country, and I am proud to be nominated by Bangladesh for Regional Director of WHO SEARO.

The reaction we are seeing in this campaign reaffirms two unfortunate truths. The first is that challenging the status quo in large established global networks and organisations always generates a partisan pushback. The second is that women competing for positions of power in major institutions face opposition laced with a vicious strain of sexism. In this campaign we have a toxic cocktail of both.

But I will not back down. I will continue advocating for the most vulnerable amongst us, I will continue telling my regional neighbours my vision for our shared future, and I will continue fighting for what I think is right.

My message to fear-mongering commentators is simple: do not be afraid of a woman or her experience, do not be afraid of mental health specialists, and trust the Member States to make the best decision for themselves.

Saima Wazed wears multiple hats including being the Chairperson of the National Advisory Committee for Autism and NDDs, Bangladesh, Chairperson of Shuchona Foundation, and Thematic Ambassador for Vulnerability for the Climate Vulnerable Forum. For more information, please visit www.saimawazed.info and www.shuchona.org.

IPS UN Bureau


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Effective International Aid Depends on the Application of Girl-Centered Design — Global Issues

Give girls an opportunity to lead by putting them in the forefront of change efforts; hearing their voices; responding to their asks; and welcoming them in decision-making spaces – it is one of the ways to invest in a future that believes in girls’ agency. International Day of the Girl Child is an annual and internationally recognized observance on October 11 that empowers girls and amplifies their voices. Credit: UNFPA Burkina Faso/Théo
  • Opinion by Amy West, Aysel Madra (washington dc)
  • Inter Press Service

WASHINGTON DC, Oct 09 (IPS) – In a year that is rapidly becoming the costliest on record for climate-related disasters, the International Day of the Girl Child appeals to the global community for greater investments for and with adolescent girls.

https://www.un.org/en/observances/girl-child-day

Mounting evidence continues to show that the wellbeing of our households, our communities, and our world, especially amidst climate change, hinges on how seriously we take this call-to-action for half of the world’s population.

Protecting the rights of girls is key to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. The Coalition for Adolescent Girls believes this prioritization of girls’ rights is all the more urgent among those who live in underserved and traditionally marginalized communities, many of which sit at the crossroads of poverty and climate fragility.

It is estimated that 80 percent of those displaced by climate-related disasters are women and girls. In the wake of cyclones, wildfires, floods, and earthquakes, adolescent girls have an even harder time accessing services and are often forced to forage for basic needs.

A direct correlation exists between natural disaster (climate-related or otherwise), girls’ inequitable access to education, skills training, and health and wellbeing supports, and increased exposure to sexual and gender-based violence.

Credit: UN Women/Ruhani Kaur

Further, the breakdown in family and community, as well as the loss of a key information and knowledge resources – namely, school or other learning centers – exposes girls to exploitative behaviors and multidimensional and intersecting vulnerabilities.

Thus, the notion of disaster preparedness and disaster response must evolve to include girl-centered protection solutions to reduce these increased risks and their ripple effect on larger social and economic development goals.

The recent earthquakes in Turkey, Syria, and Morocco have seen unprecedented levels of devastation, both in terms of human life and the infrastructure necessary for accessing public services and ensuring protection from sexual exploitation, abuse, and violence.

In the southeastern provinces of Turkey alone, 9.1 million people were affected by the earthquake there, 3 million displaced, and nearly 300,000 buildings were destroyed. Among this wreckage, an estimated 320,000 people or more continue to live in temporary shelters.

Initial reports observe that for adolescent girls there has been significant increases in domestic care and responsibilities, domestic abuse, sexual and gender-based violence, and child marriage along with reduced enrollment rates in school.

Committing to Girl-Centered Design

Girl-centered design is one protective and pro-active approach to finding new solutions to the challenges that international humanitarian and development sector practitioners struggle to address at scale.

This process thinks about how spaces, programs, and activities can be developed for and with girls based on child safety protocols and girl-led participation. It is applied to ensure that all girls, especially the most underserved, are recognized and engaged.

In Pazarc?k, and Antakya, Turkey—areas hardest hit by the February earthquake—adolescent girls, and their families, still live in temporary shelters. Several of these girls were asked recently, “if you oversaw international aid, what would you do differently?”

“I would have done something to meet the self-care and clothing needs of the girls here. Then, the girls were cared for, I would send them to school,” said one 14-year-old from Pazarc?k. Adds a 13-year-old from the same area, “There could have been classes. There could have been information for us. There is nothing here.”

Their counterparts in Antakya talk about music, painting, dance, and sports. One 13-year-old says these creative activities would not only occupy girls, but also make them “happy.” One 14-year-old girl states, “I would make girls feel valuable. I would find out what girls are interested in and organize activities to engage them.”

Recent targeted research by Suna’n?n K?zlar? cites that girls spend the majority of their waking hours “pacing” and “waiting,” or else occupied with minding younger siblings or helping their mothers with household chores. Many girls yearn for and remark on the absence of “fun.”

Creating the Spaces for Girls to Occupy

With additional evidence on the intersection of wellbeing with outdoor activities, or the powerful learning and healing that occurs with ensuring girls’ right to play, there is a collective cry for doing better by them. Shelters should be constructed to include safe outdoor spaces for girls to play, strengthen the availability of the kinds of information they need, and provide access to basic services that support healthier prospects for their immediate and future needs.

To date, when such spaces or services are available, they are used predominantly by boys and men.

Adolescent girls inherently understand what it means to be a girl, to feel safe (or not), and to be valued as equals (or not). For the girls in Pazarc?k and Antakya, investing for and with them means not only applying girl-centered design to expand the physical safe and green spaces in which they can learn, play and grow, but also the decision-making spaces where their voices and ideas can be heard and taken seriously.

And while there are some welcome signs in this direction, it is not enough. If prioritized, girl-centered design and girl-led solutions before, during and after disaster may reap the results that have heretofore eluded us.

Amy West is co-lead of the Adolescent Girls and Young Women Initiative and principal international technical advisor at Education Development Center and Aysel Madra is a research coordinator at Suna’n?n K?zlar? (Suna’s Daughters). EDC. They are both active members in the Coalition for Adolescent Girls (CAG), a member-led and-driven organization dedicated to supporting, investing in, and improving the lives of adolescent girls.

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Afghan Women Speak Out About Life and Resistance Two Years After the Taliban Takeover — Global Issues

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell
  • by IPS Correspondent (united nations)
  • Inter Press Service

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 06 (IPS) – The Taliban takeover of Afghanistan on 15 August 2021 has devastated millions of Afghanis. But women and girls have been particularly affected by progressively restrictive decrees that have created a virtual system of gender apartheid.

The stories of more than 50 women living in Afghanistan are featured on the new After August website – a collaboration between UN Women Afghanistan, Zan Times, Limbo, and independent storytellers. These unvarnished stories capture the fear, hardship, and sense of loss that shapes their lives, but also their strength, resistance, and resilience.

A few excerpts:

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“I sold my daughter out of poverty and desperation. I sold her so that the rest of the family wouldn’t starve to death… If I do not receive any aid, I will have to sell another daughter. I have a one-year-old daughter. I will take her to the city and auction her off in front of the Central Mosque. The older girls are sold off for 100,000 Afghani. I will sell my baby daughter for 50,000.” —Belquis, a mother from Ghor

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“Every day, I hugged my two children. I was afraid that the Taliban would take them from me. But consciously, responsibly, and honestly, I went to the streets every day to fight even harder than the day before … The Taliban surrounded us many times and tried to stop us with electric shocks and pepper spray, but we picked up their rifles with our bare hands and continued marching.” —Adela, a teacher and protester from Kabul

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“In the past, I used to share my feelings on social media with my friends, but today the atmosphere of fear and mistrust has deepened so much that I cannot share my pain with my friends. I have never felt so alone. Many times, I have decided to end my life, but I think about the fate of my son.” —Hira, a former public servant from Kunar

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“It is natural that fighting in the current situation also brings risks, but my life is sweeter as a woman who takes risks and has made sacrifices, even if this leads to my isolation and loss of neutrality. Changing society can only happen with our own awareness and efforts. I want a free life, the right to choose clothing, the right to choose a profession, the right to choose a field of study, the right to work.” —Amina, an engineer and activist from Langman

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“Afghanistan has become the graveyard of buried hopes. This past year was one of the most challenging years of all for people living here, particularly for women and girls. They have turned thousands of young people’s hopes and dreams into ashes, especially women and girls, and I am one of them.” —Ghotai, a computer science student from Baghlan

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“When we were children, children would hit animals and dogs with stones and harass them. Now this is the situation for women in my country. Being insulted and humiliated is the biggest change that we women see in our lives.” —Amina, a psychotherapist from Zabul

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“I am standing up for my sisters who have no support and whose men cannot raise their voices because they fear the Taliban. I want to raise the voices of these innocent women to the international community so that it no will longer just monitor and react, but instead act. Act for the benefit of the brave women of my country, because we do not get anything from reaction!” —Fatana, a protester from Nuristan

Echoing the words of Fatana, this collection aims to raise awareness and incite an international audience to reflect and, hopefully, to act.

Note: These first-person accounts have been anonymized, with names and locations changed to protect their identity. The photographs of women have also been randomly matched to stories.

**The views expressed in these stories belong to the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of UN Women and/or any affiliated agencies.
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No, Its Not Just the Poverty Youre Thinking Of — Global Issues

Hyolim Lee and Eunseol Cho, interview Sharon Park at the Songdo Grace Church, Incheon, South Korea.
  • Opinion by Hyolim Kelly Lee – Eunseol Rachel Cho (bangkok & seoul)
  • Inter Press Service

BANGKOK & SEOUL, Oct 05 (IPS) – Four acrylic panels stood like soldiers around the perimeter of my body, bolted upright by the men who installed them, light proudly bouncing off the inherent gloss on those walls as I sat on the toilet.

My backpack, rugged with zippers and the harshness of high school, chafed against the bare skin of my thighs–doughy in comparison. My hands were frantic – searching through every folder and handout and library book hoping for one thing. I could not spend any more time missing out on class. I could not lose the trust of my teacher, who had let me go to the bathroom.

Every second I spent rummaging through a compartment I had already looked at was another second I was wasting—but what other choice did I have? As my fingers foraged for a sanitary pad, the tactile familiarity of the delicate white plastic taped around it all, my breath got sharper and shorter. The enclosure of soldiers seemed to contract in accordance with my lungs, seemingly not wanting to release me until I found one, the walls cramming closer and closer…

Every month, humans, in the ridiculously bureaucratic world we live in, must do a myriad of things to continue living in normalcy.

As daughters living under the authority of adults, both of us (the writers of this editorial) have witnessed our parents get caught up in this whirlwind of paying their rent and going to the supermarket to buy groceries. But when we began the trials and tribulations of puberty, we realized that not only would our parents need to spend their cash on shelter and food every month, but also on menstrual products.

Hyolim Lee and Eunseol Cho interview Sharon Park at the Songdo Grace Church, Incheon, South Korea.
Hyolim Lee and Eunseol Cho participate in a campaign to ensure period dignity, seen here with The Pink Book, a Thai and English book written by a former member of HER Period Dignity ISB to educate girls on puberty and menstruation, and ensuring that free sanitary pads are placed in the ISB High School Bathroom, a result of the project Code Red.
From Scars to Stars, written by Sharon Park, and a pamphlet written by the Grace Academy on display.

And this isn’t a result of bureaucracy or self-indulgence – but rather the fated one of Mother Nature. The worst part is that periods are a biological cycle. So, unlike the other two tasks, purchasing menstrual products cannot be scheduled later. However, not only am I one of many who have experienced an absence of menstrual products, but we have also seen inconveniently high prices and inaccessibility.

“Period poverty results from limited access to menstrual products,” explain Ayaka Bijl, Sarisa (Monie) Sereeyothin, Julia Pugliese, and Kashvi Chauhan in an email interview with IPS about the organization they are officers for – HER Period Dignity. The writers of this piece are also involved in this organization.

The difference I have realized is that my experience is momentary – a product of forgetfulness, and theirs is enduring: a scarcity or a kind of “poverty” caused by financial and social barriers. Yet, in a world where we have found reliable information at our fingertips, and efforts to combat inequality and human rights violations are more shared than ever in our generation, the term and nuances of “period poverty” are still one that remains frustratingly shrouded in obscurity. 

One of the most significant contributors to the fog surrounding period poverty, clouding it just enough for it not to immediately cross the minds of the upper echelon of society, is period stigma. It is a term for the discrimination menstruating people face, in which misleading cultural norms and beliefs regarding menstruation are utilized. While menstruation is a natural bodily process, numerous religious beliefs prompt denigrating misconceptions about period stigma, often assuming it to be unclean and unholy.

These surrounding misinterpretations of periods continue to invigorate feelings of shame and, therefore, avoidance among both rural and urban communities, especially for the girls and women who might even need to talk about it. Even as someone attending a culturally progressive international school, I still had to rely on a desperate tone of voice and the euphemism of simply “really needing” to go to the bathroom to end up there in the first place.

“Generally, we don’t view it as intrinsically negative, but we acknowledge that society indirectly attaches stigma to menstruation, which can shape how our classmates perceive it … it’s not necessarily a common topic,” states the HER Period Dignity club officers at the International School of Bangkok. Women shouldn’t have to rely on the tentative inferences of others to maintain reproductive hygiene. We need to combat period poverty because doing so means fighting period stigma–which would decrease discrimination and vitriol against menstruating people.

The ramifications of period poverty in a young, school-aged girl’s life are glaringly obvious. As someone just starting high school, I cannot help but think about the things I would not have been able to do had I been forced to stay home due to period poverty. With exams just around the corner, I would have been forced to catch up through vague instructions sent to me on a Google Document. Sweating alongside my teammates under the unabashedly fierce Bangkok sun would not have been an option. Instead of being hot on the heels of my passions at school, I would have been forced to sit still. My entire present would have been on pause, and my future questioned. But this is only the experience of someone standing on a pedestal in society.

For those without the economic privilege that I hold, the result of period poverty would have been so aggravated that hope would either be luxury or delusion. The World Bank estimates that broader society and national economies can profit from better menstruation management: with every 1 percent increase in the proportion of women with secondary education, a country’s annual per capita income grows by 0.3 percent.

But for those who “were not able to go to school in the first place due to economic poverty, not period poverty,” according to Sharon Park, who volunteered in Cambodia for the Songdo Grace Church, their potential would never be fulfilled. The future of the local Thai girls living in the slums next to our school would not be a question; it would be an answer to the generational poverty in their family: inheritance.

Nonetheless, something is more immediately destructive to the young schoolgirls currently experiencing this. Though I was lucky to find a new pad at the bottom of my backpack, for others, health issues are bound to occur when dirty rags and leaves become the new pads and tampons without proper menstrual products. Urinary tract infections and thrush can escalate to life-threatening degrees when left untouched, and continued use of such substitutions could hinder reproductive ability—rendering a woman “useless.”

As someone who faces enough anxiety at school regarding the leakage of period blood, I cannot imagine what these girls are going through without the safety net of a pad or tampon. The issue impacts mental health, too, with a Kenyan school girl committing suicide after facing humiliation in the classroom due to the lack of a pad. These are not isolated cases, with even 68.1 percent of U.S. college students who underwent period poverty monthly reporting symptoms consistent with moderate or severe depression. Period poverty is suppressive and life-threatening in every aspect for young female students.

The 50th Ms. Korea candidate, Park, has helped girls who are beginning menstruation.  She has established an association that aids lower-income women in South Korea by establishing the HER Period Dignity Club. The club is constantly finding ways to ameliorate the issue in Thailand through fundraisers, education, and collaboration with other NGOs.

Bijl explains why the club is crucial at her school. “Although our club’s primary focus is on period poverty, we also prioritize the normalization of period stigma.”

In a personal email exchange, the NGO-based club explains the process behind one of its most significant projects.

“We started by meeting the CFO of ISB and the Dean of Students and presented our idea through a formal proposal that detailed the way we would satisfy the needs of our community,” installing free pads in all the female high school and eventually middle school bathrooms. We chose the name ‘Code Red’ to evoke the sensation of surprise associated with experiencing your period unexpectedly,” say the leaders.

As an extension of this, they “went to speak in middle and elementary school classrooms about menstruation from a destigmatizing perspective.”

The club at the International School of Bangkok was first established after having “the opportunity to meet Pear (Manyasiri Chotbunwong), who leads the HER Period Dignity NGO,” at a service conference. Hearing about Pear’s
proactive efforts to address this issue motivated us to actively participate in her mission. Pear founded HER (Health. Equity. Respect.).

The NGO also provides “reusable pads help individuals break free from the constant need to buy new ones, improving access to menstrual products,” says Bijl.

The ISB club can be found sharing awareness on Instagram (@herperioddignity.isb), and the HER Period Dignity NGO can be found as well (@herperioddignity).

From my mother to your daughter and her friends, from the waitress at a restaurant you are ordering at to the beautiful model posing in an advertisement at the bus stop, every menstruator deserves period products. We, the authors of this editorial, are members of a generation pushing for radical change in the overarching matters of our lives. This includes acting upon the philosophy above in this paragraph. The Code Red initiative has helped me breathe in the bathroom, knowing there was always a collection of pads in a basket next to the sink I could rely on.

“We hope that from here, it only continues to improve,” Bijl.

Everyone deserves that continued normalcy in the beautiful yet chaotic world that we live in—which includes life with minimal hindrance from periods. In the future, Eunseol and I aim to further clear the fog of obscurity around the issue at school.  As Park stated, “Change begins with the people, when we are aware.”

Note: Edited by Hanna Yoon

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Teachers For Change! — Global Issues

Credit: Education Cannot Wait
  • Opinion by Heike Kuhn (bonn, germany)
  • Inter Press Service

BONN, Germany, Oct 04 (IPS) – Once a year, on October 5, we celebrate World Teachers’ Day. Why is it so important to have a closer look on the teaching profession? What is so special about being a teacher nowadays?

World Teachers’ Day is an international day which was established to attract public attention on the work of teachers. The day was established in 1994, in commemora-tion the signing of the “ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers” in 1966, which focused on “appreciating, assessing and improving the ed-ucators of the world” and on providing a global opportunity to consider issues related to teachers and teaching (see Wikipedia, The Free Encycopledia, World Teachers’ Day).

With benchmarks regarding teacher’s rights and responsibilities, standards for their preparation when starting the profession as well as their ongoing training and em-ployment their profession got international attention. This is due to the fact that teaching and learning conditions are most important for the development of pupils and students everywhere.

Dr. Heike KuhnEducation is also at the heart of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with a stand-alone goal: SDG 4 demands inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning opportunities for all. With a special target, SDG focuses on teachers, stating that by 2030, there is a need to substantially increase the supply of qualified teachers, including through international cooperation for teacher training in develop-ing countries, especially least developed countries and small island developing states (SDG 4c). The 2030 Agenda was signed in 2015 in New York, but was has happened up to now in order to reach this goal?

Special attention was given to teachers during the UN Transforming Education Summit on September 19, 2022, with relevant recommendations stating that teaching should be an attractive and recognised profession, taking into account that teachers need autonomy, decent working conditions, support and lifelong learning opportunities.

However, a year later, reality is quite disillusioning as we can see from the theme for World Teachers’ Day 2023: “The teachers we need for the education we want: The global imperative to reverse the teacher shortage”.

How come that this profession has suffered from attrition? For decades, the educa-tion sector has been chronically underfunded. Already in 2016, data analysis from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) estimated that in order to meet the targets of the SDGs by 2030, nearly 69 million more teachers were needed. Most recent estimates by UNESCO and the Teacher Task Force (TTF) confirm this number today, revealing that in sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia alone, an additional 24 million teachers are required.

So what are the root causes and what should be done? Starting with the most im-portant reasons: The COVID 19 pandemic and its long school closures have even worsened an already dire situation. Becoming a teacher is simply no longer attrac-tive: teaching many pupils, put together in crowded classes in not adequately main-tained buildings and not being reasonably paid for the often exhaustive pedagogic work does not come along with incentives for this ambitious profession.

Credit: Education Cannot Wait

Disillusioned by these working conditions, teachers leave their countries for better paid teaching jobs in other regions (e.g. Caribbean teachers move to the US) or – even worse – quit being teachers in order to pursue other jobs.

With children dropping out of schools due to wars, conflicts or the ongoing climate crisis, teachers face new challenges all the time, their mental health is as endan-gered as the mental health of their pupils. And how can a child traumatized by war and escape, living in overcrowded refugee camps concentrate on school subjects? And what a challenge for teachers who might have made similar experiences but nonetheless try to convey hope and structure as well as a bit or normal life to the children in their lessons.

So what is teaching all about? It is about learning and changing your mind-set. Teachers can empower children of all sexes, can open perspectives for lives and therefore ignite change in millions of young pupils. Female teachers are often role models for girls, conveying self-esteem, questioning harmful gender norms. Teachers can educate green skills needed so much nowadays when we are taking the first steps, sometimes stumbling on our way to a green economy, no longer exploiting our planet.

Let me ask you: Do you remember when a teacher empowered you, believing in you? Hopefully you do and hopefully you could experience the power and the impact on your life.

This is exactly why we need qualified teachers so urgently, everywhere. Education is a human right that shall no longer be a privilege for few people, but an opportunity for all – including the possibilities of digitization and AI. All children and learners deserve it. And we need teachers to inspire all human beings, letting them thrive in order to restore and save the planet.

In my country, Germany, there is a saying: A teacher is much more important than two books. I firmly believe this is true.

Dr. Heike Kuhn is Head of Division, Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Bonn, Germany
Co-Chair of the Teacher Task Force (with South Africa), https://teachertaskforce.org/
Co-Chair of the Executive Committee of ECW (with Norway), https://educationcannotwait.org/

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UNs High-Level Appointments Should be on Gender Rotation, not Geographical Rotation — Global Issues

  • by Thalif Deen (united nations)
  • Inter Press Service

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 04 (IPS) – The UN’s high-level appointments have mostly been on the basis of “equitable geographical rotation”—with Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, Western Europe and Latin America and the Caribbean taking turns.

But a proposal for future appointments and for candidates for elective office-– based on gender rotation—is gaining ground against a world body which is mostly male-oriented even at its highest echelons, with nine all-male Secretaries-General (UNSG) and only 4 women out of 78 presidents of the General Assembly.

In an interview with IPS, Natalie Samarasinghe, Global Director for Advocacy, Open Society Foundations and co-founder of the 1-for-7 Billion campaign “for a more open and inclusive UNSG selection process”, said so-called temporary special measures have proven successful in transforming the landscape for women across sectors, from national politics to company boards and senior UN positions.

But these measures can only go so far, as it is governments who nominate and appoint candidates to posts such as the Secretary-General (SG), President of the General Assembly (PGA) and heads of multiple UN agencies.

She pointed out that decades have shown that warm words aren’t enough. As the Group of Women Leaders has shown, 13 international organizations have never had a female leader, including the United Nations, International Labour Organization and the World Bank.

A further five have only had one, including the UN Refugee Agency and UN Development Programme. And of the 78 presidents of the General Assembly, only four have been women.

“Gender rotation of the GA presidency is not a complex reform: it would require only a simple resolution and mean that states would have to put forward qualified female candidates (of which there are plenty) at least every other year, instead of just talking about it. This is something that could be considered for other senior positions too,” she said.

For the appointment of the Secretary-General, she said, it seems states are finally waking up. In 2021, the GA noted for the first time that “there is yet to be a woman Secretary-General” and invited states “to bear this in mind in the future, when nominating candidates”.

But even this tame language provoked pushback, especially from the five permanent members (P5) of the Security Council. While the focus was on objections by Russia, UN watchers have noted that all permanent members worked to undermine the language on gender, albeit with more sophisticated arguments, she noted

“During the last SG selection process, I deliberately called for the “best possible person” to be appointed, noting how many women would more than fit the bill. That was because saying it had to be a woman sat uneasily with disrupting regional pre-emption”.

“Today, when the normative functions of the UN may well be its strongest, and most needed, I have no qualms in calling for Madam Secretary-General,” Samarasinghe declared.

Susana Malcorra, President, Global Women Leaders (GWL), told IPS “GWL Voices is actively advocating for better gender representation in all organizations of the System, both in the institutions and in their governing bodies.”

“Our Flagship Report: Numbers Matter, launched in March, shows how under-represented women have been in the history of the 33 multilateral organizations”.

“After that, we have launched two campaigns: “Mme. Secretary-General” (to ensure that a woman succeeds Antonio Guterres) and #GenderAlternationUNPGA. We have launched the latter through this OpEd that I authored in Devex”.

Some Presidents, at the request of GWL Voices, Malcorra said, raised these questions in their statements at the High Level week in September:

President of Slovenia: https://x.com/mfespinosaEC/status/1704318856909426781?s=20

President of Spain: https://x.com/GWLvoices/status/1704649522192724357?s=20

President of Botswarna: https://x.com/GWLvoices/status/1704646411390783751?s=20

Joseph Chamie, a consulting demographer and a former director of the United Nations Population Division, told IPS: First, it is unfortunately the case that Goal 5 of the SDGs to achieve gender equality and empower women and girls by 2030 is unlikely to be met.

Second, given that the United Nations has the long-standing tradition for geographical and regional rotations on most senior appointments and elections, it seems both reasonable and desirable to be guided by gender rotations for each region.

Third, if gender rotations are adopted as a guideline by the United Nations for appointments and elections, including the Security Council, the rotations need to be applied for each and every major region, said Chamie who has worked in various regions of the world and is the author of numerous publications on population issues, including his recent book, “Population Levels, Trends, and Differentials“

Finally, while gender rotation by region for UN appointments and elections would be desirable, clearly much more needs to be done, especially by some countries, to achieve gender equality and empower women and girls.

“Countries blatantly denying women and girls their basic human rights should be highlighted and strongly encouraged to end their discriminatory policies”, declared Chamie.

Antonia Kirkland, Global Lead on Legal Equality & Access to Justice at Equality Now, told IPS the majority of countries are failing to meet Sustainable Development Goal 5 – achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls – and 54% have no laws on key issues of gender equality, such as marriage and divorce rights.

For example, only 14 countries, just .07%, have full legal equality between men and women, she pointed out.

“Sexual harassment and sexual exploitation by UN staff within and outside the UN still persists, with cases going unreported for fear of retaliation and stigma. And while parity has been achieved within the senior management level of the UN, it has not yet been reached within the executive heads of UN agencies nor the general staff ranks.

“In addition to further strengthening policy and legal frameworks within the UN around the world, a feminist woman Secretary-General is needed to lead and encourage a culture of equality and inclusivity based on fundamental human rights standards.

“Beyond reaffirming previous resolutions referring to “gender balance.” and strongly encouraging member states to bear in mind there have only been male Secretary-Generals – as the General Assembly did in a September resolution – the UN should fully endorse a gender rotation, or gender alternation as GWL Voices and others are calling for.

“Building on previous campaigns for a woman Secretary-General, UNA-UK, a co-founder of the 1-for-8 Billion (formerly the 1-for-7 Billion) campaign has clearly called on UN Member States to consider only nominating women candidates and undertake other important reforms to make the selection process as transparent and inclusive as possible.”

While gender equality is everyone’s responsibility, Kirkland said, representation is important because women have been excluded from decision-making roles for far too long.

“However, it is important to be represented by women who are progressive, feminist, and work for substantive gender equality for everyone, everywhere, including further marginalized communities.”

Meanwhile, the notion of geographic distribution remains firmly embedded in the UN system, according to civil society organizations (CSOs).

When it comes to state representation in bodies such as ECOSOC or the Human Rights Council, it is sacrosanct, baked into the Charter, resolutions and rules of procedure.

When it comes to staff appointments, it is a matter of principle and reflected in several resolutions and processes (e.g. A/41/206 which affirms “the principle of equitable geographic distribution, and the need for rotation in the composition of the upper echelons of the secretariat”)

The idea of ‘rotation’ between regions is handled differently depending on the post. For the President of the General Assembly, rotation through the regional groups is stipulated (GA rules of procedure, rule 30). That has been followed since 1966.

For the Secretary-General, the idea gathered steam after Waldheim – the third, and not particularly effective, postholder from WEOG, and again when Boutros-Ghali was not appointed to a second term (African diplomats argued that their region had ‘lost out’).

In 2015, Eastern European countries fielded a number of candidates, with the region saying that it had never occupied the post and some were resentful of the push that year – within the UN and outside through the 1-for-7 Billion campaign (now 1-for-8 Billion: https://1for8billion.org/) – for the emphasis to be on merit first.

But in practice every appointment process has featured candidates from different regions, and the postholder is not, of course, supposed to represent any one region.

For several other senior appointments, the big issue is not so much rotation but breaking the stranglehold that particular states have on these posts.

Between 1995 and 2022, just five states – the permanent members of the Security Council – were appointed to over 20% of senior posts (https://cic.nyu.edu/data/un-senior-appointments-dashboard/)

Despite the GA’s position that no national of a state should succeed another national of that state (e.g. GA resolution 46/232), certain nationalities dominate posts such as DPO, OCHA, DPPA, DESA etc.

The last non-French person appointed to head UN peace operations was Kofi Annan in 1993. OCHA has been headed by Brits for 16 years.

On gender, several references refer to the need for equal and fair distribution based on gender as well as geographic balance (e.g. GA res 69/321). There is no reference to rotation, nor has this principle been applied in practice.

There has been progress on gender parity on other senior posts (USGs, heads and deputy heads of peace operations and resident coordinators).

This has been the result of a concerted effort: a clear vision championed at the highest levels and translated into a systemwide strategy with targets and so-called ‘temporary special measures’ (e.g. parity on shortlists, or an explanation as to why this was not possible)

Currently, the UN has five regional groups – the Asia-Pacific states, the African states, the East European States (even though Eastern Europe has ceased to exist after the end of the Cold War), the Latin American and Caribbean states and the Western European and Other States (includes Australia and New Zealand).

The US does not belong to any regional groups but is designated as an “observer” in the Western European and Other States Group.

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Pronatalism on the Rise to Counter Growing Push for Gender Equality — Global Issues

This 14-year-old Ugandan girl was forced into marriage by her parents at 8 years old. Credit: UNICEF/Stuart Tibaweswa
  • Opinion by Nandita Bajaj (st paul, minnesota, usa)
  • Inter Press Service

ST PAUL, Minnesota, USA, Oct 04 (IPS) – There’s an insidious new tactic emerging for selling right-wing ideology to wider audiences, evident in last month’s Budapest Demographic Summit for “family-friendly thinkers and decision-makers,” the upcoming pro-birth Natal conference in Austin, Texas, and the recent film “Birthgap.”

According to the United Nations, at least 12 million girls are married before they reach the age of 18 every year, and more than 650 million women alive today were married as children. Around 257 million women globally face unintended pregnancies due to lack of access to contraception, abortion care, and counseling.

They all peddle pronatalism, a set of norms and policies that exhorts and often coerces women to have more children to raise fertility rates, often coupled with alarmism over alleged “population collapse.”

Pronatalism is on the rise to counter the growing push for gender equality, contraceptive access, and women’s educational and economic empowerment. It is connected to totalitarian policies dictating reproductive choices, the racist Great Replacement conspiracy theory, the religious anti-abortion movement, tech elite futurism.

Elon Musk, for example, is an avowed pronatalist who donated $10 million to population collapse “research” and liked the idea of denying voting rights to childless people. He wanted to attend the Budapest summit, but couldn’t make it so he met last week in Texas with Hungary’s President Novák instead to draw attention to the “demographic crisis.”

Lately, pronatalists are trying to pull a more appealing game face. The Budapest Summit says it wants to support the “psychological health and security of families,” so they can “plan for a secure future.” The Natal conference claims it “has no political or ideological goal other than a world in which our children can have grandchildren.”

The “Birthgap” film purports to help cure an epidemic of “unplanned childlessness” and proposes “re-engineer our societies to reduce many more people would go on to have…children just like parents naturally do.” It conducts tearful interviews with regretful women who lament that their natural drive to have children was thwarted by society, and now it’s too late.

Who could object to standing up for families’ health and security, and for the right of people who want children to have them? Yet behind this innocuous-seeming family-friendly rhetoric lurk unsavory connections to right-wing propaganda, manipulation, and straight-up lies.

The Budapest summit touts Hungary’s achievement of the “highest rates of marriage and childbearing in Europe, while divorce and abortion rates are falling,” a nice way of saying that its right-wing populist leader Viktor Orbán adopted and implemented the Great Replacement ideology, which motivated mass-shooters in the U.S., as state policy. “We do not need numbers, but Hungarian children,” he said. “In our minds, immigration means surrender.”

The Natal conference has demonstrable links to far-right eugenicists and racists. “Birthgap” filmmaker Stephen Shaw is feted by right-wing talk show hosts like Jordan Peterson, Neil Oliver, and Chris Williamson, and presented as a “renowned demographer” despite having no credentials in demography. Shaw and Peterson both gave keynotes at the Budapest summit.

But ad hominem objections to the people behind the conferences and the film aside, the assertions they make are discreditable and counterfactual. Decrying imminent “population collapse” while the global population grows by 80 million each year and is projected to hit 10.4 billion in the 2080s is absurd.

To make depopulation seem like a threat, “Birthgap” resorts to lying about data on the reasons for declining birth rates. It cites a 2010 study (which it calls a “meta-analysis”) by Prof. Renska Keizer which the film says indicates that just 10% of women chose not to have children and 10% can’t have them for medical reasons, which “leaves a whopping 80% of women without children childless by circumstance” as opposed to by choice.

But that’s not at all what Keizer’s research says. The 2010 study Birthgap cites is not a meta-analysis, not quantitative, and does not indicate 80% of childless women didn’t choose to be so. In fact a 2011 study by Keizer et al. analyzed a 2006 dataset surveying women in the Netherlands who were childless at age 45, and found that 55% of them were childless voluntarily, while 45% were childless due to medical or other reasons.

Other studies found similar results: 56% of those without children were voluntarily childless according to a 2021 Pew Research Center survey, 72% according to the CDC National Survey of Family Growth, and 74% according to a 2022 Michigan State University study. Researchers working on my organization’s fact-checking project Birthgap Facts found no credible data supporting the film’s claim that 80% of childless women were “childless by circumstance” as opposed to by choice.

What the data does show is that women exercising their right to choose if and when to have children results in delaying childbirth, smaller families, and a decline in teen pregnancy. Those outcomes are beneficial and should be celebrated, not stigmatized.

According to the United Nations, at least 12 million girls are married before they reach the age of 18 every year, and more than 650 million women alive today were married as children. Around 257 million women globally face unintended pregnancies due to lack of access to contraception, abortion care, and counseling.

At current levels of consumption, today’s population of eight billion is driving resource depletion, soil erosion, water shortages, species extinctions, and climate catastrophe. Over a billion children are already at “extremely high risk” from climate change.

High fertility rates and population growth undermine climate resilience and complicate efforts to end poverty and hunger and ensure basic services and infrastructure.

These are the real threats to the future, not some imagined conspiracy to stigmatize reproductive choices and hold fertility rates down. They make Shaw’s proposal of “social engineering” to reverse the imaginary threat of depopulation all the more reprehensible.

By distorting and lying about childlessness, he’s trying to manipulate young people and their governments into prioritizing procreation over education and career. This purports to avoid a dystopian future, yet it would actually usher one in.

Rather than manufacturing a crisis whose remedy entails “social engineering” to roll back progress on human rights and women’s control over their own lives, we should focus on the real crisis fueled by pronatalist pressures from family, religion, and governments that force millions into motherhood against their wishes, often by means of coercion and sexual violence.

The rhetoric of the Budapest summit, Natal, “Birthgap” and their ilk claiming they’re simply trying to help families and alleviate the heartbreak of “unplanned childlessness” is insidious, and we should recognize and call it out for what it is: another arrow in the pronatalist quiver, another weapon wielded against hard-fought gains in gender equality and reproductive autonomy.

Nandita Bajaj is the Executive Director of the NGO Population Balance and an adjunct lecturer at the Institute for Humane Education at Antioch University. Her research and advocacy work focuses on the combined impacts of pronatalism and human expansionism on reproductive, ecological, and intergenerational justice.

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