Follow S/GWI on Facebook and Twitter.About the Author: Ruth Bennett serves as the Public Affairs Advisor for the Secretary's Office of Global Women's Issues (S/GWI).
Like many offices in the State Department, we use the last two weeks of the year to review where we've been and map out where we're heading. This year, it's an easy assessment to make. January 2009, we didn't exist. December 2009, so many people are talking -- and, yes, sometimes arguing, but at least talking about and carefully thinking over -- women's role in foreign policy.
Here are just a few of our highlights:
• April 3, 2009: S/GWI is created, and Melanne Verveer is confirmed as Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues.
• May 13, 2009: Amb. Verveer testifies before the U.S. Senate Subcommittees on African Affairs and Human Rights, Democracy and Global Women's Issues about rape and sexual violence in conflict zones.
• October 1, 2009: Amb. Verveer testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the global costs and consequences of violence against women.
• October 21, 2009: Amb. Verveer testifies before the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights and Oversight about the incidence of violence against women, and about possible solutions.
Ambassador Verveer also traveled to most regions of the world and met with women from all walks of life and spoke with their governments about the barriers that still remain to women's equality. Among many other places, these travels took her to Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and India. We saw major media take up the cause of women's empowerment. Soon we'll be launching a Women's Leadership Fund to channel public/private partnership money to the places where it's most urgently needed. And did we mention that you can track all these developments on our website as well as Facebook and Twitter?
We're happy with this start, but, really, we're focused on what comes next.
Next September marks the 15th anniversary of the Beijing Fourth World Conference on Women -- the venue at which, in 1995, then-First Lady Clinton famously declared that “…human rights are women's rights...And women's rights are human rights, for once and for all."
The Platform for Action that 189 countries agreed to at that conference in 1995 -- the "Beijing Agenda” -- outlined 12 areas in which action was critically needed to achieve women's economic, political, and social equality. We've made progress on many of those issues, which ranged from women's equal access to education, healthcare, jobs, and credit, to freedom from gender-based violence, and more, but the Beijing Agenda remains, clearly, an unfinished one.
As S/GWI looks ahead to 2010, we're putting at the top of our action list all these remaining challenges to women's equality. We're also going to focus on two fundamental issues in particular: promoting women's economic opportunities (from which other rights and freedoms often follow), and working to ensure that women around the world are safe from gender-based violence (without which safety other rights and freedoms are often impossible).
It's a tall order. But the sense of momentum -- from within government, from the private sector, from all of you -- is undeniable, and we're looking forward to reporting back to you our activities and our progress over the next few months. Happy holidays and happy new year to everyone!
Comments
Comments
Jack in Virginia writes:
Ms. Bennett,
Thanks for your posting. I wonder if you could comment on the treatment of women in Middle Eastern countries (like Saudi Arabia, Yemen, etc.) and the fact that the United States provides financial and military support to these countries.
I'm not blind to the realities of our national security and foreign policy, but it seems that there is a disconnect. It's easy for your office to scold the government in Conakry for the systematic rape of women by the Guinean military, but what about lashings, forced marriages, rapes, and despicable treatment of women in the countries that receive our financial assistance.
In 2010, how will your office encourage countries like Saudi Arabia and Yemen to move away from the draconian treatment of women?
Look forward to hearing from you.
Jack
Susan C. in Florida writes:
I absolutely agree with Jack in VA. Recently I read about the number of women in Afghanistan who are committing suicide by setting themselves on fire. They would rather do this than be forced into an arranged marriage as a child, or they do it to get out of an extremely abusive marriage that they have endured for many years. Some of the women/girls are as young as eleven when they do this. What a horror. We must speak up. If these countries want our money, our business, our help, than we should ask something of them. These kind of "women issues" should be addressed.
Joe in Tennessee writes:
It is interesting how all societies which are Old Testament based have deliberately ignored Lilith, Adams first wife because she was created to be equal with Adam and he just could not deal with that…umm, does make you wonder why it is not taught in Bible Studies. Perhaps, it is because there would have to be an explanation for the man being fifty one percent.
In the Middle East there is the added burden of how Lilith was demonized.
A basic interesting read if you are not aware that Adam had two wives created by God. One wanted to be equal, one became equal in effect and both demonized.
Human rights and dignity should be assured regardless of any belief system predicated on mythology or tainted religious belief patterns.
On a fair note: Most laws are premised on protectionism of certain social moirés and structures which are felt more beneficial to the society that is being protected by those laws. It has taken the best democracy in the world a very long time to correct many of them.
The control element of Religion vs. Law is the actual question and fighting ground. When one is proven incorrect, should it not be changed? Does Tradition supersede human rights?
DipNote Blogger Ruth Bennett writes:
Jack,
Thanks for taking the time to make your comments. Although we engage in various ways with the countries you named, not all are recipients of U.S. foreign assistance. And we do engage with them precisely because doing so is the best (some might say the only) way that we have for changing attitudes and behaviors within sovereign countries.
Our view is that many of the abuses that women face in other nations – abuses you correctly identify – are the consequence of poverty, illiteracy, and cultural isolation. Through USAID and the Middle East Partnership Initiative, sponsored by the Department of State, as well as through other offices and bureaus, our assistance efforts in the Near East and North Africa focus on addressing these root causes through the promotion of micro-enterprise and development programs, educational assistance, and gender-based programs including maternal and child health initiatives, as well as initiatives to strengthen the rule of law. And our diplomats, both in-country and in Washington, work directly with foreign governments to encourage them to review and address their human rights practices, including on women’s issues. It’s a long road to recognizable change, but we believe that trying to externally impose practices and ideas is both undesirable and ineffective. Supporting change that’s already occurring within countries is a more authentic, stable, and longer-lasting route to women’s equality.
Best regards,
Ruth
Palgye in South Korea writes:
Until November, thinks that must cooperate unconditionally.