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What Kind of Equality?

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What Kind of Equality? What kind of State? What kind of equality? Secretaria de Políticas para as Mulheres Alicia Bárcena Executive Secretary Antonio Prado Deputy Executive Secretary Sonia Montaño Chief Division for Gender Affairs Susana Malchik Officer-in-Charge Documents and Publications Division This document was prepared under the supervision of Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), for presentation at the eleventh session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean (Brasilia, 13-16 July 2010). Work on this document was coordinated by Sonia Montaño, Officer in Charge of the Division for Gender Affairs of ECLAC, with assistance from Coral Calderón. Particular thanks are owed to Diane Alméras, Natalia Gherardi, Ana Cristina González, Nathalie Lamaute-Brisson, Vivian Milosavljevic, Laura Pautassi, Patricia Provoste and Corina Rodríguez for their substantive contributions. Jimena Arias, Halima-Sa’adia Kassim, Denisse Lazo, Paola Meschi, Paulina Pavez, Carolina Peyrin, María de la Luz Ramírez, Sylvan Roberts, Mariana Sanz, Sheila Stuart and Alejandra Valdés also participated in the preparation and discussion of the document. The authors would also like to express their gratitude to Antonio Prado, Deputy Executive Secretary of ECLAC, for his valuable comments. The document incorporates valuable contributions from ministers and authorities of machineries for the advancement of women in Latin America and the Caribbean, who defined its contents at the forty-third meeting of the Presiding Officers of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean (Port of Spain, 7 and 8 July 2009). They also sent materials and information for the preparation of the document and enriched its final version with comments and debates offered in two virtual forums. The report includes the progress achieved by the Gender Equality Observatory for Latin America and the Caribbean and gives an account of the work carried out during its first two years of operation, with an emphasis on women’s economic autonomy. Financial contributions were gratefully received from the Spanish International Cooperation Agency for Development (AECID) and the Ibero- American Secretariat (SEGIB), and technical and financial contributions from the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). LC/G.2450/Rev.1 • December 2010 • 2010-948 © United Nations What kind of State? What kind of equality? Contents 3 Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean 4 What kind of State? What kind of equality? 5 What kind of State? What kind of equality? Foreword The eleventh session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean was held in 2010, a symbolic year for the participation of women at the highest levels of decision-making. This year, three women in the region have been elected to shape the destiny of their countries: Laura Chinchilla in Costa Rica, Kamla Persad-Bissessar in Trinidad and Tobago and Dilma Rousseff in Brazil. In the last five years, six women have been elected heads of State or government. When Rousseff, the last of those elected, takes office, 42% of the population of Latin America will be governed by women. Against this backdrop, the Economic Commission for and which was presented to the Governments of the Latin America and the Caribbean presented What kind region by ECLAC (2010a) at its thirty-third session (the of State? What kind of equality? at the eleventh session of most important intergovernmental authority for guiding the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the work of the Commission). the Caribbean, held from 13 to 16 July 2010 in Brasilia. What kind of State? What kind of equality? takes a The question as to the role of the State is being asked at detailed look at women’s work, which goes hand in hand a time when a path towards gender equality is in sight. with several issues that influence and govern their lives. However, at the same time, Governments in the region First, it is important to highlight that there are two sides have yet to address the many obstacles to equality in order to women’s work: paid work and unpaid work, especially to continue moving towards that path and, as a result domestic and care work. For women to be on an equal of the recent crisis, the capacity of States to overcome footing with men with regard to paid work in society, a way gender equality in all its forms is under debate.1 This to lighten the unpaid workload that women shoulder has to document is in keeping with Time for equality: closing be found. In order to achieve equality, women also need gaps, opening trails, which places equality at the heart of to participate fully in the political life of their countries, the development paradigm for the countries of the region indeed, at all levels of decision-making, and to lead lives free from violence where their bodies are respected and 1 The main progress made in terms of gender equality since the Quito they can decide freely on matters of reproduction. Consensus includes the increased importance of gender issues in The three dimensions —economic autonomy, the public agenda, recognition of the importance of eliminating gender-based violence and the creation of the Gender Equality autonomy in decision-making and physical autonomy Observatory for Latin America and the Caribbean in accordance —put forward by the Gender Equality Observatory for with the request of the member countries of ECLAC under the third point of the Quito Consensus. 7 Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean Latin America and the Caribbean2 feature throughout men, and women spend a larger share of their time on this document in the analysis of the State’s role in unpaid work than men.3 development based on equality. The document focuses The reports on compliance with the Quito on how these three areas should be addressed to achieve Consensus (2007) submitted by countries to ECLAC gender equality in terms of workload. provide an account of the progress made towards parity The foremost proposal to emerge from this analysis and the recognition of unpaid work. Some countries have is the forging of a new social and fiscal covenant for the recognized unpaid work, including at the constitutional redistribution of total work between men and women, level, and have promoted its inclusion in the national including the adoption of all the necessary measures by accounts. Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru and the the State, whether legislative, institutional, educational, Plurinational State of Bolivia recognize unpaid work to health-related, fiscal or relating to women’s participation varying degrees in accordance with agrees xiv of the in decision-making, in order to remove gender biases Quito Consensus. from the labour market and eliminate the wage gap, Women’s entry into the labour market has occurred segmentation and discrimination. In order that men against the backdrop of demographic changes (lower and women might share rights and responsibilities in birth rates, population ageing), insufficient State- public and private life, the State, the market and families provided care services for children, older persons must take on new care roles, which shall involve joint and sick persons, the high cost of market-based care responsibility for men and women, the implementation services and more limited availability of social and of new types of services and new ways of organizing family care networks. daily life and public and private agencies, which must Rural areas, where much less progress has been be guided by public policy. made, present a major challenge for development policies Public policies on gender, which by definition and the State. The percentage of women with absolutely require democratic States with the capacity to steer no income of their own was 32% in 2008, while only action, have run against the grain of macroeconomic 10% of men are in this situation. policies which in the past two decades have tended to A second challenge involves improving the reduce the role of the State and deregulate financial conditions of women who are engaged in paid work, but and labour markets and have treated social policies as in precarious conditions, with horizontal and vertical a means of offsetting the exclusionary dynamics arising segmentation, with a marked wage gap, in flexible and from the practical application of that paradigm. As a informal occupations, such as part-time jobs (28% of result, although women’s rights are recognized in law, employed women work part time, compared with 16% the institutional structure the State needs to enforce of employed men) or jobs that enable them to work them is weakened and the objectives of equality are from home, in which they are usually subjected to often subordinated to the objectives of growth. subcontracting chains, and without social protection. The question as to the kind of State and the kind Because of the lack of job opportunities, hence of of equality that gender equality entails is answered by income, they cannot afford the care services that might proposing new ways to articulate the State, the market enable them to reconcile work and family life, which and the family, ways that favour democratic forms and makes their situation very complex. contents within the institutions they form in order to In the area of human rights, progress has been attain real equality between male and female citizens. made in adopting egalitarian constitutional and legal The spirit of the document may thus be summed up as frameworks. Some countries have moved forward with the idea of equality in the country and at home.
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