Women’s Rights and the New Administration

Women represent half of the world’s population and, as such, they have the potential to unlock its full human potential. Only when they have access to their own rights – from equal pay and property ownership to freedom from violence, maternal health, and education – will societies be transformed. Those are the goals of Goal 5, to “achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls,” which is a stand-alone, explicit, global target within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

This year, the 68th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) meets in New York City to take stock and set new priorities to advance the goals of Goal 5. Among other things, it should focus on how governments can remove laws that discriminate against women, including laws that restrict their economic participation. In the richest countries, for example, women earn only 77 cents for every dollar that men earn. Closing this gap would boost global GDP by over 20%.

But the progress made over decades has been uneven. While a record 143 countries now have gender-neutral laws in their constitutions, stark gaps persist in the labor market and in politics. Women remain underrepresented in parliaments. And sex-discriminatory laws, such as the ones that stipulate women must obey their husbands or male guardians, keep them in poverty and make them vulnerable to domestic abuse.

These laws also limit women’s rights to their own incomes, assets and inheritance. In 77 countries, for example, wives and daughters cannot inherit equally or at all. The sex-based discrimination in family law and property rights keeps women from accessing their full potential to build wealth, invest in themselves, and contribute to society and economies.

Those who believe in the value of women’s rights are fighting back against this rollback. In the United States, activists have successfully pushed back against anti-abortion laws, and fought for the right to vote in the state of Texas, which was recently passed by the legislature. But we must do more to prevent these victories from being erased by the policies of the new administration, both at the federal and state levels.

As CSW prepares to meet this year, we must demand that government agencies, private companies, and faith-based organizations work together in a virtuous partnership with civil society to protect the rights of women globally. This includes the right to a safe abortion and access to medical care for all.

Twenty years after the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, it is high time to take steps toward realizing the vision of an equal world in which women’s rights are guaranteed and respected for all. Only then will we see a truly global partnership and prosperity.