Learner Resource 6
What is gender inequality?
Gender inequality can start as soon as girls are born, and can keep women at a disadvantage throughout their lives. Child and infant mortality rates in some countries are significantly worse for girls than boys – even though biologically, infant girls should survive in greater numbers. Girls are more likely to drop out of school and to receive less education than boys.
In 1995, governments around the world met in Beijing and signed the Beijing Platform for Action, which promised to take action to reduce discrimination against women. However despite this, crimes against women continue.
Read the factsheet at http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/storage/advfy/documents/gender_bias_fact_sheet_2010.pdf
Then consider the following facts:
· Honour Killings persist, and in some countries have actually increased.
· 70% of those in the world living in absolute poverty are women.
· Women hold less than 5% of the top positions in international organisations like the United Nations and the European Union.
· Two-thirds of the world’s illiterate adults are women.
· Globally, women’s wages are 30-40% lower than for men doing the same work.
· In the UK, women working full time earn on average 18% less than men. Part time, this figure is 40%.
· Around 16% of elected politicians in the world are women.
· 500,000 women die each year from conditions related to pregnancy and childbirth.
· In the 15-40 age bracket, 75 per cent more women die than men.
· Over 200million women in developing countries have no access to contraception.
Sources: Women Human Rights Net 2005; Human Development Report UNDP 2004; Inter-Parliamentary Union 2005; Womenwatch, UN Division for the Advancement of Women 2005; Assessing Progress on Gender Equality, World Bank 2005; UNFPA 2004; Equality Now 2005 www.equalitynow.org/
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Human Rights
In groups, discuss:
· Which of the facts above can be considered causes of gender inequality?
· Which are consequences?
· Which could be considered both?
· Which facts you have learned are the most surprising?
· List the ways in which young girls lives could see inequality eradicated. You may like to refer to examples, or to your own ideas. You could turn this into a display or poster.
Further Research Ideas:
Explore how the UK’s percentage of females amongst MPs compares with the rest of the world. http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20100505211508/http:/www.equalities.gov.uk/pdf/301611_GEO_WomensRepresentation_acc.pdf
· Rwanda has the highest proportion of female MPs- why do you think this could be?
Investigate two other countries and report back on the proportion of female representation in their governments: http://www.ipu.org/iss-e/women.htm
Version 1 2 © OCR 2016
Human Rights