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ON THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BEIJING DECLARATION AND PLATFORM FOR
ACTION, WHITHER GENDER EQUALITY?  
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Equal Times Newsdesk
March 5, 2025
Equal Times
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_ Gender inequality impacts everything from income disparity between
men and women, to violence and harassment at work, the quality of jobs
that will be available in a just transition to a green economy and
occupational hazards faced by women workers. _

Participants at the Non-Governmental Organizations Forum meeting held
in Huairou, China, as part of the United Nations Fourth World
Conference on Women in Beijing, China on 4-15 September 1995, (UN
Photo/Milton Grant).

 

Thirty years ago, nearly 200 governments and tens of thousands of
activists and civil society organisations from around the world
gathered in China to hash out a historic global commitment to equal
rights and equal opportunities for all women and girls. The Beijing
Declaration
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for Action
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was signed by 189 governments at the Fourth World Conference on Women
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China, held between 4-15 September 1995. It outlined 12 critical areas
for action, covering everything from jobs to the environment and
political participation, as well as ending gender-based violence and
harassment, and provided governments with concrete steps to ensure the
actualisation of these goals.

Every March, at the United Nations headquarters in New York, the
Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) holds a two-week session to
discuss progress and gaps in the implementation of the BPfA, as well
as other issues that affect the rights of women and girls. This year
is critically important: not only does 2025 mark the 30th anniversary
of the adoption of the BPfA (Beijing +30), but CSW69 (which is taking
place from 10-21 March 2025) also reminds us that there are just five
years left to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
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and prosperity for people and planet. At a time of rising
authoritarianism, ever-increasing inequality and the rollback of basic
human rights the world over, this moment presents a final push for
universal progress.

* WHAT IMPACT HAS THE BEIJING DECLARATION AND PLATFORM FOR ACTION
HAD ON WOMEN’S RIGHTS GLOBALLY?

It has been huge. BPfA was not only unprecedented in putting the
spotlight on feminism, women’s rights and feminist leadership but it
also gave rise to a whole new wave of feminist organisations, networks
and leaders. It has increased legal protections for women and girls
exponentially, bolstered gender quotas in political leadership and
supported the economic empowerment of women, to name but a few
achievements.

* HOW DOES THE BEIJING DECLARATION AND PLATFORM FOR ACTION INTERSECT
WITH OTHER GLOBAL RIGHTS FRAMEWORKS SUCH AS THE 2030 AGENDA?

According to UN Women, the full implementation of the BPfA
will “turbo charge gender equality and sustainable development”
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this is being articulated in policy terms through the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs). Although there is a stand-alone goal
focusing on gender equality (Goal 5), the achievement of all 17 SDGs
is directly linked to gender equality and as a result, gender is
mainstreamed throughout its framework.

* ARE WE LIKELY TO SEE GENDER EQUALITY BY 2030?

No, we are not. Although significant, life-changing progress has been
made over the past 30 years thanks to the BPfA, there is still an
incredibly long way to go. To date, no country has achieved full legal
equality between women and men and not one single indicator under SDG
Goal 5 on gender equality has been met. In addition, there has been,
for a number of reasons – the endless cycle of economic crises and
global conflicts, as well as the rapidly escalating climate emergency
and the lingering fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic – huge pushback
against all human rights in recent years, and women and girls have
borne the brunt of this attack. In Afghanistan and Iran, this looks
like ‘gender apartheid’ codified in law. In warzones such as Gaza
and Sudan, this looks like devastating violence visited upon women and
girls. In countries like Bangladesh and Kenya this looks like women
and girls on the frontline of the climate crisis. In the US, El
Salvador, Nicaragua and Poland, this is embodied by the restriction of
abortion access. In countries such as Guatemala and Colombia, this
looks like the murder of female trade unionists. And everywhere, the
rollback of women and girls’ rights is accompanied by the forward
march of right-wing, patriarchal, populist leaders such as Vladmir
Putin in Russia, Donald Trump in the US, Narendra Modi in India and
Viktor Orbán in Hungary.

* WHAT IS THE SITUATION LIKE FOR WORKING WOMEN?

Working-class women are disproportionately impacted by all of these
interconnected crises, in addition to, as noted in a new ITUC report
on Beijing +30
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added pressures caused by structural gendered barriers to entering,
remaining and progressing in the world of work, unequal pay, and
completely imbalanced care responsibilities”. Globally, women are
estimated to earn, on average, 77 cents for every dollar men earn for
work of equal value and according to the International Labour
Organization
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just 47 per cent of women are part of the global workforce (for men,
that figure is 72 per cent). Gender segregation in the labour market
means that jobs where women dominate is undervalued and underpaid. And
the lack of affordable, quality childcare coupled with the
disproportionate amount of time women spend undertaking unpaid care,
cooking and cleaning means that women find themselves locked out of
decent work and into low-paid, precarious jobs.

* IS GENDER EQUALITY REALLY A TRADE UNION ISSUE?

Is water wet? Gender inequality impacts everything from the disparity
in the amount of money on average that men and women earn to violence
and harassment in the world of work, the quality of jobs that will be
available in a just transition to a carbon-zero economy and the
occupational hazards faced by women workers. However, through freedom
of association, collective bargaining, social dialogue and the power
of collective action, trade unions offer working women some of the
tools needed to correct this structural inequality.

* WHAT DEMANDS ARE TRADE UNIONS MAKING ON THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY OF
THE BEIJING DECLARATION AND PLATFORM FOR ACTION?

Representatives of the international labour movement will be present
at CSW69 to demand progress in five key areas: gender equality for
social justice, democracy and peace; women’s labour rights as human
rights; decent work for women; equal pay for work of equal value; a
world of work free from gender-based violence and harassment. You
can read more about the trade union position for CSW69 here
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- You can read the full text of the Beijing Declaration and Platform
for Action
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– Watch footage and interviews from the Fourth World Conference on
Women [[link removed]]

– Read the ITUC’s latest report _Beijing +30: Trade unions
mobilise for gender equality
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published ahead of International Women’s Day 2025.

– Read _The Crucial Role of Trade Unions in the Implementation of
the Beijing Platform For Action: Beijing +25
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published by the ITUC in 2020.

_Equal Times is a trilingual news and opinion website focusing on
labour, human rights, culture, development, the environment, politics
and the economy from a social justice perspective._

* International Women's Day
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* women's rights
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* United Nations
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* women workers
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* International Trade Union Confederation
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