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Unit 9: Status of Women

political voice. The US Department of Labor has indicated that in 2009, “the median weekly earnings Notes
of women who were full-time wage and salary workers was... 80 percent of men’s”. The Department
of Justice found that in 2009, “the percentage of female victims (26%) of intimate partner violence was
about 5 times that of male victims (5%)”. “The United States ranks 41st in a ranking of 184 countries
on maternal deaths during pregnancy and childbirth, below all other industrialized nations and a
number of developing countries” and women only represent 20% of members of Congress. Gender
inequality is thus a widespread and ingrained social and public health issue in the United States.
Impact and counteractions
Gender inequality and discrimination is argued to cause and perpetuate poverty and vulnerability in
society as a whole. Household and intra-household knowledge and resources are key influences in
individuals’ abilities to take advantage of external livelihood opportunities or respond appropriately
to threats. High education levels and social integration significantly improve the productivity of all
members of the household and improve equity throughout society. Gender Equity Indices seek to
provide the tools to demonstrate this feature of poverty.
Despite acknowledgement by institutions such as the World Bank that gender inequality is bad for
economic growth, there are many difficulties in creating a comprehensive response. It is argued that
the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) fail to acknowledge gender inequality as a cross-cutting
issue. Gender is mentioned in MDG3 and MDG5: MDG3 measures gender parity in education, the
share of women in wage employment and the proportion women in national legislatures. MDG5
focuses on maternal mortality and on universal access to reproductive health. However, even these
targets are significantly off-track.
Addressing gender inequality through social protection programmes designed to increase equity
would be an effective way of reducing gender inequality. Researchers at the Overseas Development
Institute argue for the need to develop the following in social protection in order to reduce gender
inequality and increase growth:
• Community childcare to give women greater opportunities to seek employment;
• Support parents with the care costs (e.g. South African child/disability grants);
• Education stipends for girls (e.g. Bangladesh’s Girls Education Stipend scheme);
• Awareness-raising regarding gender-based violence, and other preventive measures, such as
financial support for women and children escaping abusive environments (e.g. NGO pilot
initiatives in Ghana);
• Inclusion of programme participants (women and men) in designing and evaluating social
protection programmes;
• Gender-awareness and analysis training for programme staff;
• Collect and distribute information on coordinated care and service facilities (e.g. access to micro-
credit and microentrepreneurial training for women); and
• Developing monitoring and evaluation systems that include sex-disaggregated data.
However, politics plays a central role in the interests, institutions and ideas that are needed to reshape
social welfare and gender inequality in politics and society limits governments’ ability to act on
economic incentives.
It is interesting to note that NGO’s tend to protect women against gender inequality and Structural
violence. During war, the opposing side targets women, raping and even killing them. This could be
because women are associated with children and killing them prohibits there being a next generation
of the enemy.
Another opportunity to tackle gender inequality is presented by modern Information and
communication technologies. In a carefully controlled study, it has been shown that women embrace
digital technology more than men, disproving the stereotype of “technophobic women”. Given that
digital information and communication technologies have the potential to provide access to
employment, education, income, health services, participation, protection, and safety, among others,
the natural affinity of women with these new communication tools provide women with a tangible

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