In September 1995, following the United Nations’ Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing, China, a declaration was issued proclaiming, among other things, that “women’s rights are human rights.” The resulting resolution identified 12 “critical areas of concern,” ranging from “The persistent and increasing burden of poverty on women” to unequal access to education, violence against women to “Inequality between men and women in the sharing of power and decision-making at all levels.”
Nearly 30 years later, as Misun Woo – the regional coordinator of Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD) – told The Diplomat’s Managing Editor Catherine Putz in the following interview, women continue to face many of the exact same challenges.
“We need to ask why there hasn’t been much change to advance women’s human rights and end injustice?” Woo stressed.
In the following interview, Woo highlights the interconnected nature of these challenges. It’s not just the patriarchy; other “structural causes of marginalization and inequality” – like globalization, climate change, various fundamentalisms, and militarism – are behind the stagnation in women’s rights and human rights more generally.
In the years ahead, Woo says, “it will be critical for feminist and women’s rights movements, especially with Global South feminist leadership, to articulate solutions, reclaim ways of living and being that have been lost due to various forms of domination and oppression, and connect these stories and solutions both vertically and horizontally so that we can concretely co-imagine and build a new future.”
In talking with APWLD’s many members and partners across Asia, are there common themes in regard to the challenges women face?
Women across Asia and the Pacific face numerous forms of human rights violations and discrimination. These include sexual and gender-based violence, deepening poverty and economic exploitation – where the current global economy continues to extract women’s (cheap) labor, especially in unpaid/underpaid care labor and the gender pay gap – weak political representation and leadership power, and widening inequalities and lack of access to education and health. The debt crisis and privatization deepen these barriers, while the climate crisis and intensifying pushback against feminist and women’s human rights movements exacerbate these challenges.
The worst part of this story is that these ongoing challenges faced by women aren’t new. For instance, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995) addressed the same concerns through its 12 critical areas of concerns. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action; the 25th anniversary of the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1325, which commits member states to support women’s participation and leadership in peace negotiations and post-conflict reconstruction; and the 10th anniversary of the COP21 Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the Sustainable Development Goals. Yet, for most women in Asia and the Pacific, this year will most likely be a year of mourning as there has not been much change to the rights violations, injustice, discrimination, or inequalities they face.
We need to ask why there hasn’t been much change to advance women’s human rights and end injustice?
The answer is clear. It’s because structural causes of marginalization and inequality remain unaddressed. Causes are complex and interrelated, and hence require long-term strategies and cross-movement pressure to change. APWLD’s analysis focuses on the fusion of patriarchy with systems that routinely undermine women’s human rights: globalization, fundamentalisms, and militarism, and how colonialism and imperialism continue to manifest in these interconnected systems of oppression.
Through countless conversations and space creation, we learn there are some common challenges women face in Asia and the Pacific region. These common challenges are not working in silo but are deeply structural with compounded intergenerational consequences on women’s human rights. And that’s why APWLD is prioritizing these common challenges to help our intersectional movements to disrupt and dismantle the very interconnected system of oppressions.