Without information no participation

Lin Pugh

Editorial

The Special Session of the General Assembly of the UN has commenced its evaluation of the process that started with the implementation of the Platform of Action in Beijing in 1995. Both the Secretary General of the UN, Kofi Annam, and the president of the General Assembly, Theo Ben Gurirab, acknowledged in their inaugural speeches women's achievements of the past five years, but they also mentioned the obstacles that they have to overcome in order to achieve equal opportunity and treatment, as well as the full recognition of their human rights and the possibility to participate with equality in making decisions in their own countries. It is affirming that these issues are considered in an international forum because there is no question that discussion of these topics at this level takes on a particular importance in a moment when women demand a participatory role in the search for solutions to end gender discrimination and in the actual decisions that must be taken to achieve these solutions. The conference in Beijing was called the "conference of commitments". Official delegates from 189 countries signed specific pledges in favor of gender equality, and also signaled their desire to mobilize human and financial resources such that the agreement could concretely be implemented. But at five years, we find that the representation of women in political and economic spaces continues to be low; this is also true at the international level, where we see very few women in decision-making positions in organizations such as the UN. Do women have allies in this fight? The president of the General Assembly mentioned a few. But there is no doubt that the great allies in the feminist and women's movement continue to be non-governmental organizations, which, with their militants male and female, play a consistent role in the mobilization of all of civil society, and awaken consciousness of the importance in achieving the justice of gender as part of global justice. Certainly during this meeting, the alliances will strengthen and new agreements will materialize such that the voice and presence of civil society in international spheres continue to grow and strengthen itself.

Women Making the News: the Global Women's Media Team

By Mavic Cabrera-Balleza

'Extraordinarily tight security and local policing'; 'Beggars and vagrants on the streets of Beijing rounded up'; 'Hillary Clinton in Beijing'; 'China's human rights violations criticized'; 'Lesbians parade topless in Huairou'.

These were the kind of headlines that saw print during the Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China in 1995. Five years later, not much has changed. At the United Nations General Assembly Special Session to review the progress made since Beijing, the international media is conspicuous by its absence.

In New York today are delegates from 188 countries, 3,000 NGO delegates representing 1,250 organizations. However, the number of media people who have registered to cover the event is far from proportionate. In addition, quite a few of these journalists have come here because of their own interest in women's issues-and not with the active support of their media organizations.

In Beijing, the issue of women and media was addressed as a critical area of concern, but it seems to have made no impact on mainstream media's coverage of women and women's issues. Women are still ignored until they are raped, murdered or massacred.

It is for these reasons that Isis International-Manila initiated the Global Women's Media Team Project for UNGASS. Women need to take control of media coverage about themselves and their lives. They need to stop being passive subjects and become active purveyors of news.

Under this project, 13 NGO women from all over the world have come together to intensively cover the conference and be trained onsite in the nitty gritties of mainstream media coverage. With their knowledge and experience as women activists, they will bring to their writing a sensitivity so far lacking in writing on women's issues. They will also, perhaps, more successfully convey to readers/viewers/listeners the crucial nature and the overwhelming importance of the decisions that will be taken at the UN over the next four days.

The Global Women's Media Team is composed of Beverleigh Kanas Liu from Vanuatu, Ely Suyapa Melendez from Honduras, Maria Eugenia Miranda from Argentina, Odonchimeg Puntsag from Mongolia, Kavitha Koshy from India, Babita Basnet and Nirmala Dhungana from Nepal, Cholpon Akmatova from Kyrgyztan, Kristina Mihalec from Croatia, Dianthus Saputra from Indonesia, Ann Loreto Tamayo from the Philippines, Juliet Were from Uganda and Gabrielle le Roux from South Africa. Two mainstream journalists, Divina Paredes-Japa from the Philippines and Anjali Mathur from India serve as editors and trainers. Mari Luz Quesada-Tiongson and Mavic Cabrera-Balleza of Isis International-Manila serve as administrative staff and project coordinator respectively.

The team members will have hands-on training in gathering, writing and disseminating through mainstream media outlets news and stories related to the BPFA Review process. They will be tasked to prepare daily press releases and making live reports to their home countries via radio phone patches throughout the five days of the UNGASS meeting.

To be written and broadcast in English, Spanish, Nepali, Russian, Croatian and Bahasa Indonesia, the stories that the team will generate will be disseminated through national, sub-regional, global mainstream and alternative media outlets to bring news in a flash to women worldwide.

Other post-Review media activities, such as report-back press conferences, radio and television guestings will likewise be undertaken by the team members.

An added feature of the media team project is a crash course on radio programming on the Internet which will be conducted by the Feminist International Radio Endeavour.

This initiative, with a post-Review online training component, ultimately aims to enhance women's skills in future media campaigns and advocacy that their organizations might undertake.

News

NGOs voicing their dissatisfaction with the Beijing+5 process so far

At the NGO briefing on Monday 5 June, a statement to which NGOs could sign up to was launched, calling on governments to successfully deliver an outcome document that enables a speedier implementation of the BPFA. The statement is published in its entirety next to this article. Although the NGO participation for the Beijing+5 UNGASS is severely limited, women's NGOs have arrived in great numbers to monitor the negotiations and to support the adoption of a strong Outcome document. As the process is being stalled there is a growing frustration and feeling among NGOs that the governments 'are not doing their job' in this process. At the start of the UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) only 59 out of 261 articles of the Outcome document had been agreed to.

Besides the serious threats of attempts to backtrack on the BPFA, the disagreements on the Outcome document shows that there are still words that are perceived as 'dangerous' to some governments. The texts on women with disabilities are threatened as are wordings strengthening women's sexual- and reproductive rights.

Furthermore, the disagreements on the Outcome document are also highly present on the issues of poverty, development and the negative effects of economic globalization. It seems as if the delegations insisting on these issues tend to be conservative governments joined by the Holy See - in part these are the same delegations that are blocking a strengthening of women's sexual and reproductive rights. The women's NGO community shows, with the statement launched yesterday, that there is no acceptance to women's human rights being held hostage - the issues of women's human's rights and the issues of globalization and poverty cannot be held against each other.

As the general assembly convenes in Special Session it is time to bring the preparatory negotiations to a successful conclusion with a strong Outcome document - a document with specific, bold actions to speed up the Implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action. It is clear that the majority of countries are here jus to do that. They have repeatedly made their forward-looking positions clear on all 12 Critical Areas of Concern in the Platform. However, a few countries are intent on watering down the Platform

In Beijing, women helped to secure the commitment of 187 governments to advance women's human rights, gender equality and women's empowerment. Since 1995, we have worked in partnership with governments at home in our communities, and at the national and international levels, to turn the words of the Beijing Platform into concrete actions. These actions have made real difference in the lives of many women. But there is still much to be one.

In the halls of the United Nations and at home in our countries, women worldwide are monitoring these deliberations. We now call on you to stand behind your Beijing commitments and together with NGOs accelerate our efforts to improve women's lives.

What political participation are we talking about?

By Irene Leon and Daphne Plou

Too empowered to recognize that the UN was closing the doors in their faces, women from NGOs accepted somewhat disconcertedly when they were told without any explanation that only fifty of them would be given the opportunity to assist the Special Session of the General Assembly. If they raised their voices, though, it was only to question this act rather than to protest it.

The political participation, however, can be found in the key words of the women's speeches, and, in some cases, among the actions' priorities. But in the majority of cases, this priority is circumscribed at the national level and at the local level; while at the international level - just like international politics - these priorities are considered "new" issues in which many times, even empowered women slip outside of their contexts and surroundings.

Participation forms an inherent part of democracy, and in its absence authoritarianism lures and bureaucratic structures intensify. But no one rules alone, and power works on individuals, that is, the limits of power are established to the extent that certain dynamics allow them to do so; or power gets overturned when the rules of the game are subverted. The latter is what happened with gender relations in the last century: the women's movement changed everything, almost.

It is well known that in the last 25 years, women have procured powerful positions at the local level, and of those, many proceeded to influential international institutions. But power does not participate and exercise itself simply from political parties - which continue to diminish in meaning - or even from institutions. Power also manifests itself from the collective force of movements that, on the one hand, oppose the arbitrary decisions and actions of the powers-that-be, while on the other hand, endorse improved societals, like those that have supported the women's movement at the UN.

Access comprises another crucial aspect of a functioning democracy. That is, access to information, of course, but also simple, physical and material access, to spaces of power, such as the General Assembly, from which many women were effortlessly excluded yesterday. What danger do hundreds of woman pose listening to boring speeches, in a special gallery of a room of the UN? What risk do the governmental organizations run with the women's NGOs in attendance, armed with proposals for social advancement?

It is not so much a question of going to the show of governmental speeches, but rather an issue of having first-hand access to the information in the moment in which the pronouncement is made. This issue relates directly to the right to communication and a right to information. To be present at the General Assembly represents a symbolic issue: it signifies the possibility of moving in and through powerful spheres, especially those associated with men's power.

Another topic is that of producing opinions and ideas and circulating them. Again, this forms a dimension of the right to communication, a particular challenge in a space that is considered exclusive, where international politicians and experts, without movements, without women, with a formal CONGO that, rather than assisting NGOs, ensures that new presences do not make NGOs with status feel threatened.

It is also a question of freedom of thought and expression, in which a good number of the NGOs that attend the session look to express their points of view, that they communicate these to the international community through lobbying, contacts and others of importance, especially in cases where individuals are unable to do this in their own countries.

In light of its exclusion, what can a whole movement do outside the infamous sessions of the UN? When exclusion becomes exactly the opposite of social integration, an icon of the propositions for participation and democracy directed by women to the UN, what symbol of tradition collapses when women get to the international arena, even if it is only to listen to speeches? Some countries critique other countries for having separated spaces, of dividing them up into, on the one hand, men associated with power, and on the other, women associated with domesticity: is it possible that the UN follows an example that the majority of its members critique?

Is There Hope For Indigenous Women in the United Nations?

By Victoria Tauli-Corpuz Convenor, Asia Indigenous Women's Network

Why do indigenous women come here to New York to participate in this Beijing Plus Five Review? Do we see any hope in the UN and its various processes? Are our cries for economic justice and restorative justice going to be heeded by the United Nations?

For this Beijing Plus Five Review, we looked at the Beijing Platform for Action and identified which program points have references to indigenous women. The Beijing Declaration of Indigenous Women which came out of the Indigenous Women's Tent in Huairou in l995 was affirmed as key document which unites us. It was observed that the analysis, issues and proposals in this Indigenous Women's Declaration are still very relevant and therefore should be used as a tool for lobbying, education and mobilization. Whilst these gains in the international arena are recognized, we are also realistic in terms of expectations from the UN. It was clear to us that our empowerment as women is not principally determined by UN Conventions, Agreements or Declarations. This will mainly come from our efforts to strengthen our organizations, nations, clans and NGOs on the local and national level. The experiences of resistance mounted by our women and men against the attempts to drive us away or deprive us of our lands and resources is a source of strength. The growing efforts to organize indigenous women on the ground and the networking being undertaken on the national, regional and international levels are sources of encouragement. The capacities of indigenous women to protect and strengthen indigenous economic systems which are sustainable and to transmit indigenous knowledge on health, agriculture, etc. to the younger generations should be strengthened.

Our participation in the UN processes, undoubtedly has change some of the debates on how human rights should be addressed. The balance between individual and collective rights, the balance between civil and political rights and economic, social, and cultural rights, among others are sharply addressed when rights of indigenous peoples come into the picture. We agree that racism and racial discrimination still remain as major factors causing many of our problems. Therefore we resolved that we should play a more active role in the forthcoming World Conference on this issue. We support the Beijing Platform of Action but we regret that there seems to be a backsliding by governments in meeting their commitments in Beijing. This speaks for both the governments of the north and the south. Our elder, Lorraine Canoe, reminded us that we should not put our faith in the UN system because this is still run by governments which colonized us and still are re-colonizing us. We should rely on ourselves, the wisdom of our elders, the energies and visions of our youth, and our spiritual relationship with the Earth and all creation.

Latin America - All Rights - All of them

Latin American and Caribbean women stand for the building of plural societies, ready to overcome discrimination of any kind. But in order to work towards this aim, women need to exercise the right to freedom of expression and the right to information. Women from this region stand for political and economic democracy as well as democracy in the cultural and private spheres.