Monday 15 December 2008

German CEDAW Report - the personal remains political

Today, experts from 28 German NGOs have submitted the 2008 CEDAW shadow report to the Ministry of Family, Senior Citizens, Health and Youth. Given our demographic structure, this Ministry should be the most powerful of all, serving the majority of the population... It isn't. What if someone sneakily added "Men" to the Ministry's list of clients? Would its budget see a steep increase?

CEDAW, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination, was ratified by the Federal Republic of Germany in 1985. More German NGOs than ever before have co-operated on the shadow report - the only sign of progress! The findings are grim: no progress on gender budgeting, on reducing inequalities at work, on creating greater equality in access to social services or on reducing sterotypes in State-owned media. Gender mainstreaming seems to receive less government attention; the same applies to public funding for organisations working with survivors of gender-based violence. Nothing exceptional - even in a country whose government is run by a woman. More info on the Deutscher Frauenrat site (see link list below), some in English.

No comments:

Post a Comment