Key highlights
- USAID recently launched a Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Policy that seeks to advance initiatives for women’s leadership.
- United States recognizes the critical but difficult task of putting gender equality and women’s empowerment at the core of democratization, human rights, governance, and peace and security agendas through the implementation of the Women, Peace, and Security Act and the U.S. Strategy on Women, Peace, and Security.
- USAID will also contribute more than $15 million to launch this initiative to improve the environment for women’s leadership in eight initial focus countries, including Nigeria. In addition, Transform Digital Spaces will also be launched to reflect feminist democratic principles
USAID recently launched a Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Policy that seeks to advance initiatives for women’s leadership.
The policy established four strategic goals for all of its operations and programming.
These goals are as follows:
- reduce gender disparities
- mitigate the negative effects of gender-based violence;
- empower women and girls to fully exercise their rights;
- advance structural changes that address the root causes of gender inequality.
What was said
According to the Deputy Administrator of the USAID, Isobel Coleman, “The status of women is the status of democracy and the promotion of gender equality is more urgent now than ever”.
She commented that the progress of empowering women and girls has stalled as countries face compounding shocks from the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and conflict. As seen globally, limitations on democracy also encourage limitations on gender equality.
- “Authoritarian leaders are launching a simultaneous assault on gender equality and democracy, threatening decades of progress on both fronts. These attacks are not limited to closing space for human rights and freedoms, but also are manifest through brutal gender-based violence, harassment, and other targeted crime”
- “This is not simply because misogyny and authoritarianism tend to occur in parallel, but because they are mutually reinforcing ills”.
Putting gender equality and women’s empowerment at the core of democratization
According to Isobel Coleman, women’s empowerment is a precursor to democratization, and the United States recognizes the critical but difficult task of putting gender equality and women’s empowerment at the core of democratization, human rights, governance, and peace and security agendas through the implementation of the Women, Peace, and Security Act and the U.S. Strategy on Women, Peace, and Security.
The panel discussed how USAID is elevating the Advancing Women’s and Girls’ Civic and Political Leadership Initiative as a core US government commitment to achieving the Summit for Democracy objectives of strengthening democracy and defending human rights globally.
The USAID has taken an “ecosystem approach” to improve the environment for women’s civic and political participation and leadership, while also working to build a pipeline of women who are willing and ready to lead.
According to reports, USAID has made significant progress toward fulfilling this commitment and will continue to target individual, structural, and socio-cultural barriers to women’s and girls’ political empowerment.
To this end, USAID will contribute more than $15 million to launch this initiative to improve the environment for women’s leadership in eight initial focus countries, including Nigeria. This will be accomplished in collaboration with local and international partners.
USAID collaborates with partners
Isobel Coleman also stated that the barriers to women’s leadership are much larger than what one donor can achieve alone, so they are attempting to leverage the efforts of other key partners as well.
Therefore, USAID established the Network for Gender Inclusive Democracy to provide strategic direction as well as a platform for coordinating these programmatic and diplomatic efforts.
Diverse partners who are dedicated to enhancing coordination, knowledge management, and advocacy to improve gender-inclusive democracy and women’s political participation and leadership will join USAID in the Network. These partners’ wide-ranging and in-depth experience will allow them to take advantage of the vital connections, materials, and information required for gender-transformative results.
Network members include:
- The Governments of Australia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom;
- Intergovernmental partners, including UN Women, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Inter-American Commission of Women of the Organization of American States, International IDEA, and Open Government Partnership;
- As well as Civil society, and leading academic partners
USAID will also be launching the Transform Digital Spaces to reflect feminist democratic principles, known as “Transform” for short.
Transform will invest up to $6 million over a three-year period to reduce the risk of gender-based violence made possible by technology, notably when it is committed against women in public office and politics. The organization will support the vital work of the Global Partnership for Action against Gender-Based Internet Harassment and Abuse through the Transform activity.