Is gender equality just an ideal?
Andrea Debak
University of Split Faculty of Law
This blog is written by Andrea Debak, a Law Graduate of University of Split Faculty of Law
The principle of gender equality has been established within the core of human rights on national and international levels and unequivocally it represents one of the key components of non-discrimination in modern society in all aspects of human endeavors. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.[1]
Accordingly, every country should mainstream gender equality, for instance, by making legal systems accessible to all and addressing barriers and issues that could hinder both genders from seeking justice.
Moreover, today, the point of view that usually prevails is that women are not equal when it comes to their opportunities for employment and paid work. One of the reasons for that is genetics and mother nature because women can bring new life into the world and, through the pregnancy period, are mostly unable to work.
However, when recruiting new employees, it is unlawful to refuse to employ, consider, or shortlist someone because they are pregnant or planning to start a family.
On the other hand, women who avoid pregnancy are also often treated unfairly because today’s society still considers the mother's role as the most important woman, when it comes to her private life, and not as something that should be an individual choice. Previous implies that we are also, as human nations, insensible on problems like impotence or the fact that someone is not able to handle a job and private life because of busy schedule.
Therefore, for achieving justice and overcoming these inequalities the law should be a proper instrument.
Further, in many countries patriarchal system still elevates men to positions of authority in the business world but also in the families. In essence, gender equality emphasizes the gendered aspects of inequality, and the groups generally marginalized by patriarchy. Thus, the promotion of gender equality inevitably challenges patriarchy insofar as it fights against gender inequalities. The latter are enabled by the patriarchal system while also contributing to perpetuating it.[2]
Similarly, by analyzing the existing and relevant judicial practice, the prohibition of discrimination based on gender, it can be concluded that claims in anti-discrimination disputes still "lose" disputes in a significantly higher proportion than they manage to prove a violation of their rights and discrimination, and then when they succeed in disputes, the amounts which are awarded to them by national courts are not significant.
More specifically, it can be said that today there is quite a lot of judicial practice of national courts in the field of protection against discrimination, but also there is a lot of room for expansion and improvement, both in terms of domestic and international legal sources.
Nonetheless, by incorporating gender equality into the law reform process, the system is trying to identify and prevent discrimination and establish solid standards, which would bring member states closer to equality between genders.
Likewise, women are also likely to receive fewer opportunities at work, compared with men, resulting in their under-representation at higher levels of management and leadership within organizations. Managers give women fewer challenging roles and fewer training opportunities, compared with men. For instance, female managers and midlevel workers have less access to high-level responsibilities and challenges that are precursors to promotion. Also, men are more likely to be given key leadership assignments in male-dominated fields and female-dominated fields. This is detrimental given that challenging roles, especially developmental ones, help employees gain important skills needed to excel in their careers.[3]
The main problem is, especially when it comes to plaintiffs, how to prove the intent behind the offender’s action.
To illustrate, the employer decided and chose the applicant for a new job position primarily based on bias against women. Very difficult is to prove what is inside another person's head and what was the real intent behind certain actions. Usually, you must provide enough evidence to convince a judge that a certain business decision was motivated by some prejudice or discriminatory motive.
An employer will never honestly and openly declare that they don't want to promote a woman to a certain position and in that manner, they are disabling victims to argue that a certain statement or decision is based on gender stereotypes rather than actual qualifications.
In addition to that, it crucial is to collect evidence so it can be presented in the case because the employer probably won’t openly declare that he based his decision of promotion based on prejudice.
Consequently, because gender discrimination can have various forms, and it is hard to collect evidence, the offenders are not afraid of taking those actions.
To sum up, human rights are somewhere between idealism and realism and they represent legal tools created for establishing gender balance. In theory, they represent great ideals, but on the other side in practice, they are sometimes hard to prove and achieve. But at the same time, international human rights law and national regulations in the field of gender equality at least provide guidance and inspiration for further action.
Referring back to the main point, for me honestly, the best way to implement ideas such as gender equality and non-discrimination in today's society is by raising human awareness of these issues and problems.
In addition to that, the rresearchers have generally found that experiences of discrimination are harmful to health in several ways. For instance, previous studies have shown that perceived discrimination is strongly associated with poor indicators of both mental and physical health, including anxiety, hypertension, heightened stress responses, and self-reported health status. Recent studies have also shown that gender-based discrimination also produces deleterious health impacts such as cardiovascular disease, may increase drinking and smoking behaviors, and can aggravate depressive symptoms. [4]
Finally, the question that imposes itself is why women are trying to establish gender equality when the roles of men and women are not equal. According to my opinion, women should try to get more benefits and strive to establish their specific role by pointing out activities specifically targeting women, and by raising the consciousness of the fact that women are in some way more sensible, softer, intuitive beings, consequently, they are more suitable as workers and leaders for certain job positions and especially working with people.
Lastly, it is worth noting that several of the world’s fastest-growing economies, which have only recently emerged from conflict, owe their success in part to women’s increased role in production, trade, and entrepreneurship.[5]
REFERENCES
[1] Article 1, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, General Assembly of the United Nations on December 10, 1948.
[2] Fal-Dutra Santos Ricardo: Challenging patriarchy: gender equality and humanitarian principles, July 18 2019., https://blogs.icrc.org/law-and-policy/2019/07/18/gender-equality-humanitarian-principles/
[3] Frederique Autin, Fabrizio Butera: Research Topic Institutional Determinants of Social Inequalities, Gender inequalities in the workplace: the effects of organizational structures, processes, practices, and decision makers’ sexism, January 2016
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01400/full
[4] Multidimensional gender discrimination in workplace and depressive symptoms, Gaeul Kim, Jinmok Kim, Su-Kyoung Lee, Juho Sim, Yangwook Kim, Byung-Yoon Yun, Jin-Ha Yoon, July 16 2020
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0234415
[5] Preventing conflict transforming justice securing the peace, a global study on the implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325,