THIS year marks 30 years since the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, widely considered one of the most progressive blueprints to advance gender equality.
Fiji is a signatory to the declaration and will be one of the countries present at the 69th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) at the United Nations headquarters in New York from March 10 to 21 this year.
Ahead of the meeting, a preparatory meeting was held for governments, civil society and non-governmental organisations in the Asia-Pacific region in November.
And 30 years on, there have been strides made — some for the better — while gaps remain across many countries.
Pacific feminist Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls, who is the network coordinator for Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict Pacific (GPPAC) and Pacific Women Mediators Network, was one of the women who was on the frontlines when the Beijing Declaration came into effect.
She recalls that there was a lot of important collaboration, understanding and discussions amongst the countries, which is something that needs to continue.
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says Pacific Island Forum leaders have revitalised the gender equality declaration of 2023, as well as convening an annual Pacific Forum women leaders’ meeting as well as the women’s triennial conference.
However, she says there is still a need to ensure the financing for gender equality is done in a way that enables national women’s machineries and government to be part of the conversation.
“Financing is critical, both in terms of civil society, feminist movement work for women’s and human rights, disability, inclusion, that space and resources for civil society to bring issues to the table,” Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says.
“The qualitative and quantitative evidence, and for governments to be able to use that information to then reflect on their policies, their positions and reevaluate and reorganise. I think that’s important in terms of the financing aspect.”
Where are the shortfalls?
What is meant by mechanisms for the advancement of women?
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says this is a “lovely term”, which sits in the Beijing Platform for Action and is the reason for having different programs under different intergovernmental organisations or CROP agencies in the Pacific.
“Within those mechanisms are also the work of the women’s rights and feminist movements in civil society. So how have we progressed? I think (in) each country report, you can see that in terms of what was being discussed over a considerable period of time, one indicator is the number of girls completing primary school.
“But what happens after that? Do they have access to scholarships? Do they have that enabling environment in their homes, in their communities?
“Interestingly enough, we’ve just done some work as the Pacific Women Mediators Network, a small research project led by young women, which actually shows that when it comes to young women’s priorities, and this was in Tonga and Bougainville, the priority issues for young women in terms of defining their peace and security came down to things like personal safety and security.”
She says having an enabling environment is crucial in helping them as young women in terms of dealing with sexual reproductive health and rights.
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says they are seeing high numbers of unplanned young pregnancies, young mums, and ask what is happening to those young women.
“It’s not just about, oh my god, girls are getting pregnant. It’s actually about why is this happening?”
She says peace and security are important topics now, just as it was in 1995 when the declaration was first discussed.
“I’m saying yes, there are challenges, and it might be almost utopic to think that we will ever achieve gender equality. But I think if we’re not addressing the drivers of inequalities in a more substantive and inclusive way, that it’s not just the responsibility of the women’s machineries.
“You still have backlash towards women when they speak out around discrimination and violence. There is still that reaction first, why are the women still saying that? Twenty-five, 30 years on, we’re still facing violence in the home. We still have under representation of women in decision making across the Pacific.
“How can we talk about democratic processes when our women are so underrepresented?”
Intersecting issues
Regardless of under resourcing and different challenges, Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says different sectors have persisted over the years.
“Yes, we face the brunt of climate crisis and the intersecting humanitarian crisis, but we also have solutions,” she says.
“I think the progress is that we have persisted, regardless of under resourcing, regardless of the different types of challenges. Between 1995 and this year, we have persisted as the movement. We’ve persisted as governments.
“We’ve persisted in terms of not taking gender equality off the agenda. So that’s important. We have also seen within the Pacific Islands movement for gender equality and women’s rights, we’ve seen a diversification also.
“There’s a new, wonderful emergence of a new way of organising, whereas in the mid ’90s, it was about coordinated efforts through national councils of women.”
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls says the emergence of spaces such as the Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre and Fiji Women’s Rights Movement has helped the establishment of spaces dedicated to the LGBTQI+ movement, sexual reproductive health and rights networks.
She says this is also an indicator of how everyone is working collectively to move this agenda forward.
“If you look at the work of the feminist movement, we talk about intersectionalities. So you can’t only talk about participation without addressing X, Y, Z.
“You can’t talk about gender-based violence without talking about what do prevention measures look like, even if it’s a small example.
“I’ll give you an example in terms of the work that’s being carried out through the Pacific Women Mediators Network. We have networks such as the Pacific Conference of Churches that is working with faith leaders from across the churches of the three sub-regions of the Pacific.
“We’re seeing representation of women in the executive of the Pacific Conference of Churches, church leaders are continuing to reaffirm that they have a role to play in the prevention of gender-based violence and making equality an issue within the churches.
“And then working with civil society, we have the leadership of people like Noelene Naboulivou through the work of DIVA for Equality, driving an inclusive agenda for the LGBTIQ community, but not in a silo.”
Need for collaboration
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls uses an analogy about weaving a mat and weaving a basket to convey her next point.
“The mat is the strands of different pieces of work that come together. And when we create this basket that we carry into different conferences, we’re starting to see how the gifts of the movement come together and sit in that basket.
“We have to decolonise and also say coming back as PSIDS, let us have our processes also that actually can help us progress.”
She says the Pacific as a community does not just have issues but also strategies and solutions of their own that they can use to move their agenda forward.
“And that’s what I think has been really happening in the last wave of the feminist movement. We have said, yes, these are our priority issues, but we’re going to be driving it in this way.”