for report

1. Problems on Exclusion of Women
from POLITICAL, SOCIAL &
ECONOMIC LIFE
by:
Mariel Gia V. Gojo Cruz
Julie Avila

2. Facts and figures: Leadership
and political participation
Women in parliaments
• Only 24.3 per cent of all national
parliamentarians were women as of February
2019, a slow increase from 11.3 per cent in 1995
• As of June 2019, 11 women are serving as Head
of State and 12 are serving as Head of
Government

3. Facts and figures: Leadership
and political participation
Women in parliaments
• Rwanda has the highest number of women
parliamentarians worldwide, where, women have
won 61.3 per cent of seats in the lower house
• Globally, there are 27 States in which women
account for less than 10 per cent of
parliamentarians in single or lower houses, as of
February 2019, including 3 chambers with no
women at all

4. Facts and figures: Leadership
and political participation
Across regions
Wide variations remain in the average percentages of women
parliamentarians in each region. As of February 2019, these
were (single, lower and upper houses combined):
• Nordic countries, 42.5 per cent;
• Americas, 30.6 per cent;
• Europe including Nordic countries, 28.6 per cent;
• Europe excluding Nordic countries, 27.2 per cent;
• sub-Saharan Africa, 23.9 per cent;
• Asia, 19.8 per cent;
• Arab States, 19 per cent; and the
• Pacific, 16.3 per cent.

5. Facts and figures: Leadership
and political participation
Expanding participation
As of February 2019, only 3 countries have 50 per cent or
more women in parliament in single or lower houses:
Rwanda with 61.3 per cent, Cuba with 53.2 per cent and
Bolivia with 53.1 per cent; but a greater number of
countries have reached 30 per cent or more.

6. Facts and figures: Leadership
and political participation
Expanding participation
As of February 2019, 50 single or lower houses were
composed of 30 per cent or more women, including 22
countries in Europe, 12 in Sub-Saharan Africa, 12 in Latin
America and the Caribbean, 2 in the Pacific and 1 each in
Asia and Arab States; more than half of these countries
have applied some form of quotas - either legislative
candidate quotas or reserved seats - opening space for
women's political participation in national parliaments.
Gender balance in political participation and decision-
making is the internationally agreed target set in the
Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

8. INTRODUCTION
• Women constitute slightly more than half of
the world population. Their contribution to
the social and economic development of
societies is also more than half as compared
to that of men by virtue of their dual roles in
the productive and reproductive spheres (Bari,
F., 2005)

9. • Presently, women’s representation in legislatures
around the world is 15 percent. Despite the
pronounced commitment of the international
community to gender equality and to the bridging
the gender gap in the formal political arena,
reinforced by the Convention on Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)
and the Beijing Platform of Action, there are only
twelve countries where women hold 33% or more
seats in the parliaments (UNDP Report, 2005).
INTRODUCTION

10. Factors Hindering Women’s Political
Participation
The structural and functional constraints faced by
women are shaped by social and political relations in
a society. The common pattern of women’s political
exclusion stem from
• (a) social and political discourses
• (b) political structures and institutions
• (c) the socio-cultural and functional constraints
that put limits on women’s individual and
collective agency.

11. Ideological Factors
• Patriarchy as a system of male domination
shapes women’s relationship in politics. It
transforms male and females into men and
women and construct the hierarchy of gender
relations where men are privileged (Eisenstein
1984).

12. Ideological Factors
• The gender role ideology
is used as an ideological
tool by patriarchy to
place women within the
private arena of home as
mothers and wives and
men in the public sphere.
This is one of the vital
factors that shape the
level of women’s political
participation globally.

13. Ideological Factors
• Although the gender role ideology is not static
rather remained in a flux while intersecting
with economic, social and political systems of
a particular society, women continue to be
defined as private across countries which
resulted in their exclusion from politics.

14. Political Factors
• Vicky Randall defines politics as an “articulation, or
working out of relationships within an already given
power structure”, which is in contrast with the
traditional view of politics that defines it as an
activity, a conscious, deliberate participation in the
process by which resources are allocated among
citizens. This conception of politics restricts political
activity only in public arena and the private sphere
of family life is rendered as apolitical.

15. Political Factors
• This public-private
dichotomy in traditional
definition of politics is
used to exclude women
from public political
sphere and even when
women are brought into
politics they are entered
as mothers and wives.

16. Political Factors
• Male domination of politics, political parties
and culture of formal political structures is
another factor that hinders women’s political
participation. Often male dominated political
parties have a male perspective on issues of
national importance that disillusions women
as their perspective is often ignored and not
reflected in the politics of their parties.

17. Socio-Cultural Factors
• Gender role ideology does not only create
duality of femininity and masculinity, it also
places them in hierarchal fashion in which
female sex is generally valued less than male
sex because of their socially ascribed roles in
reproductive sphere.

18. Socio-Cultural Factors
• The gender status quo is maintained through low
resource allocation to women’s human
development by the state, society and the family.
This is reflected in the social indicators which
reflect varying degrees of gender disparities in
education, health, employment, ownership of
productive resources and politics in all countries.

19. Socio-Cultural Factors
• Additionally gender is mediated through class,
caste and ethnicity that structure access to
resources and opportunities. The socio-
cultural dependence of women is one of the
key detrimental factors to their political
participation in public political domain.

20. Socio-Cultural Factors
• Women also find it hard to participate in politics
due to limited time available to them because of
their dual roles in the productive and
reproductive spheres. With their primary roles as
mothers and wives and competing domestic
responsibilities and care work, they are left with
little time to participate in politics.

21. Socio-Cultural Factors
• In some of the countries,
particularly in South Asia,
women also face cultural
constraints on their mobility.
The mechanisms of sex
segregation and purdah are
used to restrict their mobility.
Politics requires women’s
exposure to interact with
male and female constituents
and address public meeting.

22. Economic Factors
• Politics is increasingly becoming
commercialized. More and more money is
needed to participate in politics. Women lack
access to and ownership of productive
resource, limiting the scope of their political
work.

23. Lack of Social Capital and Political
Capacities
• Women often lack social
capital because they are often
not head of communities,
tribes or kinship groups,
resulting in the absence of
constituency base for them
and means of political
participation such as political
skills, economic resources,
education, training and access
to information.

24. Policy Recommendations
• The United Nation should develop a system of
incentives for countries that work towards
narrowing the gender gap in education, health
and employment.

25. Policy Recommendations
• Clear guidelines for modalities and
implementation of affirmative measures that
lead to empowering women and creating their
ability to critically engage with the state and
the society for a social change and gender
equality should be developed.

26. Policy Recommendations
• Research, documentation and dissemination
of successful experiences in the world is
needed to promote women’s participation in
politics and development.

27. Women in risk of social
exclusion

28. • Social exclusion is a process which
manifests itself in today's society, where a few
specific sectors of the population are
concentrated
• Among them, are women, because their life
situation and their personal development is
affected in a negative way

29. • Social, demographic and economic
transformations have produced changes in the
family, and brought about changes that have led
to the diversification of family forms, supplanting
the nuclear family and creating other
organizational models for those who must
recognize their collective rights. There is a
growth of the domestic partners who have a
stable coexistence, increase separations, divorce
and single parent families.

30. • Many women, who have obtained legal separation,
let perceive the alimony which have been assigned
to them in the judicial process, by which, many of
them with children and without paid work, go to
rely on external aid to survive, so you can make
them easily entering the threshold of poverty.

31. • In all developed countries, there are groups of
women who are in conditions of social
disadvantage, which includes the category of
"women at risk of social exclusion".
• This group is made up of women with family
responsibilities not shared, in situations of
economic insecurity, sometimes caused by
separation or widowhood, single mothers who
must face alone the care of their sons and
daughters, single elderly women with scarce
widow's pensions, immigrant women without or
with work in precarious conditions, women with
disabilities, or others.

32. • These women are excluded of the levels of
social well-being that may have the majority
of citizens, and remain aside from
participation in social and economic life.

33. • Another significant survey module included in both the
2008 and 2013 NDHS is the Women’s Empowerment
Module. It examines indicators of women’s
empowerment such as women’s control over own and
husband’s earnings, women’s ownership of assets,
women’s participation in decision making and women’s
attitudes towards wife beating. It also examines their
relationship with selected demographic and health
outcomes, including contraceptive use, ideal family
size, unmet need for family planning, and child
mortality.

34. Married Women’s Control Over Own Earnings
• For the 2013 NDHS, 46 percent of married women
with cash earnings decide themselves how their
earnings are used, while 51 percent say that they
decide jointly with their husband. It was 41 percent
and 54 percent respectively in 2008 NDHS.

35. Married Women’s Control Over Own Earnings
• Only 3 percent (in 2013) and 4 percent (in 2008) of
married women said that their husbands mainly
decide how wives’ earnings are used.

36. Married Women’s Control Over Own Earnings
• Younger married women (age 15-24) are more
likely to decide how their earnings are used than
older married women. This is true both in 2008 and
2013 NDHS.

37. Married Women’s Control Over Husbands/Partners’
Earnings
• An estimated 31 percent (in 2013) and 27 percent
(in 2008) of married women said that they are the
ones who mainly decide how their husbands’
earnings are used while 61 percent (in 2013) and 63
percent (in 2008) said they jointly decide with their
husbands about the use of the husbands’ earnings.
• Around 8 percent (in 2013) and 10 percent (in
2008) of married women said that their husbands
mainly decide how their earnings are used.

38. Women’s Participation in Decision-Making
• Around 52 percent (in 2013) and 50 percent (in 2008) of married women
said they alone made decisions about their own health care, while 45
percent (in 2013) and 44 percent (in 2008) said they decide jointly with
their husbands.
• Likewise, 20 percent (in 2013) and 21 percent (in 2008) said they also made
decisions mainly for major household purchases, while 66 percent (in 2013)
and 65 percent (in 2008) were decided by both husband and wife.
• For purchases of daily household needs, 61 percent (in 2013) and 59
percent (in 2008) were mainly decided by women; only 32 percent (in 2013)
and 33 percent (in 2008) were decided by both husband and wife.
• On visits to women’s family or relatives, 69 percent (in 2013) and 70
percent (in 2008) were decided jointly by both husband and wife; 24
percent (in 2013) and 23 percent (in 2008) were mainly decided by women.

39. Ownership of Assets
• In the 2013 NDHS, questions on assets ownership were included. The
results reveal that around 32.9 percent of women own a house either
alone or jointly with someone else. It means that 67.1 percent of
women do not own a house. In addition, around 18 percent own land
either alone or jointly with someone else which means 82 percent do
not.

40. Women’s Attitudes Toward Wife Beating
• 14 percent of married women agreed that a husband is justified in
beating his wife for at least one of the following circumstances: if she
burns the food, if she argues with him, if she goes out without telling
him, if she neglects the children, and if she refuses to have sexual
intercourse with him
• 12 percent of married women said wife beating is acceptable if
women neglect the children
• 5 percent agreed wife beating is justifiable if women go out without
telling their husbands
• 3 percent believed a husband is justified in beating his wife if a
woman argues with him
• 2 percent agreed that wife beating is justified if a woman burns the
food or refuses to have sex with him

41. • Promote the attention of women alone or
with non-shared family responsibilities and
scarce economic resources that are integrated
as singleparent families in which the core are
women with family responsibilities not
shared.

42. The objectives that arise to promote social
inclusion are, among others:
• Work integration from the perspective of
gender in public administrations, to ensure
positive discrimination.

43. • Foster urgent measures rescue it the women
who are at risk of social exclusion and who
suffer double marginalization. On the one
hand, women who are victims of
mistreatment of gender and poverty; and on
the other hand, women who are victims of
prostitution and trafficking in women.

45. References
Leacock, E (1977), ‘ Reflection on Conference on Women and Development’. In Women and
National Development: The Complexity of Change , Wellesley Editorial Committee, pp.320-22.
Chicago, University of Chicago Press
Randall, V. (1987) Women and Politics: an International Perspective Basingstoke: Macmillan 2nd
Edition 1994.
United Nation Development (2005), Human Development Report, 2005.
https://europa.eu/youth/es/article/37/6333_sv?fbclid=IwAR1QHBW7ZJHRQ0OYjNCwPoougJQ8F
dzvg9M0-3R0B3444Un780-wosEtULY