selected feature news

"Lebanon's women marginalized in politics, business"

Read the Article at Daily Star

By Dalila Mahdawi

BEIRUT: Lebanese women must be given greater roles in their country’s political and economic systems, especially in the wake of the current financial crisis, a United Nations (UN) report said this week.

The “World Survey on the Role of Women in Development,” published every five years by the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs, argued that increasing women’s access to resources would have positive implications for development goals, like child welfare, economic growth and poverty reduction.

Undersecretary for Economic Affairs Shu Zukang said he hoped the study would offer “an improved understanding of gender equality implications, of economic development, and guide the design of gender-sensitive policy measures that will increase women’s access to, and control over, economic and financial resources.”

Trailing behind women in other countries, Arab women hold only 9 percent of positions classified as having “status, influence, power and decision-making authority,” the UN report said. Lebanese women-led small enterprises represented only 17 percent of the loans of formal institutions in 2006, compared to 47 percent in Tunisia or 32 percent in the United Arab Emirates.

“Given their limited access to formal finance, women financed their businesses mainly through personal sources such as savings and support from friends and family, as well as by reinvesting their business earnings.”

Although Lebanese women are increasingly entering the labor market, no substantial increase has taken place between women and men in the sharing of unpaid work, such as care giving or domestic responsibilities.

The report said many women from lower-income families are forced to take up self-employment as a means to balance their home and family duties.

A lack of social care services in Lebanon was identified by the UN as severely hindering women’s labor-force participation. The fact that a majority of Lebanese women (some 57 percent) work informally, without the support of unions or insurance, means they face additional threats to keeping their jobs or when demanding higher wages.

“Despite considerable progress on many aspects of women’s economic empowerment through – [among other things] – increases in educational attainment and share of paid work, deeply entrenched inequality persists as a result of discriminatory norms and practices, and the pace of change has been slow and uneven across regions,” the report said. “Women continue to be absent from key decision-making forums shaping the allocation of economic and financial resources and opportunities, which further perpetuates gender inequality.”

Even in comparison with their regional neighbors, Leba­nese women remain largely excluded from political positions, occupying less than two percent of political posts, compared to 47 percent in Sweden or 20 percent in Iraq. A national commission to draft a new electoral law in 2005 suggested introducing a 30 percent women’s quota, but was rejected by the Lebanese government. The Middle East region’s average of 9.7 percent for women in parliaments also stands in stark contrast to the global average of 18.5 percent.

The need to address women’s economic and political participation was especially urgent in light of the global financial crisis, the report said. “The manner in which countries respond to the recession can have disproportionate impacts on women … particularly through cuts in public spending on health and education and through inequitably designed safety nets.”

“Appropriate responses [to gender discrimination] will facilitate both achievement of gender equality and empowerment of women and economic growth and long-term prosperity,” Zukang said.

The survey recommended stimulus packages be directed at equal employment opportunities and encouraged gender-responsive budgeting to ensure funding for women’s empowerment projects.