2007/03/01

UNDP and BRIDGE/IDS Panel Discussion on Gender Indicators

Social Watch

Social Watch participated in a panel discussion on “Gender Sensitive Indicators and Measurements of Change” organized by the UNDP and BRIDGE/IDS as a side event of the 51st Session of the Commission on the Status of Women of the United Nations.

The speakers were: Rachel Mayanja, (Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues - OSAGI), Dr. Caren Grown (Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, NY), Dr. Annalise Moser (Consultant), Hanny Cueva Beteta, (United Nations Development Fund for Women - UNIFEM) and Cecilia Alemany (Global Networker, Social Watch).

The event took place March 6, 13.15 to 14.30 at Conference Room A, UN Secretariat, New York.

Achieving gender equality requires inspiring and mobilising social change. This raises many questions. How does change happen? Who or what are agents of change? Where are we starting from? What does 'success' look like? And how do we know if we are on track? How can we understand and build on what works in achieving positive change? How can governments in both North and South be held to account for their international commitments?

We need to move beyond the easy to measure - and to also harness qualitative and participatory techniques in order to explore and measure the difficult to define (such as "empowerment") and the difficult to measure (such as gender-based violence). There is clearly a need for more, focused critical reflection on indicators from a gender perspective - including of the MDGs, and of the gender-focused indicators such as the GDI and GEM.

The speakers on this panel discussion shared their expertise and experiences in addressing the challenges with regard to domains of measurements of gender equality and women's empowerment and the need for re-visiting measurements of progress including the need for global standards and context specific indicators.