Анализ переводческих трансформаций

Mexico passed a law in 2007 toughening its laws on violence against women

And the CEDAW committee in Austria decided two complaints against Austria concerning domestic violence in 2007

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also noted that within the UN itself, the number of women in senior posts has increased by 40 percent

Lack of Progress

Thirty years after the adoption of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), many girls and women still do not have equal opportunities to realize rights recognized by law. In many countries, women are not entitled to own property or inherit land. Social exclusion, “honor” killings, female genital mutilation, trafficking, restricted mobility and early marriage among others, deny the right to health to women and girls and increase illness and death throughout the life-course.

We will not see sustainable progress unless we fix failures in health systems and society so that girls and women enjoy equal access to health information and services, education, employment and political positions.

Inter Press Service notes that progress is mixed:

When it comes to female education rates, progress has been made around the world, and in many countries girls and young women have outnumbered and outperformed boys and men at all levels of schooling for decades.

-- Mario Osava: A report from Human Rights Watch also describes how women's rights have not been observed in some countries as much as expected; in some places claims are made that women's rights will be respected more, yet policies are sometimes not changed enough--or at all--thus still undermining the rights of women.

In some patriarchal societies, religion or tradition can be used as a barrier for equal rights. For example, as Inter Press Service reported, the Bangladesh government tried to hide behind laws to deny women equal rights.

As Amnesty International also points out, “Governments are not living up to their promises under the Women's Convention to protect women from discrimination and violence such as rape and female genital mutilation.” There are many governments who have also not ratified the Convention, including the U.S. Many countries that have ratified it do so with many reservations.

Despite the almost universal ratification of the Convention (second only to the Convention on the Rights of the Child), a number of countries have still not signed or ratified it. The handful of remaining countries are: USA (signed, but not ratified), Iran, Qatar, Cook Islands (a Non-member state of the United Nations), Nauru, Palau, Tonga, Somalia, and Sudan.

To see the US on this list may seem surprising to most, and Human Rights Watch is critical of the delay in getting a ratification, noting that this treaty has been in limbo in the U.S. Senate for decades. It was sent it to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for a vote in 1980. The first hearing on it was 10 years later. After a vote mostly in favor for it by the Foreign Relations Committee in 1994, some conservative senators blocked a US Senate vote on it. In 2002 the Foreign Relations Committee again voted that the treaty should be ratified, but the 107th Congress ended, so it requires a vote again in favor of sending the treaty to the full Senate for ratification!

Some opponents of the treaty have raised fears that it would undermine US law, but Amnesty International USA shows that such fears of the treaty are based on myths.

Women Work More Than Men But Are Paid Less by Anup Shah

The informal slogan of the Decade of Women became “Women do two-thirds of the world's work, receive 10 percent of the world's income and own 1 percent of the means of production.”

Women cultivate, plough, harvest more than half of all the food in the world.

According to Inter Press Service, “ In sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean, they produce up to 80 percent of basic foodstuffs. In Asia, they account for around 50 percent of food production. In Latin America, they are mainly engaged in subsistence farming, horticulture, poultry and raising small livestock.”

Yet women often get little recognition for that. In fact, many go unpaid. It is very difficult for these women to get the financial resources required to buy equipment etc, as many societies still do not accept, or realize, that there is a change in the “traditional” roles.

UNICEF's 2007 report on state of the world's children focused on the discrimination and disempowerment women face throughout their lives and how that impacts children's lives. Reasons for such disparity include the fact that women are generally underpaid and because they often perform low-status jobs, compared to men. UNICEF notes that the data isn't always perfect, and that generalizations such as the above can hide wider fluctuations. “In Brazil, for example, women under the age of 25 earn a higher average hourly wage than their male counterparts.”

UNICEF's main summary of equality in employment included the following points:

For many women, unpaid work in and for the household takes up the majority of their working hours, with much less time spent in remunerative employment. Even when they participate in the labour market for paid employment, women still undertake the majority of the housework.

When women work outside the household, they earn, on average, far less than men. They are also more likely to work in more precarious forms of employment with low earnings, little financial security and few or no social benefits.

Women not only earn less than men but also tend to own fewer assets. Smaller salaries and less control over household income constrain their ability to accumulate capital. Gender biases in property and inheritance laws and in other channels of acquiring assets also leave women and children at greater risk of poverty.

Paid employment for women does not automatically lead to better outcomes for children. Factors such as the amount of time women spend working outside the household, the conditions under which they are employed and who controls the income they generate determine how the work undertaken by women in the labour market affects their own well-being and that of children.

The middle years

“A principal focus of the middle years of childhood and adolescence is ensuring access to, and completion of, quality primary and secondary education. With a few exceptions, it is mostly girls who suffer from educational disadvantage.”

Adolescence

“Among the greatest threats to adolescent development are abuse, exploitation and violence, and the lack of vital knowledge about sexual and reproductive health, including HIV/AIDS.” Specific areas that UNICEF highlighted were female genital mutilation/cutting; child marriage and premature parenthood; sexual abuse, exploitation and trafficking; sexual and reproductive health; and HIV/AIDS.

Motherhood and old age

These are “two key periods in many women's lives when the pernicious effects of both poverty and inequality can combine.” Shockingly, “It is estimated that each year more than half a million women--roughly one woman every minute--die as a result of pregnancy complications and childbirth,” 99% of which occur in developing countries. Yet “many of these women's lives could be saved if they had access to basic health care services.” In addition, elderly women may face double discrimination on the basis of both gender and age. Many older women are plunged into poverty at a time of life when they are very vulnerable. However, “children's rights are advanced when programmes that seek to benefit children and families also include elderly women.”

Feminization of Poverty

The “feminization of poverty” is a phenomenon that is unfortunately on the increase. Basically, women are increasingly the ones who suffer the most poverty.

At the same time that women produce 75 to 90 percent of food crops in the world, they are responsible for the running of households. According to the United Nations, in no country in the world do men come anywhere close to women in the amount of time spent in housework. Furthermore, despite the efforts of feminist movements, women in the core [wealthiest, Western countries] still suffer disproportionately, leading to what sociologist refer to as the “feminization of poverty,” where two out of every three poor adults are women.

This then also affects children, which makes the dire situation even worse. For example, even in the richest country in the world, the USA, the poorest are women caring for children.

The lending strategies to developing countries by institutions such as the IMF and World Bank have affected many women in those countries.

Poverty, trade and economic issues are very much related to women's rights issues due to the impacts they can have. Tackling these issues as well also helps to tackle women's rights issues. And, tackling gender issues helps tackle poverty-related issues.

Women and children: the double dividend of gender equality

Healthy, educated and empowered women have healthy, educated and confident daughters and sons. Gender equality will not only empower women to overcome poverty and live full and productive lives, but will better the lives of children, families and countries as well.

Women's equal rights and influence in the key decisions that shape their lives and those of children must be enhanced in three distinct arenas: the household, the workplace and the political sphere

A change for the better in any one of these realms influences women's equality in the others, and has a profound and positive impact on child's well-being and development.

Gender equality is not only morally right, it is pivotal to human progress and sustainable development

Achieving Millennium Development Goal Number 3--promoting gender equality and empowering women--will also contribute to achieving all the other goals, from reducing poverty and hunger to saving children's lives, improving maternal health, ensuring universal education, combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, and ensuring environmental sustainability.

Women and Climate Change

Many of the above factors also combine to make women more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) explains:

Women--particularly those in poor countries--will be affected differently than men. They are among the most vulnerable to climate change, partly because in many countries they make up the larger share of the agricultural work force and partly because they tend to have access to fewer income-earning opportunities. Women manage households and care for family members, which often limits their mobility and increases their vulnerability to sudden weather-related natural disasters. Drought and erratic rainfall force women to work harder to secure food, water and energy for their homes. Girls drop out of school to help their mothers with these tasks. This cycle of deprivation, poverty and inequality undermines the social capital needed to deal effectively with climate change.

Women and the Media

Even media attention on women who help and fight for certain causes is distorted. For example, Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR) analyzed U.S. media reporting during the British Princess Diana's funeral, and noted that the U.S. media typically concentrate only on a few people like the late Diana and Mother Teresa who had some sort of celebrity type status, and rarely reported on the thousands of others doing similar work.

In 1985 there was a conference in Nairobi, Kenya, to formulate strategies for advancing women's rights. This was followed by a “plan of action” defined in 1995, in Beijing.

It has been recognized and agreed for a while that successful development also involves gender equality. The goals of this conference then was to reflect on the promised provisions of equality, development and peace for all women everywhere.

It was also pointed out at UN session that Women continued to be deprived of basic and fundamental rights because of measures imposed in certain countries.

In fact, some were even opposed to moving forward on such important issues, such as Holy See (the Vatican), Nicaragua, Sudan and Libya and sometimes Iraq and various other nations on particular issues such as reproductive rights, even freedom of expression (Libya and the Vatican opposed this). The Vatican, Iran and some other delegations even wanted to delete references to sexual and reproductive rights and health in the Current Challenges section of the review document.

Regarding the Vatican (the Holy See), there was growing concern at their role as permanent observer, where they are considered to be more than a non-governmental organization (NGO), but less than a nation. They therefore have some influence and have been criticized at the way they have affected some UN decisions regarding gender-related issues to be more effectively pushed forward. Some NGOs and organizations from the third world trying to fight for women's rights also felt they were left out of the conference.

Human Rights Watch

15 years on from the 1995 Beijing conference, and a decade after the conference described above, there was a 2-week meeting on women's rights progress once again. Technically, this was the 54th session of the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) to report on global efforts toward democracy and human development through the empowerment of women.

Inter Press Service (IPS) reported on the conference suggesting mixed feelings on the outcome; while there was improved understanding on some issues, there were still a number of political uncertainties.

Women, Militarism and Violence

It is often argued--and accepted--that women, being the “gentler sex”, and typically being the main care givers in society, are less aggressive than men. Feminists often argue that women, if given appropriate and full rights, could counter-balance a male-dominated world which is characterized by aggression in attitudes, thoughts, society and, ultimately, war.

In May 2004, the Occupation/Coalition forces in Iraq were shown around the world to be committing torture and other grotesque acts on Iraqi captives. For feminists and others, what was also shocking was that some of these acts were being perpetrated by women in the U.S. military.

Feminist activist Barbara Ehrenreich captures some of the thoughts and reactions quite well:

Secretly, I hoped that the presence of women [in the U.S. army] would over time change the military, making it more respectful of other people and cultures, more capable of genuine peacekeeping. That's what I thought, but I don't think that anymore.

A certain kind of feminism, or perhaps I should say a certain kind of feminist naivete, died in Abu Ghraib [the prison facility from where most of the torture pictures and footage originated]. It was a feminism that saw men as the perpetual perpetrators, women as the perpetual victims and male sexual violence against women as the root of all injustice. Rape has repeatedly been an instrument of war and, to some feminists, it was beginning to look as if war was an extension of rape. There seemed to be at least some evidence that male sexual sadism was connected to our species' tragic propensity for violence. That was before we had seen female sexual sadism in action.

… But the assumption [within feminism] of [women's] superiority [over men], or at least a lesser inclination toward cruelty and violence, was more or less beyond debate. After all, women do most of the caring work in our culture, and in polls are consistently less inclined toward war than men.

… If that assumption had been accurate, then all we would have had to do to make the world a better place--kinder, less violent, more just--would have been to assimilate into what had been, for so many centuries, the world of men.

… What we need is a tough new kind of feminism with no illusions. Women do not change institutions simply by assimilating into them, only by consciously deciding to fight for change. We need a feminism that teaches a woman to say no--not just to the date rapist or overly insistent boyfriend but, when necessary, to the military or corporate hierarchy within which she finds herself.

-- Barbara Ehrenreich notes that gender equality often appears to be limited to allowing women to have equality in a male-dominated world, meaning women struggle to have rights to do what men do. But, if what men are doing is generally seen as negative, then gender equality in that context is not enough. As she ends:

To cite an old, and far from naive, feminist saying: “If you think equality is the goal, your standards are too low.” It is not enough to be equal to men, when the men are acting like beasts. It is not enough to assimilate. We need to create a world worth assimilating into.

Profit over people by Anup Shah

As the world globalizes, multinational corporations are also coming under more scrutiny, as questions about their accountability are also being raised.

In some cases, some corporations have lobbied their governments to aggressively support regimes that are favorable to them. For example, especially in the 1970s and 80s, some tacitly supported dictatorships as they could control their own people, be more easily influenced and corrupted, allow conditions like cheap labor and sweatshops, and so on. This is less practical today as a company's image with such associations can more readily be tarnished today. Increasingly then, influence is being spread through lobbying for global economic and trade arrangements that are more beneficial to themselves.

This can be accomplished through various means including:

Tacitly supporting military interventions (often dressed in propaganda about saving the people from themselves, or undoing a wrong in the other country and so on)

Pushing for economic policies that are heavily weighted in their favor

Foreign investment treaties and other negotiations designed in part to give more abilities for corporations to expand into other poorer countries possibly at the expense of local businesses.

Following an ideology which is believed to be beneficial to everyone, but hides the realities and complexities that may worsen situations. These ideologies can be influential as some larger corporations may indeed benefit from these policies, but that does not automatically mean everyone else will, and power and such interests may see these agendas being pushed forth more so.

However, with this expansion and drive for further profits, there has often come a disregard for human rights. In some cases, corporations have been accused for hiring local militaries to subdue and even kill people who are protesting the effects and practices of these corporations, such as the various controversies over oil corporations and resource and mineral companies in parts of Africa have highlighted.

As globalization has increased in the past decade or two, so has the criticisms. Whether it is concerns at profits over people as the driving factor, or violations of human rights, or large scale tax avoidance by some companies, some large multinationals operating in developing countries in particular have certainly had many questions to answer.

The pressure to compete has often meant fighting against social clauses and policies that may lead to more costs for the company where other companies may not be subject to the same restrictions. The fear of losing out in competition then drives many companies to a lower common denominator rather than a higher one.

And so there is a downward pressure on worker's wages and their working conditions because they are such major costs for many operations.

Many multinationals encourage the formation of export processing zones in developing countries which end up being areas where worker's rights are reduced. This way they are able to play off countries against each other; if one tries to improve worker or living standards in some way, the company can threaten to move operations to another zone in another country. Some developing countries such as China also benefit from this arrangement as it makes them more competitive in international markets.

For many, the implication for this situation is that the right to form unions need to be supported. The topic of unions can cause debate and resentment from companies and free trade advocates.

On the one hand unions are supposed to represent worker's and their rights. Without unions in some sectors workers have little ability to demand fairer conditions and pay from a more influential and powerful employee.

On the other hand, in an increasingly globalized world, companies struggle to compete with each other, especially where standards vary.

The enormous labor costs means that companies from countries with higher standards are at a competitive disadvantage. Rather than a global effort to improve working conditions for everyone, it seems easier--and more profitable--for companies and countries to argue for lower conditions.

The political effect of this is also increased control and influence; with less organized labor force, the political power is more firmly in the hands of a few powerful elite.

It is quite easy to demonize unions as well because the disruption they can cause (e.g. if the union is for some public service) can easily be shown to be a hindrance for the general population. Media coverage often looks at the inconvenience of the general population and hints at the unreasonable demands unions make.

(As a Human Rights Watch report details, it is not just developing countries where this problem exists; even the United States suffers from the denial of such rights.)

Lobbying at international institutions such as the World Trade Organization also helps them see more favorable conditions and the companies with more money can wield more influence, creating an imbalanced playing field.

Constructive Engagement

Some corporations and think tanks argue that their actions can actually be positive. Their “constructive engagement” allows the spread of democracy, new technologies, human rights and so on to those regions, which, over time, would allow more positive benefits to be realized.

This sounds nice and comforting and there are certainly cases where this happens. With globalization in general, cross cultural communication is occurs far quicker than ever before. Often those countries which have been dictatorships are often regimes that have been placed in power, or supported, by western nations and the larger corporations have benefited from the dictatorships' ability to control their own people.

In some countries, large corporations have even funded media suppression or military activities against workers, themselves.

Human rights conditions have hardly improved due to corporate activities and the technologies brought in are usually still owned by the company itself, so that the self-empowering benefits of technology transfer is less than what it could be.

However, some public pressure has forced certain large companies to address their human rights issues. Such companies include large oil corporations like BP Amoco and Statoil. The constructive engagement argument is then seen as a nice cover to continue exploitative practices.

… As governments spend resources on EPZs [Export Processing Zones], they foresake the opportunity to “create more jobs for the same amount of money by investing in and supporting small enterprises serving the local market.” EPZs require government funds which could be used elsewhere for projects that directly help the poor. Their growth is coming at the expense of the poor.

With respect to tourism foreign exchange earnings for developing countries are “often lower than the income figure might lead one to believe”, says a UN report. The difference is due to “leakages”--the percentage of the tourist's money which does not stay in the country being visited, but which goes instead to the foreign-owned airline, tour operator and hotel. These figures are significant. They show that a great deal more foreign exchange stays in a country when hotels are locally owned.

We hear more and more about philanthropic organizations set up by mega-successful business elites, where millions of dollars are donated to seemingly worthy causes. However, the fact that such donations are needed also serves as an indication that development policies and globalization policies in their current form are not sustainable! The following quote summarizes this notion quite well:

It is all very well for Bill Gates to charitably donate $750m to pay for immunization programmes for certain diseases, as he recently announced he would do, and for James Wolfensohn to urge transnational companies setting up in poor countries to contribute financially directly to local education services. Societies which depend on such largess to meet their basic health and education needs are neither sustainable, democratic nor equitable--yet new dimensions of power are ceded to large companies.

Economic Power also wields Political Power

While the drive for efficiency is always a good thing (as it should help prevent wasting resources), oftentimes, the goal of keeping these costs down also leads to reducing wages, working conditions and often the basic rights of people.

This occurs because these corporations and even some nations seek out places where poor labor regulations can be taken advantage of in an unfair way, or by not supporting--or even opposing--international or national bodies and policies that could help to ensure fairness.

And regarding the notion of efficiency, there is a difference between an industry or corporation driving towards efficiency for maximizing profits, versus driving towards efficiency that would benefit society.

To highlight this point further, take for example the illegal drug or tobacco industries. They, like other industries need to operate efficiently and minimize unnecessary costs. However, their impact on society is negative to say the least.

Точно также, другие отрасли промышленности, такие как автомобильная/транспортная промышленность, отрасли здравоохранения. Некоторые транснациональные корпорации делают продажами больше, чем ВВП (Внутренний валовой продукт) многих стран. Из 10000 самых дорогих объектов, 51% принадлежит корпорациям. В то время как это может восприниамться как успешное заявление с некоторых точек зрения, другие предполагают, что эти и другие большие корпорации в значительной степени не несут ответственности за многие социальные проблемы и проблемы окружающей среды, которые они за собой оставляют, а их их размер означает, что их влияние заслуживает внимания.

In the same way, other industries, such as the automobile/transportation industries, health industries. Some transnational corporations make more in sales than the GDPs (Gross Domestic Product) of many countries! Of the 100 hundred wealthiest bodies, 51 percent are owned by corporations. While this can be seen as a success story from some viewpoints, others suggest that these and other large corporations are largely unaccountable for the many social and environmental problems that they leave in their wake, and that their size means that their effects are considerable.

It is not that every single corporation is inherently bad or greedy or something like that, but oftentimes, the very large, multinational corporations who naturally have vested interests in international development and trade policies (like any group) are able to deploy enormous financial resources in an attempt to get favorable outcomes. The political power that is therefore held by such a small number of people impacts the planet significantly. As a result a few of these corporations make up some of the most influential sources of political and economic power.

Despite its prominence in political debate, corporate power and its systems of checks and balances are not well understood. Corporate power at its current level was not foreseen by early lawmakers and constitutional scholars, and its foundation in law is uneasy and inconsistent. But it is clear that the question of the legitimacy of corporate power in the United States has been transformed.

Originally, the government had to review and specifically approve each corporate charter as being essential for a specific purpose that was in the public interest. Now one does not ask so much as notify the state that a corporation has been created. Anyone can incorporate for any activity that is not illegal. And the corporation, granted at least some of the constitutionally protected right of free speech originally contemplated for individual citizens, has now been accorded the right to question and challenge whether government is acting in the public interest.

In fact, government is now as much a creation of business as the other way around. Businesses grew so fast that there was no opportunity for other national institutions to develop adequate power to filter the impact of commerce on civil life. So Big Business begot Big Government. Because the goals of business are not always identical to the goals of society (which is partially a failure of the corporate governance system), some institution was needed to harmonize the undoubted benefits of active commerce with the various needs of other constituencies. In the United States, this organization was the federal government, the only other major national institution.

Through influencing governments, larger multinational companies especially, with their enormous resources wield significant political as well as economic power as also highlighted by the above quote as witnessed by the 2000 Presidential Election in the United States, where corporate donations to both Bush and Gore were in the millions of dollars.

Will Corporations “Rule the World”?

For all the vivid examples of modern corporate power, such as the annual income of Motorola being equal to the annual income of Nigeria's 118 million people, it is folly to believe that big business on its own is shaping the new world order. This allows the argument against globalisation to be depoliticised, reducing it to single issues of “ethical trading” and “codes of conduct”, and inviting its co-option. Above all, it misses the point that state power in the west is accelerating.

-- John Pilger: A common perception is that due to the enormous influences and power of many major multinationals, corporations are therefore going to “rule the world”; that corporations will reduce the need for a government and will dismantle the state. Yet, this is not completely true.

Corporations still require the state to provide them the environment conducive to their needs.

The state may reduce its functions and obligations and thus “roll back” its commitment to its people, but that doesn't mean that they won't be needed and become obsolete.

Such rollback will also enable decision-making (and therefore control) to be further concentrated.

This “rollback” happens both in the North and the South.

The South has been “structurally adjusted” to open up the economy and roll back the functions of the state, and even concentrates further the decision-making. That is, these IMF-, World Bank-prescribed policies have reduced democracy. In the North, in countries ranging from New Zealand, to the United Kingdom, and most aggressively in the United States, the functions of the government have been constantly rolled back. Less is spent on health, education etc, while more on military, policing and so on.

Yet governments will still be required to provide repressive functions to “keep the rabble in line” so to speak, as described by Noam Chomsky.

They will also be required to help create or open up markets, or even provide military support for such things (as described in the military expansion section on this site).

Also, an interception of society's wealth is sometimes provided to large businesses to just survive. Western nations provide a lot of protectionism to their industries, while forcing the poor countries to completely open up. If there was true free trade and fair competition, many wealthy western corporations might not be able to survive, as John Pilger suggests. So, while corporate influence increases and continually drives many aspects of our lives, from influencing and even buying elections, public policy and so on, they still require a government that functions to serve their needs as well. International institutions such as the IMF, World Bank, and World Trade Organization, are also needed. The irony is that by often using tax payer money, the tax payer unwittingly supporting a process that is leading to more exploitation of tax payers. For the poor countries, the multinational corporations of the west are seen as further extensions of those western nations.

As the post September 11, 2001 corporate scandals have shown in the U.S., even U.S. multinationals are not exempt from all issues. Corporate accountability has come to the fore especially for shareholders due to accounting and other scandals (though there are still concerns of corporate welfare going on by using the war on terror as an excuse -- sometimes legitimate, sometimes not). As one example, the L.A. Times reported that “In a setback for multinational corporations, a federal appeals panel ruled that they can be held liable in U.S. courts for aiding and abetting human rights violations committed by others abroad.” A number of multinationals have been accused for gross human rights violations around the world, as briefly discussed in various sections on this site, and as that L.A. Times provides an example of.

It is possible therefore, that with the drive for real democracy and accountability at all levels of society that the interests and influences of big multinationals and others that are currently regarded by many as having a negative impact may perhaps be checked appropriately, though history has shown that this is no easy task. The above example from the L.A. Times is just one small step.

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