Gender in Europe & CIS

The new corporate Gender Equality Strategy 2008-2011, endorsed by the UNDP Gender Steering and Implementation Committee in January 2008, reinforced the prioritization of the integration of gender into the work of UNDP. The RBEC Strategy for 2008-2011 recognizes the weak UNDP internal capacities to implement and monitor its gender-related commitments and prioritizes the development of capacities of the UNDP COs and the national partners to integrate gender into development.

 

UNDP Bratislava Regional Centre held a Capacity Building for Gender Mainstreaming Training on 14-16 April 2008 in Senec, Slovakia, with a participation of UNDP Gender Focal Points from the region. The training equipped the Gender Focal Points and other UNDP projects staff who have been identified as potential gender change agents, with the basic concepts, tools and skills necessary to design and facilitate gender mainstreaming at the country office level. The training was also attended by the programme staff of Bratislava Regional Centre who represent Energy and Environement, HIV and AIDS, Poverty Reduction practices/sub-practices, and also representatives of the PSPD management and Operations. The training has concluded that a follow up with more hands on workshops targeting the Practices and programme teams in Country Offices needs to be undertaken.

 

 

Governance is understood to include a wide range of ways in which the political, social and administrative structure of a society affects the access of its members to basic opportunities, along with a legal framework, accountability and information. UNDP defines governance as “the exercise of political, economic and administrative authority to manage a country’s affairs. It comprises the mechanisms, processes and institutions, through which citizens and groups articulate their interests, exercise their rights, meet their obligations and mediate their differences”.

 

Societies construct elaborate ideas, both descriptive and normative, of what women and men are, and what their proper place and functions and roles in a society is. Gender-balanced participation in governance processes refers, among other, to a “meaningful engagement that stems from a mutual respect for diverse opinions and standpoints”. Apart from formal public structures, mechanisms and processes the decision-making also happens in a family, community and between various groups of a bigger society. In this respect, gender mainstreaming into governance entails “addressing the ways in which both genders participate in and are affected by various systems of governance as well as the interaction between these various systems.

  

While Gender Focal Points and gender experts are formally tasked with facilitating gender mainstreaming, experience has shown that the success of the effort depends on the development of a broad consensus within the Country Offices and among Governmental counterparts, with an aim to have committed group of people within and outside UNDP with the ability, knowledge, skills and tools to facilitate and support the change process. To meet this end, and to follow the Global UNDP and regional RBEC GES 2008-2011 recommendations in general, Bratislava Regional Centre of UNDP aims at building and enhancing capacities of UNDP staff and Government partners in mainstreaming gender perspective into Democratic Governance Practice to have a competent programme staff equipped with tools, skills and concepts for effective integration of gender perspective into all levels of programming.

 

 

 

The aim of the Two-day Training, using the UNDP Gender Mainstreaming in Practice Toolkit, Quick Entry Points to Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equality in Democratic Governance Clusters manual and the Regional Report findings, is to equip Democratic Governance team staff, Gender Focal Points in COs and their partners in the Government with the concepts, tools and skills necessary to design and facilitate gender mainstreaming. For the UNDP COs staff this would mean incorporating gender perspective into the Programming in Democratic Governance Practice at the country office level. For the Government partners this is necessary in addressing gender equality issues in the policy-making processes, implementations of existing laws, and improvement of existing mechanisms with regard to women, governance and leadership

 

The objective is three-fold: