Beyond Laws: the right to be a woman

WOMEN: International Women's Day which falls tomorrow is an occasion marked by women's groups around the world. When women on all continents, often divided by national boundaries and by ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic and political differences, come together to celebrate their Day, they can look back to a tradition that represents decades of struggle for equality, justice, peace and development.

Established in 1975 by the United Nations, this special day provides us an opportunity to celebrate the progress made to advance equality for our women and to assess the challenges that remain. This day also provides an opportunity to consider steps to bring about equality for women in all their diversity.

Despite impressive human development indicators, Sri Lanka still has a long way to go in fully utilising the skills and talents of its female citizens to move the country's development and peace processes forward.

It is right that we have experienced considerable progress in human development since our independence from colonial rule in 1948. Indicators such as life expectancy, literacy and infant, child and maternal mortality are impressive at a national level, and are directly correlated with historically high Government investment in basic health and education.

However, UNDP reports indicate that although the level of gender development in Sri Lanka is higher than average for an Asian country, gender empowerment (compared with modern standards) is relatively low. This despite its being the first country in the world to produce a female PM and a President.

Our law guarantees women and men equal rights, opportunities and responsibilities in all aspects of life. Despite these legal foundations, a gap remains between laws and the reality of women's lives. Many issues from the past, such as violence and poverty, have not been resolved.

Today, as women join the labour force in record numbers, raise families and participate in their communities, barriers remain. These barriers keep women, whether they are rural women, women with disabilities, single women, lone parents or women living in poverty, from realizing their full potential.

Around 22 per cent of all households in Sri Lanka are female-headed. Many of these women have been thrust into the role of breadwinner due to no fault of theirs but with little knowledge of income-earning skills.

On the other hand, when it comes to employment, the female unemployment rate, at 22 per cent, is double that of men in Sri Lanka.

When they do find work, it is usually in low-status, low-skilled and low-paying jobs in peasant and plantation agriculture and garment sector.

The majority of jobs available to them are in the unorganised and informal sectors, which are outside the purview of labour regulations. This same fate awaits the women who represent unskilled migrant labour force working in oil-rich countries.

Besides these, the largest proportion of women in the informal sector is engaged in cultivation. A growing threat to the livelihood security of these women is the increasing mechanisation of agriculture.

Sri Lankan society still has to accept the reality of a shared world where men and women divide their rights, responsibilities and emotions equally. We still live in a very male culture and access to the power-centres must open up to women. Our women have the academic qualifications; women now equal men at higher studies.

They have proved their worth but there are still immense difficulties in reaching the top or coming anywhere near it. We have to educate our society with new values which start with the very basics, like eradicating domestic violence against women, but go much further than that. We have to do so in the family, in schools and through the media.

Women also have to change their own perceptions of how they live and their role in society. The old-fashioned notion that women were nothing except in their relationship towards a male protector figure, as daughter, sister, wife or mother, is changing.

The stereotype of the frustrated spinster is dying, but it's being replaced by another equally dangerous one of the woman who chooses to live alone as being selfish.

Finally, we must tackle one of the great sources of poverty - emotional poverty that follows the great change in women's role in society which has been more recent. There is a great incidence of poor-quality relationships in which men are unable, unwilling, unprepared or uneducated to fulfil women's needs, which causes misery to both sexes.

So what are we celebrating today? The political gurus will say, "the myriad of advances that have improved the lives of our women over the past three decades." But still, there is plenty to think about, today and everyday because no enduring solution to society's most threatening social, economic and political problems can be found without the full participation, and the full empowerment, of the country's women.