Originally published on the CGS blog on April 13, 2015.
A few weeks ago, my professor did something I’m not used to witnessing in liberal Berkeley, California: he made a sexist comment. Discussing Chinese military expansion at length, and feeling the lack of energy in the room, he tried (and failed) to lighten the mood with a joke: “I’m sure the women are bored by this, they’d rather I go back to talking about Hello Kitty.”
My jaw dropped only slightly further than yours.
It’s that not that I am so naïve as to think sexism is dead, I had just never witnessed it so blatantly and so close to home (my very progressive, liberal home). Growing up, I was blessed to be surrounded by the image of equality: all my class rooms were more or less 50% girls, I’ve always had female state senators representing me, and both my parents have the same graduate degree. In my eyes, my corner of the world appeared to be equal.
But numbers can be deceiving. After all, the room to which my professor made his “joke” was over 50% women; and yet, sexism was still 100% there.
This is exactly the point being made by Andrea Cornwall, a professor of anthropology and development at the University of Sussex: a focus on improving the numbers often overlooks and inhibits reducing the stereotypes and institutional standards that created gender inequality in the first place. As she eloquently argues:
…while the push to fulfill the numerical targets set by the MDGs gets billions of dollars, the transformational work of women’s organisations is often absent from decision-making tables and starved of funds…the development industry has entrenched tired and limiting stereotypes and left untouched the deep structures of privilege and power.
And for the most part, achieving “numerical targets” is all the World Bank’s Millennial Development Goals have sought to do. Millennium Development Goal #3 (MDG3) “has one target: the elimination of gender disparity in primary, secondary and tertiary education by 2015…progress on the goal is tracked by the ratio of girls to boys in class, the share of women in paid employment in sectors other than agriculture, and the proportion of female MPs in national parliaments.” While increasing numbers is undoubtedly a necessary step toward gender equality, this goal failed to address about every other issue needed to reach true gender equality, namely eliminating violence against women, increasing access to assets and resources (such as land), and ending discriminatory laws and constitutions, among many others.
Moving forward, the Sustainable Development Goals have the opportunity to build on the numerical successes of the MDGs. Some of these goals’ “proposed targets include ending violence, eliminating harmful practices, recognising the value of unpaid care, ensuring that women have full participation – and equal opportunities – in decision-making, and calling for reforms to give women equal access to economic resources.”
Yet, changing these embedded structures of female inferiority is not easy; even in the progressive halls of UC Berkeley, remnants of gender inequality still remain. Part of the issue is time – many of these ideas are ingrained in our cultures, religions, and societies. But removing these ideas is also a matter of effort. What “effort” looks like exactly, however, may differ in certain countries. As I noted in a past blog post, one form of “effort” is through education and economic improvements, in which case numerical targets make sense. But yet another form of “effort” is more localized and social: creating networks of support for women that give them the tools to succeed, in spite of structural barriers.
Take Guliaim Aiylchy, a native of Kyrgyzstan who only employs women at her café and bar. Bemoaning the seeming reversal of womens’ status with the resurgence of the hijab (though it should be noted the hijab is not always a symbol of male dominance), Aiylchy seeks “to support women and fight from the inside.” Maybe the first step then is individual: personally supporting gender equality even if all you can do is speak out against those stereotypes that inhibit it. In the aftermath of the “joke”, I was pleased by the passionate and allied responses from both female and male classmates; if only it was this way everywhere else.
On the Guardian’s list of 15 achievements by MDG3, only 4 were regarding changes in laws that effect gender equality. While the other numerical achievements are significant, I hope to live in the world where our successes are measured not only by a number on a page, but also by the quality of our experiences.
