Making men work for the gender cause
When it comes to Indian women, it's always good news and bad news in equal measure. We are number 15 in the world when it comes to political empowerment, but have fallen 13 places, to 114 out of 142 countries according to the World Economic Forum's (WEF) Global Gender Gap Report 2014, which measures equality between the sexes in access to work, education and healthcare. Women are 25 per cent of the Union cabinet, ten per cent of Parliament, nine per cent of MLAs across India, and we've had a woman head of state and head of government.
Yet it doesn't translate to empowerment down the line. What's the solution? Well, the world is doing its best to provide it. UN Women has launched a HeForShe programme, a solidarity movement for gender equality that brings together one half of humanity in support of the other half, for the benefit of all - its champion Emma Watson gave a stirring speech at the United Nations to launch it asking for an end to the us vs them mentality.
The MenEngage Global Alliance wants to re-examine masculinities. Now the World Economic Forum is urging nations to use half the world's talent. Not because it is politically correct or morally essential but because it makes economic sense.
As Saadia Zahidi, head of the gender parity programme at the WEF and one of the authors of the report, points out: "We have to move from a rights-based approach to gender parity to a talent based approach. And no one policy can do it. It has to be a combination of bridging the gender gap in politics, in economic participation, in education, and in healthcare." It is an idea whose time has come. In Japan, getting more women into the workforce is an essential part of Abenomics. Abenomics promises at least 30 per cent women in senior leadership positions by 2020.
Diversity has become part of the national conversation. The argument for it is this: in a rapidly ageing economy where over 40 per cent are over 60 and fertility is shrinking, making women work is smart. In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has already talked of the change in social norms that participatory democracy needs to bring about - that boys need to learn how to behave with girls for gender parity to be effected. But the female workforce in India has been declining, with nine million women dropping out of the work force in the last ten years - according to a report by the International Labor Organisation, between 2004-05 and 2009-10, a period of rapid economic growth in India, female participation in the work force fell from 37 per cent to 29 per cent. The reasons, argues Zahidi, could vary from absence of safety and security at the workplace to the responsibilities of motherhood.
The notion of work itself is different. Women in India on average spend 351.9 minutes every day doing housework, men spend just 51.8 minutes on such duties: a difference of 300.1 minutes. Much as Prime Minister Modi has launched a Swacch Bharat Abhiyan, it's time he launched a campaign to employ more women.
And it shouldn't be just a slogan. It should be accompanied by policy changes such as maternity and paternity leave and access to child care; access to credit for entrepreneurship; and re-skilling, which my colleague Sonali Acharjee refers to in her story "Second Chance at Work". With health improving and fertility rates declining, why should there be an inefficient use of the existing workforce? It's best to start from the top. How did they do it in Japan?
With Prime Minister Shinzo Abe taking the lead and identifying four reasons for the gender gap: the double burden of holding down a job while looking after the family; the inability to use the "anytime/anywhere" performance model; the lack of public and societal support mechanisms; and the limited number of role models and opportunity. We have, for the first time, powerful women ministers in the Cabinet. They should make this an issue, rather than focus on whether IIT and IIM canteens should stick to a vegetarian menu.
And they should ensure it becomes a dialogue with the men. To some this version of feminism looks wimpish, an appeasement in the long drawn out war of the sexes. Why should women have to lobby with men for what is rightfully theirs? But a little gentle persuasion never hurt anyone. And it certainly won't hurt the women's cause. Having it all is no fun with no one to share it with.