Taking action: achieving gender equality and empowering women

Notes
Chapter 1
1. One hundred and seventy-eight states are parties to the convention, the most recent
being Timor-Leste and the Syrian Arab Republic, in early 2003 (Hannan 2003a).
2. Other important conferences of the 1990s with a focus on gender equality include
the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993 and the World Summit on
Social Development in Copenhagen in 1995.
3. At each of the major UN international conferences of the past two decades governments
agreed to a number of time-bound targets, with 1990 as the base year, to serve
as benchmarks of progress (Grown, Rao Gupta, and Khan 2003). While most of these
targets focus on education and health, the Beijing Platform for Action includes a target for
increasing the representation of women in positions of power and decisionmaking. Targets
for decreasing women’s poverty or increasing women’s economic equality are notable by
their absence. Although poverty and women’s economic rights were key themes at both
the Copenhagen and Beijing conferences, governments’ commitments to addressing these
issues did not result.
4. This vision is similar to that put forth by Development Alternatives with Women
for a New Era (DAWN) (Sen and Grown 1987, p. 80).
Chapter 2
1. The task force recognizes that there are cases where interventions must target boys,
for example, in countries with reverse gender gaps in secondary education.
Chapter 3
1. The supply of teachers, even for primary education, depends on investments in
secondary and tertiary education, and this is another reason for focusing on the education
system.
2. This chapter draws from the companion report on achieving universal primary
education, also prepared by the Task Force on Education and Gender Equality (UN Millennium
Project 2005c).
3. Increases in women’s education are associated with declines in fertility around the
globe. But how much education is needed for fertility to decline? A review of 59 studies