Economic Justice and Rights: A Conversation with Gender Equality Advocates

Introduction

Welcome and acknowledgment of DP World for hosting the event.
Introduction of Sarah Hendricks, Director of the Policy Program in the Intergovernmental Division at UN Women.
Introduction of the panelists: Anuk Highland, Katya Iverson, Francoise Mudut, and Michelle Milford Morse (M3).

Framing the Conversation: Generation Equality

Generation Equality is UN Women's initiative to drive gender equality results.
It addresses backlash, inaction, and under-investment in gender equality.
It brings together stakeholders from governments, the private sector, civil society, youth organizations, philanthropies, and international organizations.
In 2021, over 1,000 commitments were made, totaling approximately $40 billion$ of new investment in gender equality.
The number of commitments has grown to $2,500$ , made to six different action coalitions, including one on economic justice and rights.

Why Economic Justice and Rights Matter

Anita Bhatia, Deputy Executive Director of UN Women, emphasizes the importance of addressing the challenges to gender equality.
Gender equality is going backwards despite some signs of progress.
It's important to look at relative data points and understand where progress stands relative to the baseline.
Hillary Clinton's statement "Women's rights are human rights" is more relevant than ever.
There is a regression in women's rights in places like the U.S., Afghanistan, and Iran.
It is crucial to move from intention to action and implement efforts that matter for women on the ground.

Headline Data Points:

$286$ years before discriminatory laws are eliminated.
$140$ years before there is gender parity in leadership.
$40$ years before equality in parliaments.

Examples of Progress:

The Kenyan government aims to eliminate violence against women.
The Tanzanian president will co-lead the next Generation Equality moment in 2023.
The Indian government is prioritizing gender equality in the G20 agenda.
Companies like DP World are actively supporting gender equality.
Role modeling, naming and shaming, and benchmarking will help drive change, along with male allyship and changing attitudes and social norms.

The Role of the Private Sector in Ensuring Gender-Responsive Supply Chains

Anuk Highland defines a gender-responsive supply chain as one where companies look at responsible business policies and the types of companies within their supply chain.
Unilever has a commitment to pay a living wage in its supply chain and spend up to $2 billion$ annually by 2025 with diverse businesses.
Currently, Unilever has spent approximately $445 million$ , with 65% going to women-owned businesses.
Women-owned enterprises account for only 1% of corporate spend, despite owning a third of the companies.
Investment in women's business success is an investment in them personally, as they invest more in their communities.
Corporations should invest in the business success of women-owned enterprises by providing access to skills, finance, etc.
It's important to work with the right partners to find these businesses.
Procurement policies by government and the private sector can encourage and enable even some quotas, particularly in the public sector, to drive procurement through women-owned enterprises.

Ensuring Gender Equality at the World Economic Forum (WEF)

Katya Iverson notes the poly-crisis of climate, cost of living, COVID, and conflict.
The WEF needs the gender lens in everything it does.
The WEF can inspire, collaborate, and bring companies and governments together to map out solutions.
It's a place where advocates for gender equality can learn something new.
There is a need to learn to take some of the areas of technological progress and apply to the gender equality space.
About 84% of women are in the private sector or the informal sector, highlighting the importance of connecting with companies.
The need is to sharpen our gender-equality game.
There's the WEF as a convening and institutionalizing effort.
For the first time, there's a WEF SRHR (sexual reproductive health and rights) women's health program with a strong gender lens.

Realizing Economic Justice and Rights at a Local Level

Francoise Mudut emphasizes justice, systems, and intersectionality.
There is a shift in language from economic empowerment to economic justice, but more progress is needed.
Economic justice involves dismantling patriarchy.
Interventions should target systems rather than individuals.
A more systemic analysis is needed in how we think about the economy and how it affects women's lives.
Organizations in Africa are leading the way in thinking about issues like tax, debt, and trade with a feminist lens.
Intersectionality is key, and we need to keep in mind that none of us have single-issue lives.
Discrimination based on skin color or sexual orientation needs to be recognized, acknowledged, and addressed in the framing around economic justice.
It's important to talk about economic justice for women, girls, gender non-binary people, gender-expansive people, and Black women.
If your dream is to be equal to a man, you are in a losing condition.

The Role of Philanthropies in Women's Economic Empowerment

Michelle Milford Morse (M3) discusses the increasing role of foundations.
Old ways of thinking about women and economies are being challenged.
Philanthropies are having a meeting of the minds with feminist leaders.
Creating caring societies and addressing the pay gap and discriminatory laws are important.
It's crucial to address mental health and the systems women live in.
Philanthropies have a duty to work with policymakers and the private sector.
There's a need to break through to a more honest, frankly in a more humble place, to a moment of backwards movement on gender equality.
There are fewer women in the global and U.S. workforce now than in 1995.
Only 10% of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are women.
This crisis offers a moment for people to be a little bit more humble and honest.
We need solidarity to ensure women's agency and power.

System Change:

There are discussions about the well-being economy and how to revolutionize the existing economy.
We need to shift focus from short-term profit-oriented to the well-being of people and the planet.
We need to look at budgets in a siloed way.
The idea of a well-being economy often challenges very entrenched notions of how economics runs.
We need to ensure that women's local organizations are at the forefront of movements driving forward economic change.
Investing in movements not because it allows for a better return on our investment, because it transforms.

Lightning Round: Outcomes for Turbocharging Global Economic Justice

Anuk Highland: Companies should look at their scopes of impact and embrace responsibility in their full ecosystem to drive gender equity.
Francoise Mudut: Hope that by the end of the week, we can hear what difference it makes to have movement voices in such a forum and that the takeaway is that we can find ways to make it more systematic—just make it more recurrent in a way that is not tokenistic, but in a way that's really with the aim of changing and people think the way we think about things, bringing the systems change here to Davos.
Katya Iverson: More companies will leave inspired by organizations like Unilever, Estee Lauder, and Procter & Gamble. Wants to see that in the sourcing related to S in the ESG, to women, gets as detailed as fundamental as the environmental in all the sourcing from both public and private sector.
Michelle Milford Morse: Absolute commitment to more economic, political, and social power for women, increased solidarity, and converting those who think they're climate people, digital people, or economists into allies who prioritize gender equality.

Conclusion

Invitation to actors to become Generation Equality commitment makers at the midpoint moment in 2023.
Gratitude to the panel, online participants, and DP World for their support in advancing a vision of a more gender-equal world.