Issues & Analysis

Under the shade of a tree at an Istanbul cafe, Suzan, a voluptuous woman in her 50s with dyed blond hair and a warm, generous smile, describes how she went from teenage bride to full-time sex worker.

Life isn't easy for the female migrants continually flowing into Istanbul from Turkey's Kurdish region. Those who are illiterate or unable to speak Turkish can face particularly intense isolation from basic services.

It’s one of the biggest online success stories of the decade, attracting a staggering 10 million monthly uniques faster than any site in history. But what makes the rise of the image-sharing Pinterest surprising isn’t its stampeding growth, or its sudden ubiquity on your friends’ Facebook walls. It’s the fact that it’s a raging success story with an unmistakably female bent.

(WNN) WASHINGTON, D.C., United States: In an effort to stop a rising tide with the use of online networks for human trafficking, two U.S. Representatives of Congress, Republican Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, along with Democrat Carolyn Maloney of New York, have sent a bipartisan letter to the largest online search engine in the world – Google, Inc. 

NEW YORK (TrustLaw) - Nearly two decades after war ended in Bosnia and Herzegovina, hundreds of women who survived rape and torture in the conflict are still seeking reparations and justice, with only 40 cases of sexual violence having been prosecuted so far, an Amnesty International report says.

Hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," has generated widespread media attention this year. The process, which injects water and chemicals into the ground to release "natural" gas and oil from shale bedrock, has been shown to contribute significantly to air and water pollution and has even been linked to earthquakes. But little has been reported on the ways in which fracking may have unique impacts on women. Chemicals used in fracking have been linked to breast cancer and reproductive health problems and there have been reports of rises in crimes against women in some fracking "boom" towns, which have attracted itinerant workers with few ties to the community.

PORT MORESBY, 6 April 2012 (IRIN) - In the Pacific nation of Papua New Guinea (PNG) sexual violence against young girls, and the shame and stigma that follows, is forcing many out of school and others into early marriage

The challenge of gender parity in South Sudan is less in the provisions of the constitution but more in implementation of the rights provided for at the state and local levels.

One: Gender is not the study of what is evident, it is an analysis of how what is evident came to be.

It’s 50 years since the Algerian revolution, the war which eventually led to Algeria gaining independence from France after nearly eight years of bitter conflict, terrorism and social disintegration.

When The Atlantic's article "The End of Men" came out over a year ago, I, likemany women, was irritated. But it took me a long time to understand why I found the article so grating. 

BAGHDAD, Mar 16, 2012 (IPS) - Dozens of bodies bludgeoned to death pop up in Baghdad’s dusty streets like the remains of a wreckage on a beach. They are the corpses of homosexuals and followers of the ‘emo’ fashion who dare to break with the strict canons of the Shia orthodoxy in power.

"Today, Trial Chamber I issued the first ever trial judgement of the International Criminal Court (ICC), in the case against Thomas Lubanga Dyilo (Lubanga). This is the first time a Trial Chamber of the ICC has issued a judgement on the guilt or innocence of the accused. The Trial Chamber convicted Lubanga of the war crimes of conscripting and enlisting children under the age of 15 and using them to participate actively in hostilities from 1 September 2002 to 13 August 2003. The case involved two stays of proceedings, an adjournment, 67 witnesses and the participation of 129 victims.

Promising methods of tracking aid funding intended to improve women's and girls' livelihoods also offer the possibility of revealing whether donors and policymakers are walking the walk when it comes to gender financing.

Lydia Alpizar Duran, Executive Director of AWID, presented on findings from AWID's 2011 global Survey "Where is the Money for Women's Rights?" on a panel at the 56th Session of CSW yesterday. The survey assessed the quality and quantity of funding available to women’s organizations.

TILLABERI/KIGALI/JOHANNESBURG, 8 March 2012 (IRIN) - The UN theme for International Women’s Day - “Empower rural women - end poverty and hunger”, probably does not mean much to people like Hani Issa, a woman in rural southwestern Niger trying single-handedly to feed her seven grandchildren. 

Farida Shaheed is a sociologist with over 25 years’ research experience on women’s issues (including rural development, women and labour and legal rights), especially in Pakistan and South Asia. She is a long-time UNRISD collaborator, and joins us with an interview on the occasion of International Women’s Day. Her article on politics, religion and gender in Pakistan has been published in a special issue of Cahier du Genre entitled “Religion et politique: Les femmes prises au piège”. In this interview, she speaks to UNRISD about International Women’s Day, laws on women’s rights in Pakistan and some of the challenges in implementing them.

The working group on Women and Armed Conflict (Mesa de Trabajo Mujer y Conflicto Armado) and the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women’s Rights -CLADEM, express their indignation and rejects: the repeated acts of violence, constant attacks against the liberty and sexual integrity, threats, and harassment that women leaders and human rights defenders are facing because of their participation in capacity-building processes for women and young people in situation of displacement; the absence of guarantees and protection measures to prevent these crimes by the state; and the impunity that protects these crimes.

"The United Nations’ 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) opened Monday in New York, with the empowerment of rural women high on a list of priorities for this year.

For the past twenty years Moroccan women, from the liberal camp to the Islamist, have campaigned for equal rights for women. Their struggle has borne many triumphs and is gradually beginning to change the lives of women throughout the country. But how will they face the new challenges presented by Morocco's first Islamist-majority government?

Agriculture currently provides a livelihood for roughly 1.3 billion smallholder farmers and landless workers, of which nearly half – close to 560 million – are women.
This is the first of a two-part series on rural women, climate change and food security.

The Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID) is gravely concerned about the reintroduction of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda's Parliament on February 7th, 2012. At the bill's reintroduction, the Speaker informed the House that the bill will not need to be considered again by the "Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee", thereby making the process faster and raising the possibility of it becoming law.

Women were at the vanguard in the protests that ousted Hosni Mubarak. But long-held sexism has reasserted itself at the hands of the military and the Islamists.

On Wednesday February 8^th, Egypt’s head of military court has made a statement urging media outlet to halt the coverage on the “Virginity Tests” case. This decision came at the backdrop of the unraveling court case filed by Samira Ibhrahim.  But who is Samira Ibrahim and why does the Military Forces want to ban publication on the matter?

The 2012 World Development Report (WDR) is a watershed moment: it is the first time that the World Bank, the world’s largest and most influential development institution, has devoted its flagship publication to gender. Kate Bedford of the University of Kent argues that the report leaves the Bank failing to face up to its role in perpetuating policies that harm women, and is seriously limited in its approach to women’s movements, markets, and households.