CEDAW’s promise to counter gender discrimination.

Global, world

By Agnieszka Rybak
cedaw, discrimination, women, rights, equality, un, gender, women rights

The project looks at CEDAW, laws related to domestic violence, harassment, property, employment rights, discrimination and equality.

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is the international women’s rights treaty that spells out women’s rights and asks governments to eradicate all forms of discrimination. It is often described as the “Bill of Rights” for women everywhere. CEDAW was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 18, 1979, and and countries began to implement it on on September 3, 1981. The treaty provides a theoretical framework that identifies barriers to women’s advancement, assess needs, set goals, and suggest measures to be taken for action and international standard for protecting and promoting women’s rights.

As of March 2018, 190 countries have ratified CEDAW. The United States and Palau are two signatory countries that have not yet ratified the Convention. Among a small minority of countries that have not yet ratified or acceded to CEDAW are Iran, Somalia, and Sudan.

To achieve its goals, CEDAW requests countries that have ratified the treaty to combat discrimination in all areas including public actions, laws and policies, and require sanctions on acts of private actors, including within the family, community, and commercial arenas. CEDAW appoints a Committee that deals with monitoring the implementation of the provisions by state parties as well as the possibility for individuals around the world to complain to the CEDAW Committee.

Using data from the World Bank and the UN, I created an interactive map to answer above raised questions and provide a snapshot of how women’s rights are legislated around the world. Women’s rights issues covered in this project are work, constitution, domestic violence, sexual harassment, and property which are important indicators to understand women global well-being.

Additionally, to add a much more in-depth dimension and urgency towards women’s rights issues across the globe, I used the Gender Gap Index to identify the best and worst places for women. The Gender Gap Index measures the differences between women and men, especially as reflected in social, political, intellectual, cultural, or economic attainments or attitudes.

Methodology

The map contains eight layers in total. Data for each layer was cleaned, re-organized and geocoded using ArcGIS Desktop.

For “the women’s equality treaty layer,” I created InfoWindow (aka pop up text on mouse hover) to show each country’s name.

For “women’s rights around the world by issue layers,” I created bubbles in different color to show identified full, partial and non-positive and no data responses.

For “the best and worst places for women layer,” I used polygon pattern fill with the opacity at 75 % so that other layers could be visible and to add more in-depth dimension to the map.