Gender-Based Discrimination and Economic Inequalities

United Nations - A/HRC/29/31

General Assembly

Distr.: General;  27 May 2015;  Original: English

Human Rights Council

Twenty-ninth session

Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development

Report of the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston

Summary

In the present report, the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights focuses on the relationship between extreme poverty and extreme inequality and argues that a human rights framework is critical in addressing extreme inequality.

       In the report, the Special Rapporteur provides an overview of the widening economic and social inequalities around the world; illustrates how such inequalities stifle equal opportunity, lead to laws, regulations and institutions that favour the powerful, and perpetuate discrimination against certain groups, such as women; and further discusses the negative effects of economic inequalities on a range of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights.

        The Special Rapporteur also analyses the response of the international community, including the United Nations, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, to the challenge of extreme inequality, finding that human rights are absent in the inequality debate and little has been done to follow up on any of the studies or recommendations emerging from the United Nations human rights system.

       To conclude, the Special Rapporteur proposes an agenda for the future for tackling inequality, including: committing to reduce extreme inequality; giving economic, social and cultural rights the same prominence and priority as are given to civil and political rights; recognizing the right to social protection; implementing fiscal policies specifically aimed at reducing inequality; revitalizing and giving substance to the right to equality; and putting questions of resource redistribution at the centre of human rights debates

25. Although many forms of discrimination are inherently unjust, the correlation between gender-based discrimination and economic inequalities deserves special mention since it potentially affects half of the world’s population. While both men and women may experience myriad inequalities, based on factors such as their race, ethnicity, sexual orientation or disability, gender-based discrimination is too often seen to be almost exclusively a women’s problem. In its World Development Report 2012, the World Bank describes the forms of discrimination that still exist in many countries and that directly affect economic inequality between men and women. According to the World Bank, men and women still have different ownership rights in at least nine countries, and in many countries, women and girls still have fewer inheritance rights than men and boys.[1] In addition, women continue to fare badly in the labour market generally. A stocktaking by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women) shows that almost 80 countries maintain restrictions on the types of work that women are permitted to undertake. Also according to UN-Women, at the global level, women’s labour force participation rates have stagnated since the 1990s. Currently, only half of women are in the labour force compared to more than three quarters of men. Despite considerable regional variations, nowhere has this gender gap been eliminated: globally, women earn on average 24 per cent less than men. In one study of four countries, lifetime income gaps between women and men were estimated to be between 31 and 75 per cent.[2]

To access Full Special Rapporteur Report, go to http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/RegularSessions/Session29/Pages/ListReports.aspx.

Извор: WUNRN – 19.06.2015