Hondurans protest outside a Tegucigalpa hotel where U.S. and Central American officials were negotiating a regional trade pact. Credit: Paul Jeffrey, Courtesy of Photoshare

By Laila Malik and Inna Michaeli
TORONTO/BERLIN, Mar 6 2018 (IPS)

Since its explosion onto the social media landscape at the end of 2017, the #metoo movement has continued to gain global traction. Initially centred on powerful Hollywood women breaking decades of silence about sexual abuse and harassment in the industry, the conversation soon spread across global regions and sectors, from #YoTambien in the Spanish-speaking world to #balancetonporc in French.  From China to أنا_كمان# in Arabic. From national governments to universities to international development, the stories are grim, and their pervasiveness has been jarring.

But for the majority of women and LGBTQI people, these stories are nothing new.

Individual instances of abuse and harassment are locked firmly in place by prevailing working conditions and an absence of labour rights protection. Across the planet, women’s disproportionately high rates of informal employment and complex production chains prevent them from organizing to protect their rights

Because global feminists and human rights advocates have been fighting for a more just world for decades, and have long noted that those individual instances of abuse and harassment are locked firmly in place by prevailing working conditions and an absence of labour rights protection. Across the planet, women’s disproportionately high rates of informal employment and complex production chains prevent them from organizing to protect their rights.

When they do, they are threatened with violence and union-busting attacks – often by the powerful, mostly North-based, transnational corporations who employ them. Data on the global workplace harassment and abuse of trans and non-binary people is less readily available, but many countries around the world continue not to even recognize trans and nonbinary identities and rights, and International Labour Organization (ILO) research reveals that LGBT people face discrimination in “access to employment and throughout the employment cycle, and can result in LGBT workers being bullied, mobbed, and sexually or physically assaulted”. People who do not conform to traditional gender norms face even more discrimination than those who can “pass”.

While talk in corporate and international development circles about the importance of women’s economic empowerment is on the rise, it often stops at individual income generation or improvement of self-esteem. Meanwhile, governments often refuse to take measures to protect precarious and informal workers – the majority of whom are women – out of fear of losing their competitive advantage to labour markets in other countries.

The situation of Cambodian women who work in the beer industry is case in point. In Cambodia, young women are hired by beer companies to sell as much of the brand as possible. They work long hours in bars, restaurants, and beer gardens late into the evenings, and are paid by commission or by a set salary per month. Some have contracts protected under the Cambodian Labour Code, and some are unprotected informal workers.

Cambodian beer promoters have been organizing since 2006 for a living wage, and to introduce protections against sexual harassment and violence, long working hours and toxic working conditions in bars and restaurants. During that time, more workers have gained formal status, allowing them to  benefit from the country’s labour code, and minimum wage standards.

But last year, Cambrew Ltd. – the largest brewery in Cambodia, 50% of whose shares are held by the Carlsberg Group – announced a change in working hours that would force women to leave work two hours later in the evening – despite travel safety and childcare concerns – without consultation with workers.

The company also began offering short-term contracts as a way to discourage beer promoters from joining the union, as well as giving union leaders morning shifts where they cannot make additional wages through overtime or larger sales. Ongoing fear of police brutality and dismissal continue to keep trade union activism and mobilization in check.

In other parts of the world, millions of women work under – and fight – similar conditions, upheld by the same logic. 85% of sweatshop workers are women between 15-25 years old, where stories abound of managers calling women workers into the back of workrooms, trying to touch or grope them and threatening to fire them if they refuse.

Around the world, 1 in every 13 female wage earners is a domestic worker, and only 10% of them are employed in countries that extend them equal protection under national labour laws. About 30% of them work in countries that exclude them from labour laws completely. Basically, the threat and exercise of sexual abuse and harassment of women is the cultural grease that keeps profits flowing efficiently across the globe.

Young Bangladeshi women raise their fists at a protest in Shahbagh. Credit: Kajal Hazra/IPS

Time for binding agreements

But feminists and human rights advocates have been, and continue to mobilize for gender and economic justice. In October 2017, 14 organizations came together to request the integration of a gender approach into a long-awaited international legally binding treaty to hold corporations accountable for human rights abuses.

It would include assessments of the impact of business activities on women’s lives, ensuring that women can get justice in courts and creating conditions that are safe, respectful, and enabling for women human rights defenders. It would challenge corporate impunity and legally oblige businesses to uphold international human rights standards all over the world.

At the same time, the International Trade Union Confederation and others have been mobilizing with a campaign for the International Labour Union (ILO) to adopt a comprehensive convention on violence and harassment against men and women in the world of work. This convention is a step in the right direction – towards transforming workplaces to become safer and dignified spaces for people of all gender identities.

On March 8, International Women’s Day,  the intergovernmental working group on the binding treaty will  present its report at the Human Rights Council in Geneva – more than 100 years since women garment workers came out to the streets to demand fair working conditions.

Today, working spaces are often still exclusionary, exploitative and unsafe, particularly for women, trans and non-binary people and global south communities, as well as for queer and racialised people, for differently able-bodied people, and for migrant communities. It is time we responded to that long-standing demand for the human rights of all workers to be respected.

No one international treaty will hold all the solution, but it is a reminder that in order to stop violence against women in the workplace, a structural change is needed in our economic and human rights systems, and the struggle is long underway.

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This article is part of a series of stories and op-eds launched by IPS on the occasion of this year’s International Women’s Day on March 8. ]]> https://www.ipsnews.net/2018/03/metoo-in-the-global-workplace-time-to-connect-the-dots/feed/ 0 https://www.ipsnews.net/2016/11/how-do-you-make-a-region-visible/ https://www.ipsnews.net/2016/11/how-do-you-make-a-region-visible/#respond Tue, 22 Nov 2016 18:01:48 +0000 Inna Michaeli http://www.ipsnews.net/?p=147889

Feminists and activists in plenary at the 13th International AWID Forum in Bahia, Brazil. Credit Claudia Ferreira

By Inna Michaeli
BERLIN, Nov 22 2016 (IPS)

“One challenge we are facing is that we are invisible as a region, and the feminist movement is invisible, both inside and outside the region.” Natalia Karbowska, Board Chair of Ukrainian Women’s Fund said at a session on Eastern and South-East Europe, Caucasus, and Central Asia: Getting (back) on global feminist map during the recent AWID Forum held in Bahia, Brazil from the 8^th-11^th September, 2016.

You might recognize your own region in the trends Natalia described: women’s organizations wrongly perceived as service providers, rather than drivers of advocacy and policies; gender mainstreaming shifting the focus and funds away from feminist movement-building; and, governments dismissing policies on gender because “there is a war in the country.”

Changing national formations, contested colonial histories and violent conflicts, and the vast ethnonational and cultural diversity, make it impossible to speak of Eastern Europe, North Caucasus, the Balkans, and Central Asia as one region. And yet, many voices in the session on Eastern and South-East Europe, Caucasus, and Central Asia at the AWID Forum emphasised the need to work together and to develop unified messages around thematic areas.

The destructive role of Russia for civil society in the region came out strongly. Its draconian laws and repressive practices against NGOs are having a negative effect far beyond its borders. Irina Maslova – leader of the sex-workers’ movement Silver Rose, based in the city of St. Petersburg, Russia – could not have said that more clearly: “I am deeply ashamed that in my country, in my city, the law against ‘gay propaganda’ was passed. That the law criminalizing NGOs as ‘foreign agents’ was passed, and now it hits everyone, hits hard. It spreads throughout the region and incites repression of civil society, especially women’s organizations and the most marginalized.”

Highlight on Sex Workers and LGBT People

Sex workers in Russia and the region, explained Irina, “are either invisible or seen as criminals. The existing laws untie the hands of the police, of the state, of society, to steal, to attack, to kill us”.

Migrant sex workers are particularly vulnerable. In one of the criminal raids on brothels, Sandra, a young African sex worker, suffered extreme injuries. Silver Rose supported her through the long surgery and rehabilitation process and the struggle to file a police complaint. Transnational migration and associated vulnerability make a strong case for feminist cooperation across regions.

Danyar Orsek, Director of Kyrgyz Indigo, outlined the challenges for LGBT movements. “In some countries like Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, there are laws against sodomy since Soviet times. In others, like Russia, they are passing new laws, like the one on gay propaganda. In Kazakhstan, transgender people need sterilization if they want a legal recognition, their gender in the passport”. Legal obstacles are enhanced by violence in the family and society, discrimination in universities and workplace.

A selection of activists marching for rights and justice at the 13th International AWID Forum in Bahia, Brazil. Photo credit Claudia Ferreira

Working Together, Working Regionally

While collaboration has a long way to go, there are positive examples to build on. Irina told with excitement about a great diversity of women coming to meet the CEDAW committee to tell the truth about Russia: “…women working on drug policy, women human rights defenders, women of Caucasus and even women from Ukraine came. We joined forces because we are joined by the desire to live, to live as women, as happy women.” As a result, Russia received strong recommendations, including to repeal the ‘gay propaganda’ law.

Natalia emphasised the importance of mobilizing people. “We had the bill on foreign agents in Ukraine and many people out on the streets, people who don’t know the term civil society, but they came and stopped it. A lot depends on us, and strong movement consists of strong organizations, and this is why it is important to have strong funds“.

“We are often so isolated in our problems. But when an activist is killed in Honduras - we need to react, to connect with them, to raise solidarity. This is how people start getting interested.” -
Lara Aharonian, Director of Women's Resource Center in Yerevan, Armenia
“This Region Isn’t Interesting for Funders”

Mariam Gagoshashvili, from Astraea: Lesbian Foundation for Justice shared from her experience. “I thought it is because of lack of knowledge of what’s happening in the region. But I understood that the funding that came in 1990s had a lot of geopolitical interests that are not there anymore.”

Natalia suggested to go “beyond women’s rights or human rights rhetoric and talk about policy and politics. Women’s rights and gender equality are also questions of national and regional security. And, we also lack data and stories from our country”.

There is a need to get creative on sustainability and alternative sources of funding: national and regional women’s funds, emigrants who maintain strong ties and commitment to the civil society.

Why Should Feminists Care?

So how do you get (back) on the feminist map? And why should feminists worldwide care about these parts of the world?

First, there are strong geopolitical reasons. Totalitarian trends and religious fundamentalisms currently on the rise will not stop at national borders. In Irina’s words, “Russia is looking to its imperialistic past, and tries to transmit its politics, its laws and practices onto the global level. It tries to call people back to the fascist past. We must speak about this, and speak loudly.” In such extremely repressive and increasingly isolated settings, cross-border solidarity becomes critical. “Support our voices, we are few, because it is frightening. We need this support to survive.“

Then, there is much to discover in learning from each other. “Together we are strong. This is why I am interested in other regions. We can exchange knowledge and experience, and there is much valuable experience in Central Asia we can share.”- Danyar.

Perhaps most importantly, to get on the feminist map, you can make the first step towards it. Lara Aharonian, Director of Women’s Resource Center in Yerevan, Armenia, reminded us that the best way to get people more interested in one’s region, might start with the genuine interest we take in others: “We are often so isolated in our problems. But when an activist is killed in Honduras – we need to react, to connect with them, to raise solidarity. This is how people start getting interested.” Certainly this insight can inspire us across regions and movements, whenever we feel invisible and marginalized in the global agenda. By reaching out and extending our solidarity to others, we embark on a journey of mutual recognition and solidarity.

The Eastern and South-East Europe, Caucasus, and Central Asia: Getting (back) on global feminist map session took place at the 2016 AWID Forum in Bahia, Brazil. Read more reflections on ‘Feminist Futures: Building Collective Power for Rights and Justice’

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