Are beliefs, attitudes and practices holding African society back?
For International Women’s Day on 8 March 2020 we celebrated “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s Rights”. This theme resonated with people of every gender, age, ethnicity, race, religion and country who are committed to creating the gender-equal world we all deserve. However, do our values, beliefs, attitudes and practices contribute to an unequal world? The new Gender Social Norms Index released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) answers this question. Across the world, in 75 countries with 80 percent of the global population, close to 90 percent of women and men hold some sort of bias against women’s rights and gender equality.
In Africa today it is clear that social beliefs are obstructing gender equality.
Globally, half of the world’s men and women feel that men make better political leaders, and over 40 percent feel that men make better business executives and that men have more right to a job when jobs are scarce. The level of bias in the 13 African countries for which data is available is higher than this global average. These biases extend to areas like politics, work, education, intimate partner violence and women’s reproductive rights. This means that more African women and men agree with the notion that men make better political leaders and it is not essential for women and men to have the same political rights. In addition, university education is considered more important for a man than a woman. As a result there are 7 females enrolled in tertiary education in Africa for every 10 male students while across the world there are now slightly more female students compared to males (UNESCO).
These biased beliefs are held by both women and men.
While both women and men are both biased against gender equality, the share of women who are not biased is much higher than the share of men. Globally, only 14 percent of all women have no bias while the share of men with no bias is even lower at 9 percent. For the African countries in this sample, the share of women and men with no bias is much lower. Only 6 percent of the women and 3 percent of the men in selected African countries had no bias — on average. This means that over 90 percent of African women and men in these countries have at least one bias. This is out of the 7 dimensions related to politics, work, education, intimate partners violence and women’s reproductive rights. There is still a wide variation across countries. The share of the population that has the least biases is found in Ethiopia. The population with the highest share of biases is in Nigeria and Zimbabwe.
Biases against gender equality are growing around the world.
From 2005 to 2014, the low share of the global population with no bias fell from 14 percent to 13 percent. This rising bias affects both women and men. The share of women with no bias fell by two percentage points while the share of men with no bias fell by one percentage point over this period. However, for the four African countries included in two World Values Surveys 2005–2009 as well as 2010–2014 the deterioration was even higher. Growth in biases against gender equality was higher among women than among men. The biggest rise in bias happened in South Africa and Morocco. This was mainly from a rise in the share of women with a bias against gender equality.
Across these four countries, biases in terms of politics, education and jobs are rising faster than the world average. A backlash against gender equality.
Intersectionality is important in responding to these biases.
Different forms of discrimination against social categories combine, overlap or intersect and they are amplified when put together. For example, discrimination against race, class, age, gender, ability, ethnicity and residence status are often interconnected. This creates overlapping and interdependent disadvantage. This matters in our quest to change perceptions and behavior for more gender equality on two fronts.
First, programs targeted at creating a more equal world may leave the most disadvantaged women and men behind if these differences are not explicitly considered in program design and implementation. A good example is the work done by UNDP to reconcile customary and statutory law in Zambia to counter negative social and cultural norms related to violence against women. Here partnerships with chiefs, religious and traditional leaders and engaging both women and men through community forums were key in changing men’s behavior towards gender based violence.
Secondly, these intersecting identities can also influence beliefs and experiences across social groups and generations. Changing perceptions to eliminate the bias that constrain women and men’s behavior in ways that lead to inequality must be tailored to these realities. Applying a systems approach that maps both positive and negative feedback loops is essential in addressing intersecting identities.
For instance, exploring inter-generational and social dimensions in the transfer of social norms. Do younger generations have more or less bias? Are both women and men seen as capable political leaders and entitled to the same political, economic, education and physical integrity rights by young people everywhere? What influences these beliefs and changing perceptions? Useful questions to explore further.
