50 years and 50 reasons

Today, 07.02.2021, we celebrate 50 years of women’s rights to vote in Switzerland. I am deeply grateful to all the women who came before me. All the women who fought for the rights we benefit from today. All the women who shook the very foundations of Swiss democracy to enable equal participation. All the women who were bold, innovative, agile, resilient, fearless and visionary. Without them we would not be where we are today. And my way of honouring their work is by continuing their work as advocate for SDG 5. Knowing it is likely to take another 7 generations to achieve economic gender equality worldwide, I am committed to doing my part. Our generation is stepping boldly in our predecessors’ footsteps and we are determined to move the needle, too. 

We are the most educated generation of women ever and we are using our brains, our hearts, our resources and our networks to shape a better future.

We are relentlessly working to break glass ceilings in corporations around the globe. And while not all glass ceilings are breaking, the cracks run deep. I want my daughter and my son to see the cracks and know that if they, too, put pressure on those cracks, the glass will shatter at some point. 

We continue to promote financial literacy, financial confidence and financial participation for all women and girls, as a key success factor for future economic gender equality. Access to capital for female entrepreneurs is the next frontier to conquer.

We are committed to not let a crisis like covid set us back a decade. We know the pandemic is affecting us disproportionally more than men, but we stay strong. We are determined to bounce back with all our resilience and our vulnerability - which is the birth place of creativity, innovation and change. Thank you @Brené Brown for framing that so poignantly - generations of women will be forever in your debt for the findings of your research.

And my gratitude goes to each and every man who has supported a women on her path. To all the fathers, partners, husbands, brothers and sons, who perceive, recognise and empower the women in their lives as true peers. We cannot do this without you all.

So it is with renewed sense of purpose and bubbling energy levels (from the heavy doses of VITAMIN W all our networks inject in us) that we continue paving the way to a more equal future.

There is much more work to do. Gender equality across the world is still in a pitiful state. So here are my 50 reasons to keep on fighting. For the sake of all the girls who are victims of inequality and injustice - and mindful that many boys are victims too. 50 reasons why we still need to join forces to advance gender equality around the world. It needs each of us. It needs all of us. We are all part of the solution.

And together, we can make a difference - just like those who came before us did.

EDUCATION:

1. Every girl deserves an education, on par to the boys
2. Every girl must be taught her rights and every boy must be taught to respect them (and vice versa)
3. Every girls must know her worth - and that she is worth no less than a boy
4. Every girl must know she decides over her own body
5. Every girl deserves professional role models
6. Girls’ education reduces child marriage
7. Girls’ education reduces teenage pregnancy
8. Girls’ education improves health and reduces HIV rates
9. Girls’ education leads to smaller, healthier and more sustainable families
10. Education enables girls to make decisions and have choices

HEALTH:

1. Gender equality saves women and girls’ lives 
2. Women deserve to receive the same quality medical care than men
3. Women’s specific medical conditions deserve to be as well researched as mens’
4. All girls need to be empowered to own their bodies and their sexuality
5. Girls should never have to miss school due to menstruation, for lack of sanitation or sanitary products
6. Women must be free to make their own reproductive choices
7. When women make their own reproductive choices, children grow up healthier
8. Sexual abuse must end
9. Human trafficking must end
10. All forms or violence and repression against women must end

ECONOMY:

1. Girls’ education reduces poverty 
2. Every girl deserves to enter the workforce on equal terms
3. Every woman deserves equal opportunities 
4. Every woman deserves equal pay
5. No women should face pay-gap-induced wealth gaps and pension gaps
6. No women should have to pay “pink taxes” because female hygiene products are exceedingly costly or subject to luxury goods taxes
7. Men spend more time at work but women spend more time working: we need to level the playing field of unpaid care work
8. Women have been disproportionately impacted by the covid19 pandemic 
9. Women’s empowerment leads to higher economic growth
10. Companies with better gender and ethnical diversity perform better

POLITICS:

1. Democracy without 50% of the population duly represented is hypocrisy 
2. We need equal gender representation in all governance bodies and decision making processes 
3. We need to break the stereotypes and discriminatory laws that prevent women from participating in economical and political life
4. We need coherence in domestic and foreign policies and fulfilment of international obligations on gender equality
5. We need to ensure data harmonisation on gender equality and increase accountability on all societal levels
6. We need better policies on affordable childcare to enable gender equality
7. Gender equality improves racial equality 
8. Gender equality fosters peace
9. Gender equality is key to achieve all the other Sustainable Development Goals
10. Who on earth, in today’s day and age, can justify a male-driven military coup removing a female democratically-elected leader? This is not the Middle Ages...

OVERALL:

1. It’s fair
2. It’s right
3. It’s needed
4. It’s high time
5. It’s not that hard
6. We’re tired of all the excuses
7. We can get it done if we want to
8. We do want to
9. Our daughters will thank us
10. Our sons will, too