General Recommendation No. 40 on equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making system

Women have the right to equal and inclusive representation in all decision-making systems on equal terms with men. Despite significant progress by States parties, this right is still not respected, which also seriously hampers the implementation of all other rights under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. Furthermore, the failure to ensure the equal and inclusive sharing of decision-making power between women and men prevents States and the international community from effectively addressing urgent local, national, regional and global challenges. As noted in the preamble of the Convention, the full and complete development of a country, the welfare of the world and the cause of peace require the maximum participation of women on equal terms with men in all fields. To respond to these challenges for current and future generations, the present general recommendation contains an outline of a road map towards women’s full enjoyment of their right to equal and inclusive representation in all decision-making systems.

In the present general recommendation, the Committee provides comprehensive guidance for States parties on achieving the equal and inclusive representation of women in all decision-making systems across all sectors, aiming for a systemic change. It outlines legislative, policy and programmatic measures to ensure the implementation of this obligation and overcome global challenges. It defines “equal and inclusive representation” as fifty-fifty parity between women and men in all their diversity in terms of equal access to and equal power within decision-making systems, hereinafter also referred to simply as “parity”. It defines “decision-making systems” as encompassing decision-making that takes place through formal and informal processes in all sectors, including in political, public, economic and digital spaces. Achieving parity therefore requires considering multiple arenas of decision-making and how they interact, and dismantling all obstacles that prevent women from accessing decision-making systems on an equal footing with men.

The present general recommendation furthermore incorporates young people and future generations into a vision of society rooted in peace and parity. As outlined in the present general recommendation, there is a key convergence between the expectations and rights of young people and the building of a parity-based system.

The Committee observes that a growing number of disruptive and urgent challenges, including those related to peace, political stability, economic development, climate change, technological advancements, such as artificial intelligence, and the transformation and sustainability of the multilateral system and governance, directly affect the implementation of the Convention and are increasingly transforming societies. Their complexity requires the building of collective intelligence by placing parity at the core of decision-making. A “surge in parity”, as it has been described by the Secretary-General,¹ is key to joint decision-making and to the innovative solutions needed to build resilient societies.

1. United Nations, “Secretary-General’s remarks to High-level event on Women in Power”, 12 March 2019, available at www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/statement/2019-03-12/secretary-generals-remarks-high-level-event-women-power-delivered. ↩

Despite the escalation of conflicts and crises and women being key driving forces of sustainable peace,² women remain structurally and significantly underrepresented in conflict and crisis prevention and peace negotiations and peacebuilding efforts. Between 1992 and 2019, women represented only 13 per cent of negotiators, 6 per cent of mediators and 6 per cent of signatories in peace processes.³ In 2022, women participated as negotiators or delegates on behalf of parties to conflict in 4 of the 5 active peace processes led or co-led by the United Nations. Proportionally, their level of representation stood only at 16 per cent, however, a further drop compared with 19 per cent in 2021 and 23 per cent in 2020.⁴ In 2023, none of the peace agreements reached included representatives of women’s groups as signatories.⁵ Women comprise only one third of participants in international forums debating such critical issues as the threat posed by nuclear weapons, increasing military expenditure, the proliferation of arms and ammunition and the weaponization of new technologies.⁶

2. United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women), “Women’s participation and a better understanding of the political” in Preventing Conflict, Transforming Justice, Securing the Peace: A Global Study on the Implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1325 (2015), available at https://wps.unwomen.org/participation/; The Pact for the Future, General Assembly resolution 79/1, para. 40; and UN-Women, “Facts and figures: women, peace, and security”, 18 October 2024, available at www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/peace-and-security/facts-and-figures. ↩
3. United Nations, “Inclusive diplomacy”, available at www.un.org/en/observances/women-in-diplomacy-day. ↩
4. S/2023/725, para. 9. ↩
5. University of Edinburgh, PA-X Peace Agreement Database, version 7 (plus AgtID 2467), 2023, available at https://pax.peaceagreements.org/. ↩
6. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: women, peace, and security”. ↩

Disinformation and polarization threaten to exacerbate conflicts. Although women’s leadership in political decision-making leads to greater stability and peace, stronger responsiveness to people’s needs and enhanced cooperation,⁷ women’s political representation and civic space are increasingly under attack through restrictions on the activities of women’s organizations, growing attacks on and intimidation of women politicians, journalists and human rights defenders, and challenges to and reversals of generational gains made in relation to women’s and girls’ human rights.

7. Minna Cowper-Coles, Women Political Leaders: The Impact of Gender on Democracy, (London, Westminster Foundation for Democracy, 2021). ↩

The economic autonomy of women is key for accessing their rights and the pathway to inclusive economic growth,⁸ poverty eradication, social justice and sustainable development.⁹ It is a key step towards a human rights-based economy. However, the overrepresentation of women in many informal, low-paying, less innovative and economically less lucrative sectors largely excludes them from decision-making positions and shaping the economy. They are underrepresented in decision-making in the economic governance architecture, multilateral financial institutions, debt servicing systems, capital markets, the industrial infrastructure architecture, trade negotiations and public procurement regimes. For example, women-owned businesses are awarded only 1 per cent of government contracts in the public procurement market,¹⁰ and women comprised only 17.7 per cent of inventors named in patent applications in 2023.¹¹ Women occupy only 28.2 per cent of management positions in the labour market,¹² and a survey of 185 central banks showed that only 16 per cent were led by women.¹³ In 2019, only 2 per cent of venture capital was directed towards start-ups founded by women.¹⁴ The growing importance of the digital economy and the continuing gender digital gap risk exacerbating this situation and creating new forms of systemic discrimination.

8. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: economic empowerment”, February 2024, available at www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/economic-empowerment/facts-and-figures. ↩
9. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: economic empowerment”. ↩
10. International Trade Centre (ITC), “ITC-UN-Women: Global Campaign on Gender-Responsive Public Procurement”, available at www.intracen.org/news-and-events/campaigns/women-in-public-procurement. ↩
11. World Intellectual Property Organization, “Intellectual property, gender, and diversity”, available at www.wipo.int/web/gender. ↩
12. Taylor Hanna and others, “Forecasting women in leadership positions: technical brief”, (UNWomen), available at www.unwomen.org/sites/default/files/2023-11/forecasting-women-in-leadership-positions.pdf. ↩
13. Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum, Gender Balance Index 2024. ↩
14. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), UNESCO Science Report: The Race against Time for Smarter Development (Paris, 2021). ↩

As highlighted in general recommendation No. 37 (2018) on the gender-related dimensions of disaster risk reduction in the context of climate change, gender inequalities and intersecting forms of discrimination against women and girls are exacerbated by climate change and disasters, which heighten their exposure to resulting risks and losses. The critical role of women in disaster risk reduction is also highlighted in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030. Research shows that countries with more women parliamentarians are more likely to adopt policies on climate change and land conservation and ratify environmental treaties.¹⁵ Similarly, having more women on corporate boards has been linked to energy efficiency improvements and a reduced environmental footprint.¹⁶ In agricultural regions, women’s traditional and Indigenous knowledge is key to adaptive practices in farming, climate change management and resource management.¹⁷ However, women, especially young women, who are leading climate and environmental activism,¹⁸ are largely excluded from decision-making. As at 2020, women held only 15 per cent of ministerial portfolios in the environmental sector.¹⁹ The representation of women on party delegations at the twenty-eighth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change stood at 34 per cent, a proportion that has remained stagnant over the last 10 years.²⁰

15. International Union for Conservation of Nature, “New data reveals slow progress in achieving gender equality in environmental decision making”, 1 March 2021. ↩
16. Silvia Lesi, “Gender and climate action”, European Investment Bank, 28 July 2023. ↩
17. General recommendation No. 37 (2018) on the gender-related dimensions of disaster risk reduction in the context of climate change. ↩
18. See also A/HRC/50/25. ↩
19. International Union for Conservation of Nature, “New data reveals slow progress in achieving gender equality in environmental decision making”. ↩
20. WEDO, “Release: new data shows 34% women’s participation on party delegations at COP28, the same percentage as 10 years ago”, 24 January 2024. Available at https://wedo.org/release-new-data-shows-34-womens-participation-on-party-delegations-at-cop28-the-same-percentage-as-10-years-ago/. ↩

The rapidly evolving technological transition, propelled by the exponentially increasing importance of artificial intelligence as a core driver of the digital transformation, is changing the global community. This fifth industrial revolution has immense potential to benefit humanity if developed using an approach that is based on human rights, including women’s rights, and accessibility for persons with disabilities. Diverse perspectives and collective intelligence are essential to achieve this. However, due to gender gaps in access to technologies, including digital literacy, and in studies, careers and leadership positions in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), women have been severely underrepresented in the development of these technological advances. For example, women make up only 29.2 per cent of all STEM workers, and roughly 30 per cent of the artificial intelligence workforce.²¹ They comprise only 18 per cent of graduates from doctoral programmes on artificial intelligence,²² and 13.83 per cent of artificial intelligence paper authors.²³ Only 12.4 per cent of women are C-Suite executives in STEM.²⁴ Artificial intelligence systems have also shown a tendency to reflect and magnify gender bias,²⁵ which manifests in discriminatory outputs, risking a rollback in gender equality gains and new forms of structural discrimination.

21. World Economic Forum, Global Gender Gap Report 2023 (Geneva, 2023). ↩
22. Daniel Zhang and others, Artificial Intelligence Index Report 2021 (Stanford, Stanford University, 2021). ↩
23. Gabriela Ramos, “Why we must act now to close the gender gap in AI”, World Economic Forum, 22 August 2022. ↩
24. World Economic Forum, Global Gender Gap Report 2023. ↩
25. UN-Women, “Artificial intelligence and gender equality”, 22 May 2024, available at www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/explainer/2024/05/artificial-intelligence-and-gender-equality. ↩

The disruptive challenges described above must be dealt with at the local, national, regional and international levels. The rules and platforms of multilateralism, the role of which has expanded significantly in recent decades, often maintain discrimination, including the underrepresentation of women, and often respond insufficiently to the complexity of current challenges. A parity-based system, resolutely geared towards the integration of young people and intergenerational leadership, is a condition for the effectiveness, sustainability, resilience, legitimacy and accountability of the multilateral system.

Patriarchal structures impede the equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making systems. Patriarchy is a system of power deeply embedded in political, social, economic and cultural structures. It creates a hierarchy, historically assigning distinct roles, worth and qualities to women and men. It results in a division of labour whereby women are primarily responsible for the private sphere of the home and family, while men are the main actors in the public sphere of politics and economy, based on differential weights assigned to efforts in the two domains. Patriarchy permeates all societies. At its most severe, it takes the form of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination of women, committed with the intention of maintaining a regime that is increasingly referred to as “gender apartheid”.²⁶It is therefore crucial to codify the crime of “gender apartheid” to create full accountability for gender-based crimes.

26. In article 7 (1) (h) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on gender grounds is identified as an act that constitutes a crime against humanity. There is a growing call, including among human rights mechanisms of the Human Rights Council and civil society, for the codification of the crime of gender apartheid under international law, including in the definition of apartheid in article 2 (2) (h) of the Proposed International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Crimes Against Humanity. ↩

A transformative approach addressing patriarchy, as presented in the present general recommendation, is in line with article 5 (a) of the Convention,²⁷ which commits States parties to eliminating prejudices and practices that are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women.

27. Unless otherwise indicated, articles refer to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. ↩

To this end, the Committee identifies seven pillars of equal and inclusive representation in decision-making systems: (a) fifty-fifty parity between women and men in decision-making systems as a starting point and universal norm; (b) effective youth leadership conditioned by parity; (c) intersectionality and the inclusion of women in all their diversity in decision-making systems; (d) a comprehensive approach to decision-making systems across spheres; (e) equal power and influence exercised by women in decision-making systems; (f) structural transformation for the equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making systems; and (g) civil society representation in decision-making systems.

Targets of 30 per cent for the representation of women in decision-making are incompatible with the Convention’s core aim of elimination of discrimination against women, as they convey a message that inequality between women and men is justifiable. Decision-making will have real and dynamic meaning and lasting effect only when it is based on fifty-fifty parity and takes equal account of the interests of both women and men. The equal and inclusive representation of women is also an important driver of integrity, as it disrupts pre-established collusive networks.²⁸

28. See also United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, The Time is Now: Addressing the Gender Dimensions of Corruption (Vienna, 2020). ↩

As reflected in the concluding observations of the Committee, a growing number of States parties have passed or are considering parity laws for elections and other decision-making roles. Parity means the full and equal sharing of power on a fifty-fifty basis between women and men as a permanent and core feature of all areas, including political, public and economic life. Legislation guaranteeing parity is thus not intended to be removed once women’s historical disadvantages have been redressed but remains as a legal principle and permanent and universal feature of good governance. References to parity in the present general recommendation are always in relation to fifty-fifty parity between women and men in all their diversity.

Young people have proven to be vital stakeholders in contributing to human rights, sustainable development and peace and security, and the importance of their representation in decision-making has been underlined by States.²⁹ Young people are recognized as critical agents of positive change, fulfilling their own potential and ensuring a world fit for future generations in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Pact for the Future. However, gender inequality between girls and boys, young women and young men compromises their role in constructing a better world. Furthermore, existing approaches to youth engagement often view young people as a homogeneous group, reinforcing social norms and structures that perpetuate inequality. A transformative approach to young people’s engagement is required to reach parity in decision-making for current and future generations. Parity is essential to ensure that young people can build a peaceful, equal, inclusive and sustainable world that responds to their demands, implements their rights, ensures youth co-leadership and intergenerational solidarity, and enables them to anticipate and overcome crises.

29. The Pact for the Future, General Assembly resolution 79/1; Human Rights Council resolutions 32/1, 35/14, 41/13 and 51/17; Security Council resolution 2250 (2015); and General Assembly resolution 76/137. ↩

Under the Convention, States parties must address discrimination against women that intersects with other forms of discrimination, including newly emerging forms of discrimination. In its general recommendation No. 28 (2010) on the core obligations of States parties under article 2 of the Convention, the Committee clarifies that intersectionality is a basic concept for understanding the scope of States parties’ obligations, a concept further clarified in general recommendation No. 33 (2015) on women’s access to justice and No. 35 (2017) on gender-based violence against women, updating general recommendation No. 19. The Committee consistently issues recommendations to address intersecting and evolving forms of discrimination, including in relation to decision-making roles, and has also issued general recommendations No. 18 (1991) on disabled women, No. 27 (2010) on older women and the protection of their human rights, No. 34 (2016) on the rights of rural women and No. 39 (2022) on the rights of Indigenous women and girls, in all of which it calls for equal and inclusive decision-making. To ensure truly inclusive decision-making systems, women in all their diversity, with particular attention to young people as guarantors of the sustainability of parity, need to be the leading forces in legislation, strategies, policies and programmes aimed at realizing this right.

Decision-making spans various interconnected spheres. In its general recommendation No. 23 (1997) on women in political and public life, the Committee clarifies that States parties’ obligations under article 7 cover all areas of political and public life. Article 8 further guarantees women’s rights to represent their governments at the international level and participate in the work of international organizations. A joint reading of articles 7 and 8, alongside articles 5 and 9–16 elucidate an expansive approach to women’s representation in all decision-making systems. This aligns with articles 1 and 3, recognizing the interrelated nature of women’s rights across all fields of life. The Committee also highlights the need for the equal and inclusive representation of women in all emerging fields, including artificial intelligence.

The Convention stipulates that women enjoy equal rights with men. In its general recommendation No. 23 (1997), the Committee stresses that a tokenistic approach is unacceptable – women must be involved equally in decision-making at all levels. However, patriarchal norms often limit women’s opportunities to accede to senior levels of decision-making, where they could drive and influence agendas. The distribution of decision-making roles also often reflects patterns of gender segregation: the allocation of ministerial portfolios, for example, tends to be based on assumptions about stereotyped male and female responsibilities. Equal and inclusive representation in decision-making means that all roles are accessible to women and men at all levels. It also means revaluing and prioritizing issues, as well as ensuring parity across issues.

The preamble and articles 5 and 11 (2) (c) stipulate that changing stereotyped gender roles in society and the family, as well as a reclassification of work is needed to achieve full equality. In its general recommendation No. 23 (1997), the Committee elaborates how domestic work and care obligations, women’s economic dependence on men and long and inflexible working hours constitute obstacles to women’s equal and inclusive access to decision-making. Changing these norms and stereotypes requires the structural transformation of gendered roles and responsibilities across the public and private spheres, fostering a context in which women and men can equally integrate professional duties and competencies and family and other care responsibilities, including through a new organization of work and a reconfiguration of the concepts of productivity, monetization and the care economy.

The representation of women in civil society is essential for integrating a gender perspective in decision-making and for advising States in the development of gender-responsive legislation and policies. In particular, the role of women’s rights organizations and women human rights defenders must be seen as equally important as that of other civil society organizations, and parity must also be achieved in civil society organizations. To create more inclusive forms of governance, States should open pathways and remove any obstacles, reverse the increasing closing of civic space, ensure rights protection and provide financial support and capacity-building to women’s and girls’ organizations and women human rights defenders, so that they can participate substantively in all fields of decision-making, including but also going beyond issues that are narrowly perceived as “women’s issues”. Support should also be provided to other civil society organizations to establish a parity-based system, to see it as their role and to develop their capacity to work towards parity.

Under international human rights treaty law, women are guaranteed the right to equal and inclusive representation in decision-making systems. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women affirms women’s equal right to participate in political and public life, including international decision-making and decision-making related to peace and security, as well as their equal rights to participate in decision-making in the economic sector. The Convention on the Political Rights of Women grants women equal rights to vote, run for office and hold public positions without discrimination.³⁰ Under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, women and men have equal civil and political rights, including in relation to decision-making in the political and public spheres.³¹ The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights also stipulates the equal right of men and women to enjoyment of all economic, social and cultural rights, thereby also including decision-making in these spheres.³² Regional conventions, including the American Convention on Human Rights, the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the Protocol thereto on the Rights of Women in Africa, the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (European Convention on Human Rights), the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence³³ ensure similar protections. Reflecting an intersectional approach, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities recognizes that women with disabilities face multiple forms of discrimination and stipulates that States parties must ensure that all persons with disabilities can effectively and fully participate in the conduct of public affairs.³⁴The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination prohibits racial discrimination across all political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.³⁵

30. Convention on the Political Rights of Women, arts. 1–3. ↩
31. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, arts. 1 (1) and 3. ↩
32. International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, art. 3. ↩
33. European Convention on Human Rights, art. 14; American Convention on Human Rights, arts. 1 and 23; Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women, arts. 4 and 5; African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, arts. 2 and 13; Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, art. 9; Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, arts. 21, 23, 39, and 40; and Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, preamble and arts. 1 and 6. ↩
34. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, arts. 6 and 29. ↩
35. International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, art. 5. ↩

The four United Nations World Conferences on Women, held in Mexico (1975), Copenhagen (1980), Nairobi (1985) and Beijing (1995), have shaped women’s roles as equal actors in decision-making. In the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the participation of women in power and decision-making is identified among the strategic objectives. Governments are called upon to remove all obstacles to women’s full and equal share in economic, social, cultural and political decision-making, so that power and responsibility are shared between women and men at home, in the workplace and in the wider national and international communities.³⁶ In its resolution 1325 (2000) and its subsequent resolutions, the Security Council urges States to ensure the equal representation of women at all decision-making in conflict prevention, management and resolution. Sustainable Development Goal targets 5.5 and 16.7 are aimed at women’s full participation and leadership in political, economic and public decision-making, and progress towards those targets is tracked using representative metrics based on gender, age, disability and population group.³⁷ In the agreed conclusions adopted at its sixty-fifth session, the Commission on the Status of Women urged that action be taken to achieve the goal of fifty-fifty gender balance at all levels of elected positions.³⁸ Under action 8 of the Pact for the Future, States have undertaken to ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making in political, economic and public life.³⁹ In action 19, it is recognized that the full, equal, safe and meaningful participation of women in decision-making at all levels of peace and security is essential to achieve sustainable peace.⁴⁰ In the Kigali Declaration, adopted at the 145th Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, parliaments committed to achieving parity in political decision-making.

36. Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, paras. 1, 190 and 192. ↩
37. See https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal16#targets_and_indicators. ↩
38. E/2021/27, chap. I.A. ↩
39. General Assembly resolution 79/1, para. 27 (b). ↩
40. Ibid., para. 40. ↩

The principles of non-discrimination and substantive equality are affirmed in articles 1 to 4. Non-discrimination is defined in article 1, while the obligations of legislative and other measures to achieve non-discrimination and substantive equality in all areas are enshrined in articles 2 and 3. Under article 4, it is established that temporary special measures to accelerate substantive equality shall not be considered a form of discrimination. In its general recommendation No. 25 (2004) on temporary special measures, the Committee explains that, under the non-discrimination obligation, States parties are required to ensure that there is no direct or indirect discrimination in their laws and that women are protected against discrimination in both the public and private spheres. In its general recommendation No. 28 (2010), the Committee clarifies that it is necessary to assess the de jure and de facto situation of women and implement policies for substantive equality, grounded in constitutional and legislative guarantees and supported by action plans.

In order to achieve substantive equality, in its general recommendation No. 5 (1988) on temporary special measures, the Committee urges States parties to use temporary special measures, such as positive action, preferential treatment or quota systems. Further examples of temporary special measures are specified in general recommendation No. 25. While temporary special measures are sometimes misunderstood to conflict with constitutional equality or merit-based systems, in general recommendation No. 25 (2004), the Committee clarifies that the non-identical treatment of women and men is sometimes necessary to address socially and culturally constructed inequalities that hamper a true merit-based system. The Committee underlines the need to establish a strong legal framework, including targeted permanent and temporary special measures, to prevent and address discrimination and ensure substantive equality in order to reach fifty-fifty parity in decision-making systems within a clear time frame. Such a legal framework is currently insufficient or lacks implementation or institutionalization.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

In the Convention, it is recognized that women can face multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination, mentioning women in poverty (preamble), women of a particular marital status (articles 9, 11 and 16), pregnant women (articles 11 and 12) and rural women (article 14). By mentioning specific groups of women, it is made clear that, to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women, States parties must also tackle all possible intersecting factors of discrimination. In various general recommendations and concluding observations, the Committee observes how discrimination against women interacts with other forms of discrimination, including that based on race, ethnicity, indigenous status, religion, belief, health, status, disability, age, class, caste, sexual orientation, gender identity, political opinion, national origin, marital and/or maternal status, socioeconomic status, and refugee, asylum-seeking, displaced or migratory status. That list is nonexhaustive and might vary across countries and over time and include newly emerging forms of discrimination, such as discrimination against climate refugees. The Committee has also specifically and constantly stressed the rights of women in all their diversity to participate in decision-making at all levels.

The Committee notes that women subjected to intersecting forms of discrimination will encounter additional barriers to access decision-making roles. It identifies a lack of statistical data on women in decision-making, disaggregated by other grounds of discrimination. The Committee stresses that all aspects of the present general recommendation should be interpreted within an intersectional framework.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Under article 5, States parties are required to eliminate all forms of gender stereotypes in all spheres.⁴¹ The Committee observes strong prevalence of gender stereotypes in all spheres of society, including their perpetuation and exacerbation through media portrayals of women reinforcing the dominant position of men. The rapidly emerging artificial intelligence sector, including generative artificial intelligence, computer vision systems, speech and audio artificial intelligence, robotics and control systems, specialized artificial intelligence systems and hybrid artificial intelligence systems, learns from frequently gender-biased training data, carrying gender-based discrimination from the analog into the digital world, and needs to be addressed urgently from a human rights, including women’s rights, perspective. Furthermore, some misinterpretations of religion and culture can shape gender stereotypes. The Committee emphasizes that gender stereotypes constitute a key barrier to women’s equal access to decision-making.

41. In its forthcoming general recommendation No. 41, the Committee will specifically address gender stereotypes in various sectors, including in connection with the media, digitalization and artificial intelligence. ↩

The Committee recommends that States parties:

The right of women to participate on equal terms with men in their countries’ political, social, economic and cultural life is recognized in the preamble and articles 7 and 8 of the Convention. In its general recommendation No. 23 (1997), the Committee clarifies that equal sharing of decision-making power must avoid tokenism, whereby women are included but restricted to less influential roles or gain their position by virtue of connections to male relatives. It establishes that States parties have a responsibility to appoint women to senior decision-making roles. The Committee observes that women remain underrepresented in leadership positions at all levels and, when included, are often restricted to less influential roles or leadership roles in areas stereotypically associated with femaleness and stereotypically deemed less important.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Equal access to all levels and aspects of education is enshrined in article 10 and further elaborated in general recommendation No. 36 (2017) on the right of girls and women to education. It is a key precondition for accessing decision-making systems on an equal footing with men and boys. However, the Committee observes that many women and girls still do not benefit from equal access to or participation in education, in law and in practice. The violation of this right is further exacerbated through intersectional discrimination, as seen, for example, against women and girls with disabilities. Even when equal access is granted, gender stereotypes are prevalent in the education system, including in teaching and learning materials, classroom practices, teacher training and biased attitudes towards girls and women both inside and outside the school environment, gearing them towards traditional fields of study and gendered behaviours. This not only keeps women out of certain disciplines that are critical to shaping the future, such as new technologies, including artificial intelligence, but also prevents them from envisioning themselves assuming a decision-making role. It is a key task of an education system to integrate an “education to empowerment”, ensuring that girls, boys, women and men are given the tools necessary to achieve parity and exercise leadership in an equal, responsible and ethical manner.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Gender-based violence against women is a form of discrimination directed against a woman because she is a woman or that affects women disproportionately.⁴² It seriously inhibits women’s ability to enjoy rights and freedoms on equal basis with men. In its general recommendation No. 35 (2017), the Committee defines gender-based violence against women as taking multiple forms, including acts or omissions intended or likely to cause or result in death or physical, sexual, psychological or economic harm or suffering to women, threats of such acts, harassment, coercion and arbitrary deprivation of liberty. Such violence may occur in all spheres of human interaction, whether public or private, including in the contexts of the family, the community, public spaces, the workplace, leisure, politics, sport, health services and educational settings. It can also occur online and in other digital environments and also takes the shape of structural, emotional and economic violence. It also often targets women human rights defenders, politicians, activists and journalists. The prohibition of gender-based violence against women has further evolved into a principle of customary international law, as illustrated in general recommendation No. 35 (2017).

42. General recommendation No. 19 (1992) on violence against women. ↩

The Committee observes that legislation addressing gender-based violence against women is often lacking, in whole or in part, and, where it does exist, it is often not fully implemented. Gender-based violence against women in the public and the private sphere prevents women from taking initial steps toward representation in decision-making. When exercised against women in decision-making roles, it may push them out and constitute a chilling effect discouraging other women from reaching for such positions. Legislation to specifically address gender-based violence against women in political and public life, including against women human rights defenders, politicians, activists, journalists and voters, is frequently lacking. The Committee highlights the role of media outlets and social media platforms in committing, perpetuating and normalizing gender-based violence against women, and the role of political parties in trivializing such violence, including sexual harassment and other misogynistic behaviour, within their ranks. It also recognizes that gender-based violence against women, including in decision-making, is often exacerbated for women who are subjected to intersectional discrimination.

The Committee stresses that gender-based violence against women, while discrimination itself, is the result of an unequal and discriminatory system, based on the structural domination and exclusion of women. While emphasizing the importance of adopting and implementing robust legislation to address gender-based violence against women, it also urges States parties to adopt a comprehensive approach and implement all rights under the Convention, including institutionalizing parity, as the key safeguard against gender-based violence against women.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

In its general recommendations No. 23 (1997), No. 30 (2013) on women in conflict prevention, conflict and post-conflict situations, No. 34 (2016), No. 37 (2018) and No. 39 (2022), the Committee calls upon States parties to ensure that civil society representatives are consulted and can actively shape policy formulation, implementation and monitoring in all areas and at all levels. Currently, spaces to consult with women’s and girls’ rights civil society organizations are limited and often not institutionalized, and consultation is frequently limited to issues narrowly perceived as “women’s issues”, rather than the full range of local, national, regional and international policy issues.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Under article 7 (a), women are guaranteed the right to vote in all elections and referendums. However, despite legal reforms, women still face barriers to fully exercising this right. In its general recommendation No. 21 (1994) on equality in marriage and family relations, the Committee notes that nationality laws may deprive women of their right to vote based on family or marital status and, in its general recommendation No. 23 (1997), the Committee highlights obstacles, including women’s limited access to candidate information, voter registration challenges linked to caring responsibilities and financial constraints that limit their time to follow campaigns and turn out to vote, as well as stereotypes discouraging women from voting or leading to attempts by men to influence or control women’s voting. Women may also face additional barriers to voting due to the lack of or control over necessary identification documents.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

The right of women to stand for election to any public body is established in article 7 (a). The Committee observes, however, that the number of women candidates remains structurally limited and that women candidates remain subjected to significant discrimination in this area.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Women’s right to participate in the formulation and implementation of government policy is guaranteed under article 7 (b). This includes the responsibilities of the parliament, local and regional councils and other community decision-making bodies. Under article 11, States parties are required to reconcile conflicts between work and family life, and, in general recommendation No. 25 (2004), the Committee recommends that laws, policies and programmes consider aspects of women’s lives that may differ from those of men. Despite progress, women still hold only 27 per cent of seats in national parliaments⁴³ and constitute 35.5 per cent of elected members in local government.⁴⁴ They hold just 24.1 per cent of parliamentary speaker roles⁴⁵ and 18.9 per cent of chairs of parliamentary committees on defence, finance, foreign affairs and human rights.⁴⁶ They often account for less than 15 per cent of mayors and governors at the local and provincial levels. Few women serve as presidents and prime ministers, and only 23.3 per cent of cabinet ministers globally are women.⁴⁷

43. Inter-Parliamentary Union, “Global and regional averages of women in national parliaments”, Parline database, available at https://data.ipu.org/women-averages (accessed on 25 October 2024). ↩
44. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: women’s leadership and political participation”, 2 October 2024, available at www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/leadership-and-political-participation/facts-and-figures. ↩
45. Inter-Parliamentary Union, “Women speakers of national parliaments”, Parline database, available at https://data.ipu.org/women-speakers (accessed on 25 October 2024). ↩
46. Inter-Parliamentary Union, “Women in parliament in 2023”, available at www.ipu.org/resources/ publications/reports/2024-03/women-in-parliament-2023. ↩
47. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: women’s leadership and political participation”. ↩

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Article 7 (b) stipulates women’s rights to hold public office and perform all government functions, another area in which women remain underrepresented in leadership positions.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Under article 7 (c), women have the right to participate in non-governmental organizations and associations concerned with public and political life. Further guidance in this regard is provided in general recommendations No. 23 (1997), No. 33 (2015) and No. 39 (2022). At present, provisions requiring that political parties, trade unions and professional associations ensure parity in their decision-making bodies are lacking or their implementation is limited. Representatives of civil society organizations and women human rights defenders are also frequently subjected to legal restrictions and to threats, attacks and reprisals.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

The Committee highlights that, as critical decisions are increasingly made at the global level, international decision-making is an area in which parity needs to be pioneered and established.

Under article 8, States parties are required to ensure that women have equal opportunities to represent their governments at the international level. Women served as 20.54 per cent of ambassadors in 2023.⁴⁸ At the United Nations, 39 per cent of heads and deputy heads of mission were women in 2023.⁴⁹ Women remain underrepresented in diplomatic and foreign services of most States parties, particularly in the highest ranks, and tend to be appointed as ambassadors in embassies considered less important for their country’s foreign relations.

48. Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy, Women in Diplomacy Dashboard, available at https://womenindiplomacy.ae. ↩
49. UN-Women, “Facts and figures: women, peace, and security”. ↩

The Committee notes with appreciation that some States parties have adopted a feminist foreign policy, which seeks to advance gender equality and women’s rights through foreign policy and multilateral engagement.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Article 8 stipulates equal opportunities for women to participate in the work of international organizations, which also includes universal and regional organizations. In its general recommendation No. 23 (1997), the Committee attributes the underrepresentation of women to the absence of objective criteria and processes for appointment and promotion to relevant positions. At present, concrete mechanisms to reach parity in the international arena are lacking.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

It is affirmed in the preamble that the cause of peace requires the maximum participation of women on equal terms with men in all fields. Building on the Convention, its general recommendation No. 30 (2013) and Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) and subsequent resolutions, the Committee emphasizes the essential character of parity in all sectors as a prerequisite for peace and security. Women, however, remain significantly underrepresented in all decision-making systems in relation to peace and security.

The Committee observes that the increasingly complex and changing nature of conflict, emerging security threats caused by new technologies, including cyberattacks and artificial intelligence-driven lethal autonomous weapon systems, which may also exacerbate existing power imbalances and biases, a climate emergency, pandemics, the increasing exploration of outer space and various shifts in the geopolitical landscape have created an urgent need for the expansion of the women and peace and security agenda to address newly emerging threats, including those going beyond armed conflict prevention. The women and peace and security agenda must be applied both domestically and internationally and both in armed conflict prevention and in building resilience to all impending and unanticipated crisis situations.

The Committee underlines that the degree of prioritization and implementation of women’s rights in times of peace is intricately connected to their treatment in times of conflict. Domestic, foreign and transnational policies are also strongly interconnected and have cross-border and global impact on women’s lives. It is therefore also essential to apply the women and peace and security agenda with a new interdisciplinary understanding of the interconnected nature of these dynamics and use it as tool to secure women’s rights and a gender-responsive peace in all contexts, through both international development and domestic policies.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

A joint reading of the obligation to eliminate discrimination and achieve substantive equality in articles 1–3 and women’s equal rights in decision-making enshrined in articles 7 and 8 with their specific rights in relation to education, employment and economic empowerment in line with articles 10, 11 and 13 provides for parity in economic decision-making. This is further underlined and explained in general recommendations No. 13 (1989) on equal remuneration for work of equal value, No. 16 (1991) on unpaid women workers in rural and urban family enterprises, No. 17 (1991) on the measurement and quantification of the unremunerated domestic activities of women and their recognition in the gross national product, No. 36 (2017) and No. 39 (2022).

The Committee acknowledges the positive steps by private sector and key economic institutions to implement the business and human rights frameworks but considers that the private sector has a specific responsibility to establish parity at all levels. Women’s autonomy and parity is the precondition for women to positively combine their productive outputs, professional career and their personal choices, including with regards to maternity. A more gender-balanced top management is also correlated with more robust anti-corruption measures and increased transparency, with clear benefits for private sector organizations.⁵¹

51. Scott Berinato, “Banks with more women on their boards commit less fraud”, Harvard Business Review, May–June 2021, available at https://hbr.org/2021/05/banks-with-more-women-on-their-boards-commit-less-fraud; and Kellie A. McElhaney and Sanaz Mobasseri, “Women create a sustainable future”, October 2012, available at www.eticanews.it/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/ Report-Women_Create_Sustainable_Value.pdf. ↩

De jure and de facto discrimination and significant gaps in global and national economic frameworks and governance systems prevent women from being able to equally shape and access the economic market and assume decision-making roles therein. It also results in a failure to implement women’s economic rights and capture women’s productive outputs and contributions. Furthermore, unpaid care work, which is disproportionately carried out by women, constitutes a key factor that prevents women from accessing economic opportunities on the same level as men and needs to be revalued and shared equally.

The Committee also identifies the digital economy, including the technological transition and development and the use of artificial intelligence, as a key field requiring the equal and inclusive representation of women. This is crucial to prevent the perpetuation of gender stereotypes and new forms of discrimination.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Women’s control over their own bodies and lives and their equal rights, including legal status and legal capacity in all spheres, including in the family and community sphere, are enshrined in the Convention and are fundamental to exercising all their human rights, including their right to equal access to decision-making. The Committee observes that, despite progress, women’s and girls’ enjoyment of their rights in these areas often remains very limited. It also underlines, in its general recommendations No. 21 (1994) and No. 29 (2013) on the economic consequences of marriage, family relations and their dissolution, that unequal rights in family relations underlie all other aspects of discrimination against women.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

The Committee underlines the urgency of reaching parity in all decision-making systems to meet States parties’ overdue obligations under international law as well as to collectively build equal, resilient and prosperous societies.

The Committee recommends that States parties:

Building on existing commitments, the Committee sees several opportunities for action by the international community and regional organizations to advance the legal and normative basis for parity in decision-making in all spheres and at all levels.

The Committee recommends that the international community: