Women still short on respect in the economy
They still account for only 38% of human-capital wealth globally
R.E.S.P.E.C.T, demanded the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, in what became an anthem for the struggle for gender equality in the 1970s and ’80s. There was a rising optimism globally that perhaps finally we were gaining momentum towards gender equality. The year 1979 heralded the United Nations Cedaw (Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women) and 16 years later came the adoption of the Beijing Platform for Action at the Fourth World Conference on Women.
For a country like South Africa, then a oneyear-old democracy, having just thrown off the shackles of racism and sexism that defined the patriarchal apartheid state, this was a historic point for the establishment of real equality in South Africa and the world.
And yet in 2018, Statistics South Africa’s Crime Against Women report shows a decline compared with historical levels, but still unacceptably high levels in the major categories. Worldwide we see the strengthening of conservative right-wing movements, even in previous bastions of democracy in Europe and North America.
One of the victims of this shift is women’s rights and the position of women in society. It is achieved with both directed policy, like restricting women’s reproductive rights, and through more subtle means, like making it harder to integrate women and the girl child into streams and professions that were historically the domain of men.
Utterances by folk in the leadership of influential organisations like the South African Institute of Civil Engineers take the struggle for gender equality back decades.
The progress to overcome this is slow. The latest World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report measures progress in four categories.
The findings are expressed as a percentage, with 0% as maximum inequality and 100% being gender parity. In the categories of educational attainment as well as health and survival, the world has made great and rapid strides, with gap percentages of 95% and 96% respectively.
We have seen an increased access to education for the girl child in most parts of the world, and the old adage of “educate a woman, and you educate a village” has proved to be true.
Amartya Sen, economist and Nobel laureate, quoted Bangladesh as a prize case-study where the economic fortunes of the country changed radically on the back of women’s education. In fact, health and survival are in many ways a direct result of this.
The other two categories in the gap report fare far less favourably. The category of economic opportunity and participation scores an unsurprising 58%. We all know of the barriers to entry, and even when women get in, there are the multiple glass ceilings. The cost to society is high. The cost to the economy is even more direct.
In the World Bank’s Unrealised Potential report it is calculated that women account for only 38% of human-capital wealth globally.
The number drops to less than one third in low-income and lower-middle-income countries. Part of the reason is limited opportunity for participation. The other is a complete lack of income parity, even when women and men are in the same job performing at the same level.
And this area of transformation is proceeding at a snail’s pace. It is estimated that at the current rate of change it will take 217 years before genderbased income parity is achieved.
The prevention of full participation of women in the economy has a wealth loss of $23 620 (R341 600) for every one of the 7 billion people on Earth today, says the World Bank report.
Globally, for the 141 countries that participated in the survey, the loss in human-capital wealth notches up to $160.2 trillion.
How can it be that we are currently in a prolonged global economic recession on the one hand, and an undeveloped and therefore unrealised human-capital dividend, estimated at $160.2 trillion, in the form of women and the girlchild, on the other?
The reason could lie in the fourth category of the Gap report – political empowerment. This relates not only to women’s representation in political formations at various levels of governance, but to general participation in decision-making at all levels. The political empowerment gap is at 23%. Loosely interpreted, this means that 77% of all the decisions that matter in the world today are taken by men. Enough said!
The current quagmire is influenced by the attitudes of the first and second industrial revolutions that have been instrumental in determining the shape and attitudes of the modern economy.
Traits of physical strength and specialisation in silos were deemed to be key, and tended to favour male dominance. But that was two industrial revolutions ago.
The challenges of 21st century society demand integration, synergy and social skills – the very traits that were previously regarded as the bastion of women, and a weakness.
In particular, success in the 21st century economy demands high emotional intelligence. Does this mean that the fourth industrial revolution depends for its success on the much higher participation of women?
Does this mean that the dividend of the industry 4.0 can only be fully realised on the back of full and equal gender participation in the economy and in society? The arithmetic seems to indicate that this is in fact the only pathway to a prosperous and sustainable future.