Promoting Gender Equality to Enhance Societal Progress
With the emerging of democracies and economies, the urge of women’s participation in the public sphere is becoming inevitable. In modern society, women’s participation has consequences both at the individual and collective levels, one of which is a greater strive for gender equality. In the existing literature, gender equality has a wide spectrum of definitions. It is related to religion, politics, economy, etc. In essence, it is also related to human rights, the rights to developing our true and unique potentials as humans. Psychologist Abraham Maslow, through his well-known concept of the hierarchy of needs, defined the five main human needs, namely physiological need, safety need, love/belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. The more an individual is able to attain these needs, the more empowered they are, thus the more they are able to take care of their surroundings. Gender equality, indicated by women participating in the public sphere, allowing for self-actualization, which is an important factor to progress and development.
Gender equality and the empowerment of girls and women is grounded in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, and is anchored in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. Advancing gender equality and the rights of women and girls is essential to realizing their rights, and the rights of children. Children’s rights and well-being often depend on women’s rights and well-being, and childhood investments in gender equality contribute to lifelong positive outcomes for children and their communities. While many developing countries have exhibited considerable gender inequality in health, employment, and education, according to the World Bank, closing gender gaps matters for development and policymaking. It could enhance economic productivity, improve development outcomes for the next generation, and make institutions and policies more representative.
Referring to the findings of existing studies, there are factors, both at regional and national levels which are considered contributing to more inequality, namely economic opportunities, education, and technological progress.
- Economic Opportunities
The Indonesian economy has undergone dramatic changes over the last few decades, where it has achieved middle-income status in 2004 and high growth also rapidly reduced poverty from 23 percent of the population in 1999 to 11 percent in 2016. Yet one area that has not changed much is the participation of women in the labor market (Monash University, 2017). According to the World Bank, women’s access to economic opportunities is also undermined by their lower access to production input. There has been much evidence on gender discrimination in access to jobs, education, health, political representation, and so on (i.e UNDP’s Gender Inequality Index, the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index, etc). On the other hand, many studies have revealed how women’s access to jobs, cash transfers, education, credit, land, and other assets has positive implications for poverty reduction, fertility decline, children’s welfare, and agricultural productivity..
According to Klasen (1999), greater gender inequality in the use of human resources in an economy is likely to impact growth. The first pathway works directly through labor markets; which relates to the productivity of labor and the extent to which economies are making optimal use of their human resources. If ability and talents are assumed to be evenly distributed by gender, then the failure to educate and make use of women’s ability and talent to the same extent as that of men represents market distortion, restricts the pool of talent available, and this lowering average productivity. In the second pathway, if women’s access to education and economic opportunities is more likely to lead to greater investment to the human capital of their children, then it improves the chance of productivity for the next generation of workers.
2. Education
Studies on gender equality in Indonesia tend to show the trend of increasing girls’ and women’s educational participation in Indonesia. According to the Ministry o Women and Child Empowerment, decent education is reflected in several indicators, including the highest education attained, the average length of schooling, and the Participation Rate. The Participation Rate is a measure of the number of children in a certain school age group who are currently attending school at the educational level according to their age. The rate itself provides a positive indication of community participation in the education system that is structured by utilizing educational facilities at each level of education according to school age. Based on data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) in 2015, the participation rate of females in elementary school was around 96.86 percent, slightly higher than with men who are around 96.45 percent in urban areas. The same thing happened in rural areas, the rate of women was higher than that of men. The participation rate of female junior high schools is approximately 81.80 percent higher than that of males, which is about 79.50 percent in urban areas. Meanwhile, in rural areas, the female junior high school participation rate is 77.49 percent higher than males, which is around 73.07 percent. Meanwhile, female high school education level is about 66.68 percent higher than male, which is only 64.88 percent in urban areas for female high school areas, which is about 54.37 percent higher than the male which is only 52.52 percent. In addition, results of previous research indicated, in general, rural households which are anticipating economic crisis tend to reduce investment in the education of young children with the aim of protecting the education of older children. Meanwhile, parental education plays an important role in increasing school participation, where a mother’s level of education is more dominant in deciding her child to go to school at the basic education level.
A study by Azzizzah (2014) found that women are more likely to have never attended school compared to men, and the gap is bigger in rural compared to urban areas. Some of the determining factors are Indonesia’s patrilineal system and women’s family responsibilities (i.e getting married at a young age and taking care of the family) (Monash University, 2017). Using the Family Life Survey, Rammohan and Robertson (2012) find female educational outcomes are significantly worse for females in provinces with patrilocal norms (as opposed to matrilocal or neolocal norms). Another important aspect is the quality of education received, where Indonesia still faces challenges in low-quality education. Compared to other countries in the Southeast Asia region, Indonesia is still underperforming among adolescents aged 15 years old in comparison to those in Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, and Malaysia (Monash University, 2017). Similarly, with regard to science and reading, Indonesia still scores very low (Monash University, 2017).
3. Technological progress
The digital divide between the “haves’’ and “have-nots’’ to ICT access is created not only by unequal access to technology but also through the lack of real engagement and use of the technology, and concerns about that use (Selwyn, 2014; Suwana 2016). Norris (2001) described the digital divide as every inequality within the digital community, including access between men and women, rich and poor, and also developed and developing nations (Norris, 2001; Suwana, 2016). There are two forms of digital divide access and the ability divide, and the inequality of ability to use ICT among those who already have access (Dewan & Riggins, 2005). In the context of Indonesia, it has resulted in a degree of unequal access to information. While Renggana (2008) found the internet can empower Indonesian women through opportunities, such as working and creating online shopping at home. Unfortunately, the development of ICT has not occurred automatically with the opportunity of women’s usage of the internet. Thus, the lack of digital media literacy can create a broader digital divide (Renggana, 2008; Suwana, 2016).
Women’s and girl’s empowerment has several aims: enhancing women’s abilities and leadership to actively participate, to bargain positions, to organize small or medium-size or large enterprises, to open employment opportunities, and to change the roles and functions of women’s organizations at local levels as the media can support females to become active participants in their living local programs (Nugroho, 2008, Suwana, 2016). ICT can bring major improvements to the economic, political, and social empowerment of women, and the promotion of gender equality (Primo, 2013, p. 27). The digital also serves as a medium that allows women and girls to give more voice. In Indonesia, there have been reports of improved social status, bargaining positions, and influence on village policies by providing rural women training in digital media (Suwana, 2016; McKinsey, 2020). More women need access to these technologies since it is estimated that there are 1.1 billion unconnected women in low- and middle-income economies in the Asia Pacific (Suwana, 2016; McKinsey, 2020). Moreover, digital literacy among many women is low — lower than among men. It is vital that women are given the training in science, technology, and mathematics that will equip them for the industries that will thrive in the automation age
Ensuring these factors are crucial to promoting sustainability. These efforts are also to meet the goals to create a world where each woman and girl can exercise her freedoms and choices, and realize all her rights, such as to live free from violence, to go to school, to participate in decisions, and to earn equal pay for equal work. However, in many circumstances, women are still vulnerable to external risks. For instance, the COVID-19 pandemic has proved to create setbacks for gender equality. Economic shutdowns have a severe effect on women-dominated professions, and unpaid care work (which mainly done by women) will continue to increase. Given these setbacks, progress will be slower to attain. Thus, striving for gender equality should be part of the effort to tackle the unprecedented challenges and come out stronger for a more just and wealthier society.
References
Kabeer, Naila and Luisa Natali. 2013. Gender Equality and Economic Growth: Is there a Win-Win?. Institute of Development Studies Working Paper 417
Kalssen, Stephan. 2002. Low Schooling for Girls, Slower Growth for All? Cross-Country Evidence on the Effect of Gender Inequality in Education on Economic Development. World Bank Economic Review, vol. 16(3), pages 345–373, December
Suwana, Fiona and Lily. 2016. Empowering Indonesian Women Through Building Digital Media Literacy. Kasetsart Journal of Social Sciences, 38(3), pp. 212–217.
McKinsey Global Institute. 2020. How Can Digital Technology Speed Up Gender Equality?. Retrieved from
Monash University. 2017. Women’s Economic Participation in Indonesia: A study of gender inequality in employment, entrepreneurship, and key enablers for change. Australia Indonesia Partnership for Economic Governance
