Dr Pia Rowe* says the backsliding in the push for gender equality in Australia over the past 12 months shows how much more work remains to be done.
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Late last year the World Economic Forum released its Global Gender Gap report for 2018, and it’s not good news for Australia.
Yet again, we’ve slid backwards on the global scale, now ranking 39 out of 149 countries.
And it doesn’t get any better when you drill down to the individual measures.
In “Economic participation and opportunity” we’re ranked 46th, while “Political empowerment” earned us the downright abysmal score of 49.
For a country that year after year boasts number one ranking for gender equality in education, this simply isn’t good enough.
We’re barely into February, but even just a cursory glance at the recent events gives us an indication of our dire straits.
The Liberal Party’s “woman problem” gained much media attention in 2018, and despite some attempts to deflect the sad statistics, 2019 didn’t exactly get off to a stellar start with the announcement that the Minister for Jobs and Women, Kelly O’Dwyer would not recontest her seat at the next election.
Citing family, and “not politics”, as the reason for her decision, the statement highlighted the inherent problem with the false binary.
As Mark Kenny, Senior Fellow at the Australian Studies Institute at The Australian National University recently observed: “That federal politics is hard on families and relationships is hardly news, but the slew of resignations/defections underscores how little has been done to change things.”
Despite decades of work to acknowledge that social structures and individuals do not operate in isolation, the “personal” certainly appears an awful lot like “private” in 2019.
Politics aside, the controversy surrounding Gillette’s high-budget short film We Believe: The best men can be showed just how embedded gender inequalities are in the culture.
Drawing attention to the #MeToo movement and toxic masculinity among other things, the advertisement sparked a significant backlash online.
One of its loudest critics, British commentator Piers Morgan went as far as to argue that only “radical feminists” loved the ad “because it portrays men as bad”.
While it would be all too easy to dismiss these incidents as nothing but anecdotes, data from a national survey shows that culture and social attitudes are indeed a significant issue in Australia.
In September last year, the 50/50 by 2030 Foundation released its first major research report, From Girls to Men: Social attitudes to gender equality in Australia, which revealed some worrying trends.
While in theory most Australians support and believe in gender equality, men, and in particular millennial men, increasingly feel left out of gender equality conversations.
What’s more, many believed that political correctness gives women an advantage in the workplace.
But despite the rocky start to the year, we have also had some much needed good news that gives us reason to believe we can overcome the present challenges.
Virginia Haussegger, Director of the 50/50 by 2030 Foundation, had the great honour of being named the ACT Australian of the Year 2019 in recognition of her ongoing and tireless efforts to advance women’s empowerment and gender equality.
As Haussegger was quick to point out, Australia has made “good progress over the past several decades, and we ought to applaud the women who have worked so hard to make that happen”.
However, we have hit a period of complacency, with many still believing that the situation will naturally correct itself as more women enter the workforce — despite all the evidence to the contrary.
The fact that many men feel excluded from one of the key debates of our time is equally disconcerting.
What we now need is a concerted effort to broaden the discussion so that we can change the direction.
As noted by Haussegger: “We need to work harder to include men and boys in the discussion and search for solutions to gender inequality.”
Roll up your sleeves, people, we’ve got some work to do.
* Dr Pia Rowe is the Editor of Broad Agenda and 50/50 by 2030 Foundation Research Associate.
This article first appeared at www.broadagenda.com.au.
