From the Archives

NEW YORK--30 July 2010--

Stretching back as far as the first United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) held in 1947, the Bahá’í International Community (BIC) United Nations office has been actively advancing the principle of gender equality. Recognizing that awareness of the principle must be combined with the power of implementation, the BIC, together with a number of NGOs, was deeply involved in supporting the creation of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women).

A coalition of more than 275 organizations in 50 countries came together to form the Gender Equality Architecture Reform (GEAR) campaign, an effort that many say was critical in the effort for UN Women to be approved by the General Assembly.

“We are very pleased about the creation of this new agency,” said Bani Dugal, the Principal Representative of the BIC, who led many early discussions around the campaign as Chair of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women, and later as Co-Convenor of the GEAR campaign.

“It is an important step, and it will hopefully give greater impetus and coherence to the work of the United Nations in its work for gender equality and the advancement of women.”

Coinciding with the 10th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, civil society began raising concerns at the UN World Summit in 2005 about the lack of dialogue on women’s rights and gender equality in the UN reform agenda. These conversations sparked growing demand for the development of institutional mechanisms to protect and advance the rights of women across the UN system.

“We want the agenda of women’s rights to be at the table of all of the policy-making of the UN, and we want that to be true at the country level, as well,” said one representative of the GEAR campaign.

The opportunity to take action emerged in 2006 when Secretary-General Kofi Annan established the UN Coherence Panel, aimed at eliminating duplication and competition among UN agencies. The following year, NGOs came together at CSW and focused on the importance of addressing gender equality within the coherence agenda. Soon after, the GEAR campaign was formed. 

“There’s been human rights organizations, development organizations, men and women around the world that have been really supportive of this effort and have worked actively with us in the trenches to make it, to realize this dream,” said a member of the coalition.

Through this initiative, a shared understanding emerged that the four existing UN agencies focused on women’s rights and gender equality—the Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW), the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW), the Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women (OSAGI), and the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM)—should be merged to create a stronger, more unified entity with coherent goals and improved funding.

The campaign’s efforts culminated in June 2010, when GEAR representatives presented a petition—signed by 34,555 individuals from 165 countries and territories—to General Assembly President Ali Abdussalam Treki, calling for the establishment of a new UN body for women and gender equality. A month later, UN Women was officially created.

“Our hope now is that governments will fully fund UN Women, so that it can deliver on its promises,” said Ms. Dugal. 

“We also want UN Women to engage with civil society in a substantive manner at all levels—global, regional and national.”

At the heart of the BIC’s engagement in this effort was a commitment to the principle of the oneness of humanity, which implies that every individual must be treated with dignity, irrespective of sex, and that the work of bringing about a gender equal world requires universal participation, which involves meaningful reform within the UN system. 

In the words of one GEAR campaign representative, “gender equality is integral to all of the work that the UN does. And it’s really important that UN Women does achieve that goal and becomes this model for the UN—the UN of the future.”