Wikipedia - Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

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The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, approved in September 1995 at the Fourth World Conference on Women, is a global pledge to attaining equality, development and peace for women worldwide. The Platform for action requires immediate action by all to generate a just, humane and peaceful world based on fundamental freedoms and human rights.

Contents   [hide]  ·         1 Mission Statement ·         2 Critical areas of concern ·         3Goverment requirements ·         4 Outcomes ·         5 References

[edit] Mission Statement

According to the definition in the document’s Mission Statement:

The Platform for Action is an agenda for women's empowerment. It aims at…removing all the obstacles to women's active participation in all sphere of public and private life through a full and equal share in economic, social, cultural and political decision-making….at home, in the workplace and in the wider national and international communities. Equality…is a matter of human rights and a condition for social justice….

[edit] Critical areas of concern

The Beijing Platform concentrates on 12 "critical areas of concern" that require attention in order to achieve gender quality and women's empowerment:

• violence against women
• human rights of women
• women and armed conflict
• women and poverty
• education and training of women
• women and health
• women and the media
• women and the economy
• women in power and decision-making
• institutional mechanisms for the advancement of women
• women and the environment
• The girl child

[edit] Government Requirements

The Beijing Platform for Action requires all governments to develop policies and national plans of action to implement the Platform locally. The National Plans of Action for each country outline specific activities that the national governments will undertake to advance the situation of women, including addressing violence* against women.

The definition of violence, contained in the Platform for Action, is comprehensive, including "any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life."

 [edit] Outcomes

Following the 1995 Fourth United Nations World Conference on Women, the United Nations General Assembly mandated the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women to integrate into its program a follow-up process to the Conference, regularly reviewing the critical areas of concern in the BPFA and to develop its role in mainstreaming a gender perspective in United Nations activities.

In 2000 the Beijing+5 reviewed the progress of the 12 areas of concern and found that the goals had not been fully achieved and as a result further committed themselves to achieving the goals set out in 1995. Beijing+10 continued to review the status of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action. 

[edit] References

• Stop Violence Against Women
• Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights – Summary of the Beijing Declaration & Platform for Action
• University of Minnesota Human Rights Library
• Fourth World Conference On Women. Covenant for the New Millennium: The Beijing Declaration & Platform for Action. Santa Rosa, CA: Free Hand, 1996. 
• Healy, Lynne M., and Rosemary J. Link. Handbook of International Social Work: Human Rights, Development, and the Global Profession. New York, NY: Oxford UP, 2011.
• Healy, Lynne M. International Social Work: Professional Action in an Interdependent World. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008.
• Murray, Anne Firth. From Outrage to Courage: Women Taking Action for Health and Justice. Monroe, Me.: Common Courage, 2008.