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Gender Equality Architecture Reform
GEAR Archives
For more information, visit the GEAR Website & for the GEAR structure see the GEAR Campaign Working Group.
The Gender Equality Architecture Reform (GEAR) Campaign is a Success!
September 14, 2009: The GEAR Campaign is pleased that the General Assembly expressed strong and unanimous support in adopting a resolution today that will enable the creation of the new gender equality entity to be headed by a new Under Secretary‐General (USG).
Women and their allies from around the world have been advocating for three years for a stronger better resourced agency on gender equality and women’s empowerment, and look forward to its creation early in 2010 ‐ during the fifteen anniversary year of the historic UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. |
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- October 27, 2009:
A powerful women's agency: will the UN deliver?
by Charlotte Bunch, CWGL's Founding Director and Senior Scholar
- September 2009: Women’s Rights and Gender at the United Nations:
The Case for a new Gender Equality Architecture by Charlotte Bunch, CWGL's Founding Director and Senior Scholar (To be published in Vereinte Nationen: German Review on the United Nations, 2009)
- September 18, 2009: Charlotte Bunch, CWGL's Founding Director and Senior Scholar, was interviewed by Jeb Sharp of PRI's The World. To listen, visit The World.
- September 15, 2009: Charlotte Bunch, CWGL's Founding Director and Senior Scholar, was interviewed by Ritula Shah of the BBC. To listen, visit the BBC's The World Tonight and click on Listen (33 minute 40 second).
- September 14, 2009:
GEAR Campaign Statement on Adoption of SWC Resolution by the UN General Assembly
- September 14, 2009: CWGL GEAR Press Release
- September 14, 2009: U.N. Approves Long-Awaited New Women's Agency by Thalif Deen, IPS
- September 5, 2009: U.N. May Shelve Creation of New Women's Body by Thalif Deen, IPS
- August 2009: GEAR Campaign Statement on the report of the Co-chairs of UN System-Wide Coherence Process and Upcoming General Assembly Resolution (English, French, Spanish).
- August 2009: Regional focal point letters calling on Member States to adopt the resolution for the new United Nations Gender Entity during the 63rd General Assembly: femLINKPACIFIC (Pacific), African Women’s Development and Communication Network (Africa),
Asia Pacific Women's Watch (Southeast Asia), and South Asian Campaign for Gender Equality (South Asia).
- August 2009: Report by the Co-Chairs which summarizes the issues related to UN System wide Coherence process on which the UN General Assembly should decide in September 2009, including the reform of the UN gender architecture.
- July 2009:Talking Points Paper for speaking with representatives of your government in the next few weeks and before the first week of September especially in capitol and/or in New York or Geneva.
- July 2009: As of July 2009 the GEAR Campaign has 307 organizational signatories.
- May 2009: Revised recommendations on Civil Society Participation in a new women’s entity.
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- March 2009: UPDATE
At the conclusion of the last session of the General Assembly in September 2008, Member States adopted a resolution by consensus requesting the Secretary General to develop a paper on institutional options for the new gender entity, addressing the identified gaps and challenges of the current United Nations system. The modalities paper, as it is known, was made available at the closing of the 53rd Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) on Friday March 13, 2009, and presents all four Options initially outlined in a previous DSG paper including A) the status quo, B) an autonomous fund/programme, C) a department and D) the composite. The paper assesses the ability of each option to fulfill the functions previously outlined in the DSG's papers (August 1, 2007; July 23, 2008) with a particular focus on the composite entity (option D). At the “system wide coherence” meeting the Secretary General endorsed the composite, or hybrid, option as “the most promising.” The GEAR Campaign still favors the composite option with meaningful participation of civil society and an ambitiously funded entity, led by an Under-Secretary General. GEAR believes that the Composite entity would retain the best elements of the four women's organizations of the UN, while significantly increasing funding, strengthening country level and policy-setting work, and creating a position of Under-Secretary General to lead the new body with further emphasis on civil society participation.March 2009: Updated Campaign Statement & Key Messages (English, Spanish)
- March 2009: GEAR Petition (English, French, Spanish)
- February 2009: GEAR CSW Submission (Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, Spanish)
- September 2008:
IMPORTANT UPDATE UN RESOLUTION MOVES GENDER ARCHITECTURE DISCUSSION INTO GENERAL ASSEMBLY
On Monday, September 15th, at a final meeting of the 62nd session of the UN General Assembly, member states adopted by consensus a resolution that will officially move forward the gender architecture discussion into the next GA session. This means that states have agreed to take next steps toward strengthening the UN system in relation to gender equality and women’s empowerment. States also called for the Secretary General to provide a further, detailed modalities paper in respect to the options set out in the Deputy Secretary-General’s paper…focusing in particular on the 'Composite Entity' option with a view to facilitating substantive action by the General Assembly within the 63rd session. The Composite model (which was formerly called the hybrid or option D) is the one supported by the GEAR Campaign as the most promising; it could potentially create a new women’s entity that, if developed as GEAR supporters have been advocating for, would have strong country presence, significant funding capacity, high level leadership and a strategic normative and policy making function. For more information on advocacy for how to ensure that this work is strengthened, visit http://gear.collectivex.com/main/summary .
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