By: Alfonso Nieto Rovira
In 1975, during International Women’s Year, the United Nations commemorated International Women’s Day for the first time. Two years later, the General Assembly of the United Nations officially formalizes the Day, despite the fact that its first celebration dates back to February 28, 1909, when the Socialist Party of America designated the day in memory of the strike of workers in the textile sector the previous year in New York City, United States.
Later, in 1979, the United Nations General Assembly approved the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the most comprehensive international instrument, whose main objective is to protect the human rights of women. The Convention requires Member States to eliminate discrimination against women in the public and private spheres, including the family, and aims to achieve substantive equality between women and men, both in law and in real life, is of great importance. It is important to highlight that the Mexican Congress is equal in the representation of male and female legislators, both in the Senate and in the Chamber of Deputies. Similarly, it is notable that the current government in Mexico is testimony to the presidential cabinet with the largest number of women in charge.
This international day is commemorated around the world to raise awareness of the importance of empowering women in all settings, protecting their rights and ensuring that they can reach their full potential; In the same way, it serves to make visible the inequality and discrimination that women still experience throughout the world, as well as to make their rights effective, including the need to eliminate the wage gap, so that women receive the same remuneration for doing the same job. work than men, increase the presence of women in leadership positions and eliminate the double working day.
UNESCO works in all its spheres of competence to promote gender equality and rights, and the autonomy of women within the framework of its mandate for peace and sustainable societies. Gender equality is one of the organization’s two global priorities since 2008.
Achieving gender equality in the world starts with ensuring that women’s needs and experiences are integrated into technology and innovations
• Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation;
• End all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere; and
• Ensure that all girls and boys complete the cycles of primary and secondary education, which must be free, equitable and of quality, and produce relevant and effective school results.
In Mexico there is the National Women’s Institute (INMUJERES) which is in charge of promoting and fostering conditions that give rise to non-discrimination, equal opportunities and treatment between genders, the exercise of all women’s rights and their equitable participation in the political, cultural, economic and social life of the country.
In 2019 INMUJERES, together with the National Autonomous University of Mexico and the Regional Center for Multidisciplinary Research, published a report entitled “Of couples, homes, institutions and community spaces”, within which one of its objectives is to introduce the empowerment of women. as a process closely linked to their living conditions and, at the same time, as a powerful tool to deal with experiences of intimate partner violence.
