With the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly underway, global leaders are negotiating on issues like climate action, poverty, economic growth, violence against women and escalating conflicts.
Achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment is integral to global progress on each of these issues, and yet the UN General Assembly is far from having gender-equal representation at its own conversation table.
Just 24 per cent of Permanent Representatives at the General Assembly are women, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU)– the global organisation of national parliaments
The General Assembly makes no concerted effort among UN member states to ensure that more women ambassadors are represented. This contrasts to many (but certainly not all) parliaments internationally having open discussions and raising awareness of the need for increased female participation, and a number of countries boasting gender equal cabinets.
The lack of women represented also come as the UN’s gender goals remain far from being achieved, despite this year’s General Assembly marking the half-way point to the deadline set for achieving the 2030 Agenda and 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
UN Women and UN DESA’s 2023 gender snapshot report revealed that a mere two of the SDG indicators aimed at women’s equality were “close to target” and none were at the “target met or almost met” level.
Current trends will see more than 340 million women and girls in extreme poverty by 2030.
With progress towards achieving these goals remaining far too slow, a greater focus on gender equality could be the key to picking up the pace.
“Half of humanity is female, so unless we all participate equally, it’s difficult to have the responses that are tailored to the needs of humanity,” said H.E. Ambassador Lachezara Stoeva, the Permanent Representative of Bulgaria to the United Nations and President of the Economic and Social Council, speaking on an IPU panel focusing on making the General Assembly (GA) gender equal.
Stoeva said that solving global problems is “a matter of representation and inclusivity”.
“The GA is receiving the recipients of the decisions of member states, so we see what member states send. That’s why parliaments have a role to play at a national level, and even if [countries are] not included in the formal decision-making on appointments, they can still ask questions on the process [of diplomacy], be more inquisitive and be more demanding.”
The latest Women in Diplomacy Index shows that, in 2023, still only one fifth of all ambassadors in the world are women.
Susanna Malcorra, Founder of Global Women Leaders Voices for Change and Inclusion, former Foreign Minister of Argentina and former Chief of Staff to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon gives context to the issue of representation when she explained, “The General Assembly was established in 1945 when the UN started, and since then, and until now, only four times have women resided at the helm of the General Assembly.”
These four women are out of the 78 total people who’ve been elected the role of President of the General Assembly. There is also yet to be an appointment of a woman Secretary General.
“That proves that member states speak about women’s rights and about women having equal access, but they don’t deliver [on gender equality in] the UN General Assembly,” said Malcorra, speaking to the statistics.
“Not only do [the GA] not deliver regarding their representatives, they also do not deliver when they produce candidates for senior positions in the United Nations.”
As one of the General Assembly’s female representatives, Deputy Secretary-General of the UN Amina Mohammed said, all leaders should be encouraged “to recommit to doing everything in our power to promote the cause of women diplomats until we achieve parity in every United Nations organisation, the Security Council and General Assembly.”