Gender equality

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We marked International Women´s Day and Women´s History Month with a global call for an all-agreed fair Social Pact on Care. We started advocating for this 3 years ago when Covid-19 exacerbated the global care crisis. Since then our members have continued to multiply our actions to highlight the need to put care at the center of the political agendas globally.

A space for collective learning, participation and diverse and regional organization: this was the Feminist Forum of the XV Regional Conference on Women held at the Espacio Memoria y Derechos Humanos (Ex ESMA) on November 7 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Over the past two years, dozens of ESCR-Net members engaged in cross-network discussions to develop the analytical report “Building sustainable peace. Transforming conflict-affected situations for women.” The report argues that in dealing with conflict-affected situations, it is vital to adopt an intersectional feminist approach via a human rights framework, and provides seven lessons and principles to guide the work in the field.

The Legal Resources Centre (LRC) represented Mrs. Agnes Sithole, a seventy-two-year-old woman living in KwaZulu-Natal who married Gideon Sithole in 1972 out of community of property in terms of section 22(6) of the Black Administration Act 38 of 1927 (BAA) and the Commission for Gender Equality in a challenge to the Matrimonial Property Act of 1984. Between 1972 and 1985 Mrs. Sithole worked as a housewife and ran a home-based clothing business successfully to educate her children and assist the family household expenses. After the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Sithole deteriorated, Mr.

Mrs. Dobson was a community nurse employed by North Cumbria Integrated Care working two days a week. As a mother of three children, two of whom have disabilities, Mrs. Dobson relied on the ability to have a fixed work schedule. From 2008 to 2016 Mrs. Dobson maintained a 15-hour work week over a period of two fixed days without issue. In 2013 Mrs. Dobson’s employer first asked Mrs. Dobson to work the occasional weekend, but after explaining her family dynamic and work that she needed to complete at home the issue was dropped.

The Constitutional Court accumulated 19 cases involving women who, at the time of the events in question, were pregnant, lactating, or on maternity leave, and worked in various positions in the public sector governed by the Organic Law of Public Service (LOSEP). The Court addresses the violation of pregnant and lactating women’s rights and provides further protections by formally recognizing the right to care.

In 2003, seven-year-old Andrea was murdered by her father, who subsequently committed suicide, during a court-approved parental visitation. Andrea’s mother, Andrea González, had reported over forty-seven (47) instances of physical abuse to the police and sought restraining orders against him to protect herself and her daughter – but the father had refused to accept supervised visitations and a court of law eventually allowed for the unsupervised visits that led to the death of Andrea. After the murder, Ms.

Background: On December 11, 1998, an explosion occurred in a fireworks factory in Santo Antônio de Jesus, Brazil. The factory consisted of a set of tents located in paddocks with shared worktables. As a result of the explosion, 60 people died and six were injured. Among those who lost their lives were 59 women, 19 of whom were girls, and one boy. Among the survivors were three adult women, two boys and one girl. Four of the deceased women were pregnant; one of them was able to give birth before dying.

On 27 April 2021, ESCR-Net co-hosted an online discussion on land rights. Over 50 members from across Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, Europe and North America, convened virtually to learn from each other’s experiences and strengthen shared analysis and...

At the time of her death, the deceased, Maria Mahlangu, was a domestic worker in a private home in South Africa. Ms. Mahlangu’s daughter and grandchild were financially dependent upon her at the time of her death. Ms. Mahlangu’s daughter asked the Department of Labour for help in the form of compensation under the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act (COIDA) or unemployment insurance benefits. The Department of Labour denied both because Ms.