Women Entrepreneurs: the Next Driving Force in the Ukrainian Economy?

Posted by: Malgorzata Wolfe, Economics Officer

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Women’s Forum April 12, 2013: “Women Entrepreneurs: the Next Driving Force in the Ukrainian Economy?”

In this time of transition for the professional roles of women in Ukraine, many women are looking for ways to take charge of their own futures.  I was lucky to join over 160 Ukrainian women entrepreneurs, owners of small and medium enterprises, during the April 12 Forum: “Women Entrepreneurs: the Next Driving Force in the Ukrainian Economy?” My heart filled with hope seeing dozens of dynamic women enthusiastically discussing conference sessions, initiating new professional contacts, and exchanging business cards — demonstrating that women in Ukraine are a critical part of the economy and the future.

Under Secretary Sonenshine opened the Women’s Forum in Kyiv

U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Tara Sonenshine opened the Forum giving an inspirational speech about the importance of women’s leadership. The Forum’s goal was to promote the importance of Ukrainian women in driving Ukraine’s economic growth, boost the confidence of women entrepreneurs, and provide practical tools for further empowerment. The participants were given an opportunity to network, exchange experiences, and discuss strategic investments in the economic potential of women.

Minister of Social Policy Natalya Korolevska opened the Women’s Forum in Kyiv

Minister of Social Policy Natalya Korolevska emphasized “Equal rights and opportunities for women and men – are truly global issues.” She pointed out that gender parity is particularly important during a time of global economic crisis and announced that her Ministry has been working on a draft law which would introduce a 30% quota for women’s representation in the public sector.

The Forum’s sessions gave panelists an opportunity to exchange personal experiences and share success stories. During one of the coffee breaks, one woman approached me and said: “When you do a business you think you are alone, surrounded with your own little problems. So, it is really encouraging to hear that other women are struggling with the same issues. It is good to talk about it. It makes you stronger!”

Women’s Forum April 12, 2013: “Women Entrepreneurs: the Next Driving Force in the Ukrainian Economy?”

Two of the conference sessions focused on connectivity – one of the three “C’s” mentioned by Under Secretary Sonenshine, the other two being confidence and community. One panel focused on mentorship as an effective tool to raise future leaders, while the other concentrated on networking as a key factor for success. The first panel emphasized that as a mentor you “give back to society what you’ve received” – your education and experience. And mentoring can serve all ages; it should be seen as an overall investment in women.

Tapping the full talents of women — like those I saw at the conference — can help Ukraine achieve its full economic potential.  As Under Secretary Sonenshine said in her speech: “Empowering women is about being smart. One way to understand how to ask the smart question today is not to ask ‘why women?’ – it is to ask ‘why not.’”

 

150th Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation

Posted by: Luis CdeBaca, Ambassador-at-Large, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, State Department
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President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation 150 years ago

On January 1st in the United States, we marked the 150th anniversary of the date President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that millions of men, women, and children held in slavery were forever free. A century and a half later, President Obama said that through the Proclamation, Lincoln “reaffirmed the commitment of the United States to the enduring cause of freedom. Then as now, we remain steadfast in our resolve to see that all men, women, and children have the opportunity to realize this greatest of gifts.”

Yet we are still a long way from achieving the vision of a world free from all contemporaneous forms of slavery. As many as 27 million people are victims of modern-day slavery, also known as trafficking in persons. This crime appears in many ways. It could be the abuse of domestic workers trapped in their employers’ homes or the enslavement of a man on a fishing boat. It could be the prostitution of a young girl in a brothel or the compelled service of a boy as a child soldier. Whatever form it takes, at its core human trafficking is a crime of exploitation that robs its victims of their freedom and dignity. Modern slavery occurs in every country in the world, and every government has a responsibility to respond to it.

The Obama Administration is committed to fighting modern slavery at home and around the world using the “3P” approach—prosecuting traffickers, protecting their victims, and preventing this crime in the future. We’re also eager to partner with governments that take this problem seriously, and we are working with stakeholders in civil society, the faith community, and the private sector, which all bring unique capabilities and expertise to this struggle. A major part of our work is raising awareness about this issue and promoting greater activism in finding, stopping, and preventing this crime.

We’re driving this effort as part of our commemoration of Emancipation. The State Department joined with the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio to produce a film, Journey to Freedom, which shows the parallels between trafficking in persons and historical slavery in the United States. From Congo to Mexico to Nepal, our embassies and consular posts have opened their doors to share this film, shine a light on this problem, and encourage more people to contribute to the battle against modern day slavery.

This film is available to view online at http://www.state.gov/j/tip, and I encourage you to take the time to see how this problem affects all our communities today.

After all, it’s going to take all of us–learning how to identify this crime, knowing what to do when we see it, and preventing it from harming our communities–if we’re going to succeed in the fight against modern slavery. And this struggle deserves nothing less than our full support. As President Obama said, the “fight against human trafficking is one of the great human rights causes of our time.” The United States remains committed to this work, and we hope you will be our partner in this effort.

 

Why Ending Violence against Women and Girls Must be a Global Priority

Posted by:  Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues Melanne Verveer

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Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues Melanne Verveer

Violence against women and girls affects Ukraine just as it does in the United States and every other nation.  Gender-based violence is a global pandemic that cuts across ethnic, racial, socio-economic, and religious lines, and knows no borders.

Gender-based violence includes physical, sexual, and psychological abuse; threats; coercion; arbitrary deprivation of liberty; and economic deprivation, whether occurring in public or private life. Types of gender-based violence can include domestic violence; sexual coercion and abuse; child sexual abuse; sex trafficking and forced labor; neglect; elder abuse.

One in three women around the world will experience some form of gender-based violence in her lifetime.  The shocking and brutal rape and murder of Oksana Makar by three young men in March illustrates the worst kind of violence against women and draws crucial attention to the need for urgent action. Unlike the Makar case, other forms of violence are often overlooked in the media because they are common and widespread.  For instance, intimate partner violence is the most common form of violence, and a UN-sponsored survey found that 33 percent of Ukrainian women have faced domestic violence in their lives.  Most victims cited alcohol abuse as a contributing factor, and 75 percent of victims never ask for help or support to deal with domestic violence.

Physical violence vastly increases women’s risk for serious medical conditions – reproductive health problems, miscarriages, sexually transmitted diseases. Country studies indicate that the risk of HIV among women who have experienced violence may be up to three times higher than among those who have not.

Women with disabilities are two to three times more likely to suffer physical and sexual abuse than women with no disability.

Gender based violence extracts significant social cost as well.  A 2004 study in the United Kingdom projected the total direct and indirect costs of domestic violence to 23 billion pounds per year, or 440 £ per person.  Preventing and prosecuting violence against women pays enormous dividends in the long run.  The United States’ Violence Against Women Act, which strengthened efforts to investigate and prosecute such crimes, is estimated to have saved more than $16 billion since its enactment in 1994.

Violence against women and girls is not just a gender or economic issue but one encompassing international human rights and national security.  We need laws in place to criminalize such acts.  These laws need to be enforced and hold people accountable, since impunity too often helps to fuel the violence.

Taking Action to Eradicate and Raise Awareness of Violence against Women and Girls

The 16 Days of Activism against Gender Violence, beginning on November 25, offer all of us an opportunity to renew our commitment to free women and girls from violence, whether it happens behind closed doors or as a public tactic of intimidation.  Whether it occurs in our own neighborhood or on distant shores, violence against women and girls damages us all- men and women alike.  As Secretary Clinton has stated, “It is time for all of us to assume our responsibility to go beyond condemning this behavior, to taking concrete steps to end it, to make it sociably unacceptable, to recognize it is not cultural; it is criminal.”

We all need to work together—the international community, governments, multilateral organizations, and grassroots-level advocates to address and prevent violence from occurring.  Many nations have passed legislation addressing gender-based violence. The next critical step is to work together to improve implementation of those laws in order to increase accountability and address impunity.  We need increased advocacy and more interaction between policy makers and those who work in the field.  We need to empower girls to speak up for themselves, and educate boys to speak up for their sisters.  We must support the inclusion of men, boys, and other critical community stakeholders – such as religious leaders – in addressing and preventing violence and changing gender attitudes.  We must ultimately overcome the deep-rooted gender inequalities that either tacitly allow or actively promote violent, discriminatory practices.

U.S. Government Leadership

The United States has made significant progress in its efforts to address gender-based violence around the world, through the development of the U.S. National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security; the Gender-based Violence Scale-Up Initiative and Evaluation of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR); the work of the President’s Interagency Task Force to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons; and efforts to incorporate gender-based violence programming into humanitarian response activities.

In August 2012, the United States was proud to release its first-ever Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Gender-Based Violence Globally, along with an Executive Order signed by President Obama directing its implementation.  This strategy brings the whole of the US government together to indentify, coordinate, integrate and leverage US efforts and resources around the world.

We must recognize that violence against girls and women is, at root, a manifestation of the low status of women and girls around the world.  Ending the violence requires elevating the status of women and girls and freeing their potential to be agents of change in their community.

The United States has made gender equality and women’s empowerment a core focus of our foreign policy.  Countries cannot progress when half their populations are marginalized and mistreated, and subjected to discrimination.  Evidence demonstrates that women’s empowerment is critical to building stable, democratic societies; to supporting open and accountable governance; to further international peace and security; to growing vibrant market economies; and to addressing pressing health and educational challenges  When women and girls can live free from violence and are afforded equal opportunities in education, healthcare, employment and political participation, they lift up their families, their communities and their nations, and act as agents of change. As Secretary Clinton has stated, “Investing in the potential of the world’s women and girls is one of the surest ways to achieve global economic progress, political stability, and greater prosperity for women – and men – the world over.”

 

It’s a Long Road from Seneca Falls

Posted by: Jason Gilpin, USAID

When I moved to Ukraine in 2007, I was pleasantly surprised that Women’s Day is a national holiday. Given all the inequality and injustice that women all over the world have faced and continue to face, I wondered why we in the United States hadn’t thought to celebrate a day outside Mother’s Day to honor the more than half of the world who get less than a quarter of the credit.

The origin of women’s rights in the United States is the Declaration of Independence of 1776, which declared that “all men are created equal.” As the English Dictionary, Merriam Webster points out, a definition of “man” is “the human race: mankind.” Unfortunately, it took my countrymen about a century and a half after 1776 to establish that “men” in the Declaration of Independence didn’t refer to the “male human,” it meant “the human race: mankind.” American women were denied the right to vote until 1920, but even at the time of America’s founding, the nation’s strength was dependent on the wisdom, prudence and perseverance of its women.

Even though women in revolutionary America were prohibited from voting, serving on juries, or even signing contracts, I wonder today how the

Martha Washington (June 2, 1731 – May 22, 1802)

young USA could have succeeded without the wisdom, foresight, and courage of its founding mothers, such as Martha Washington, Abigail Adams, Margaret Catharine Moore Barry, and Dolley Madison (that’s not a typo – she spelled her name Dolley, although most people think it’s Dolly!).

Martha Washington is honored for having set the standard for intelligence, sensibility, and indefatigable patriotism in American women. She also continually encouraged her husband onward in the Revolution, despite the threat that she might very well lose everything she had, which was not at all insignificant, considering the fact that George Washington owed most of his wealth and economic status to her inheritance.

 

The Secret History of Women’s Day: Or, How an American Strike Became a Soviet Tradition

Posted by: Eric A. Johnson, Public Affairs Officer

As March 8 approaches, Ukrainian women often ask me what Americans do to celebrate International Women’s Day. My short answer is: nothing. But before anyone can get offended, I rush to explain that we honor the important women in our lives on two other days. On St. Valentine’s Day (February 14), every right-minded American man celebrates the main woman in his life (be she wife, lover, girlfriend) by taking her out to dinner (or cooking it for her) in addition to buying a card, chocolates (often in the shape of hearts), and flowers (usually red roses to signify true love). And then on Mother’s Day (the second Sunday in May), Americans honor their mothers by taking them out to lunch or dinner – or, better yet, cooking it for them. But given that so many men can’t cook, Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day tend to be the two days of the year when it’s almost impossible to find a free table in a good restaurant.

Starting in New York City in 1857, women workers made a tradition of labor actions and protests on March 8. In 1910, the first International Women's Day was celebrated on the same day. This photo shows an early Women's Day protest.

All holidays begin somewhere. Mother’s Day is the relatively recent invention of American Anne Jarvis who suggested a holiday honoring mothers after the death of her own activist mother in 1905. Jarvis – who never had any children of her own – first proposed the holiday in 1912 and by 1914 U.S. President Woodrow Wilson had turned it into a nationally recognized day. By the 1920s, Mother’s Day was celebrated across the country.

St. Valentine’s Day has much older roots dating back to pagan celebrations in Greece and Rome which revolved around Hera (Juno), fertility, and her marriage to Zeus (Jupiter). With the death of the Christian martyr Valentine of Rome (killed AD 269 and buried on February 14), the holiday evolved into a Christian feast day. However, it wasn’t until English poet Geoffrey Chaucer was inspired by the Italian Renaissance to write his Parliament of Birds (1382) that St. Valentine’s Day became associated with romantic love – and love letters – in the popular imagination. The holiday, however, did not come to resemble something that we might recognize today until 1847 when another American woman – Esther Howland – began producing St. Valentine’s Day cards for her father’s store in Worcester, Massachusetts. The rest, as we say, is history.

 

Women’s History Month: Our History is Our Strength

Posted by: Leah Antil, Public Affairs Section Intern

March is Women’s History Month, which honors the achievements of women throughout history. It is a chance for people all over the world to recognize female role models by drawing on their tenacity, courage, and creativity as sources of strength in the extraordinary challenges that face the world today.

In the United States, Women’s History Month began with the official recognition of March 8th as International Women’s Day in the mid 1970s. In 1981, groups united by the National Women’s History Project lobbied U.S. Congress to declare a ‘National Women’s History Week’ that included March 8^th. By 1987, through presidential decree, the week became Women’s History Month, and Congress has issued a resolution for the month every year. This year, the Obama Administration released a report highlighting 50 years of progress.

International Women’s Day has a 100-year history of celebrating women throughout the world. It was originally established in 1911 and celebrated Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, and Germany, when over a million people rallied for women’s rights to vocational training and work, as well as to end job discrimination based on gender. Now, a century later, March 8^th is a day to advocate for political and social awareness of women’s struggles worldwide. 

 

International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women

Posted by: Public Affairs Officer Christopher Fitzgerald

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Ending Gender Violence

In the United States, November 25 was our Thanksgiving holiday, but around the world it was also the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. I had the honor today of welcoming to the Embassy a group of Ukrainian activists and officials working to stop domestic violence and spoke to them about America’s commitment to this campaign in Ukraine and elsewhere.

PAO Christopher Fitzgerald speaks to anti-gender violence activists

The Embassy’s Democracy Commission small grants program supports the work of the conference organizer, a non-governmental organization called the Harmonized Society Foundation, led by a remarkable woman named Natalya Grishchenko. The work she and her NGO are doing to help victims of domestic violence is important, and our support reflects the commitment of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to the rights of women and children.

As Secretary Clinton notes in an opinion article on this subject, “one in three women around the world will experience gender-based violence in her lifetime.” In fact, the problem is so pervasive that it will take many years to solve. But the good work being done in Ukraine by NGOs like Harmonized Society is a big step in the right direction.