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The United Nations at Seventy-Five: Where Are the Women in The United Nations Now?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2020

Kirsten Haack ,
Margaret P. Karns  and
Jean-Pierre Murray
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Abstract

Following the unsuccessful attempt to get a woman appointed as UN secretary-general in 2016 and the drop in women in senior posts in 2015, it appeared that gender equality at the UN was as distant as ever. Yet, gender equality within the Secretariat and UN system has been on the organization's agenda since 1970, with goals and target dates set for the level of women's participation and achievement. These have been met in some issue areas (for example, in so-called feminine portfolios) and organizations, but not others. As part of the special issue on “The United Nations at Seventy-Five: Looking Back to Look Forward,” this essay traces the evolution of efforts to increase the representation of women in the UN system and takes stock of their current representation therein, analyzing the data on the Secretariat and appointments to senior posts as well as in various operations and programs.

Keywords

gender equalitygender parity strategyUN Secretariatprofessional staffspecialized agencieshard- and soft-issue areas
Type
The United Nations at Seventy-Five: Looking Back to Look Forward
Information
Ethics & International Affairs , Volume 34 , Special Issue 3: The United Nations at Seventy-Five: Looking Back to Look Forward , Fall 2020 , pp. 361 - 371
Copyright
Copyright © 2020 Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs

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References

NOTES

1 For information on the United Nations Intellectual History Project, its publications, and its oral history transcripts, see unihp.org/.

2 Gayle Kirshenbaum, “U.N. Expose: Inside the World's Largest Men's Club,” Ms. magazine, September/October 1992, pp. 16–19.

3 On the subject of women's exclusion, see Helen McCarthy, Women of the World: The Rise of the Female Diplomat (London: Bloomsbury, 2014).

4 United Nations Economic and Social Council, “Participation of Women in the Work of the United Nations: Report of the Secretary-General,” E/CN.6/132, March 16, 1950.

5 UN General Assembly, “Employment of Qualified Women in Senior and Other Professional Positions by the Secretariats of Organizations in United Nations System,” A/RES/2715, December 15, 1970, www.un-documents.net/a25r2715.htm.

6 See, for example, United Nations Economic and Social Council, “Employment of Women by the Secretariats of Organizations within the United Nations System,” E/RES/1857(LVI), May 16, 1974, digitallibrary.un.org/record/215198?ln=en; and UN General Assembly, “Employment of Women in the Secretariat,” A/RES/3416, December 8, 1975, digitallibrary.un.org/record/650382?ln=en.

7 Sec. V, para. 356 in “The Nairobi Forward-Looking Strategies for the Advancement of Women,” World Conference to Review and Appraise the Achievements of the United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development and Peace (conference report, United Nations, Nairobi, June 15–26, 1985), 1997-2001.state.gov/picw/archives/nairobi-contents.html.

8 UN Women, paras. 190 and 193 in “Women in Power and Decision-Making,” section G of Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action: Beijing+5 Political Declaration and Outcome (New York: United Nations, 1995), www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/csw/pfa_e_final_web.pdf?la=en&vs=800.

9 Other of Annan's appointments include two women as USG, Mary Robinson as the United Nations high commissioner for human rights and Elizabeth Dowdeswell as the executive director of the UN Environmental Programme; and three women as ASG, Angela King as special adviser on gender issues and advancement of women, Rafiah Salim as ASG of human resources management, and Gillian Sorensen as ASG for external relations.

10 See United Nations General Assembly, “Delivering as One: Report of the High-Level Panel on United Nations System-Wide Coherence in the Areas of Development, Humanitarian Assistance and the Environment,” A/61/583, November 20, 2006, undocs.org/en/A/61/583.

11 These units include the Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW); the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW); the Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women (OSAGI); and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). For details on the debates over UN Women's establishment, see Hilary Charlesworth and Christine Chinkin, “The Creation of UN Women” (RegNet Paper 2013/7, Regulatory Institutions Network, Canberra, Australia, June 3, 2013), papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2289567.

12 Daniela Ligiero, “UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Commitment to Gender Equality,” United Nations Foundation (blog), March 23, 2016, unfoundation.org/blog/post/photos-un-secretary-general-ban-ki-moons-commitment-to-gender-equality/.

13 Karin Landgren, “The Lost Agenda: Gender Parity in Senior UN Appointments,” Global Peace Operations Review, December 14, 2015, peaceoperationsreview.org/commentary/the-lost-agenda-gender-parity-in-senior-un-appointments/.

14 Kirsten Haack, “The UN Secretary-General, Role Expansion and Narratives of Representation in the 2016 Campaign,” British Journal of Politics and International Relations 20, no. 4 (November 2018), pp. 898–912.

15 Antόnio Guterres, quoted in “Making Progress toward Achieving Gender Parity,” United for Gender Parity, n.d., un.org/gender/.

16 Rosemary DiCarlo of the United States was the appointee for this post. It is worth noting that peace operations—that is, peacekeeping in particular—are separated from the Department of Political Affairs, and a man (Jean-Pierre Lacroix) was named USG for Peace Operations.

17 Teresa Casale, Lyric Thompson, Sarah Gammage, and Lila O'Brien-Milne, Progress under Threat: A Report Card on the Secretary-General's Second Year from the Feminist U.N. Campaign (Washington, D.C.: International Center for Research on Women, 2019), www.icrw.org/publications/feminist-un-report-card-2/.

18 Quoted in Ellen Wulfhorst, “Fight for Gender Equality at U.N. Faces Tough Internal Resistance, Report Says,” News, Thompson Reuters Foundation, January 23, 2019, news.trust.org/item/20190123224801-84kzg/. See also Lyric Thompson, Teresa Casale, and Lila O'Brien-Milne, “Baby Steps toward a Feminist United Nations,” Foreign Policy, January 29, 2019, foreignpolicy.com/2019/01/29/united-nations-guterres-feminist-campaign/.

19 See, for example, Haack, Kirsten, “Breaking Barriers? Women's Representation and Leadership at the United Nations,” Global Governance, 20, no. 1 (January–March 2014), pp. 37–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 See United Nations System Chief Executives Board for Coordination, UN System HR Statistics Reports. Available at: www.unsystem.org/content/un-system-human-resources-statistics-reports.

21 It is important to note that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund are not included in the UN system staff reports for the CEB.

22 Using the criterion of at least one hundred professional staff, a total of eighteen entities were included in our study: the UN Secretariat; the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO); the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO); the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD); the International Labour Organization (ILO); the International Maritime Organization (IMO); the International Telecommunication Union (ITU); UNAIDS; the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP); UNESCO; UNFPA; the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR); UNICEF; UNIDO; the World Food Programme (WFP); the World Health Organization (WHO); and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Data for the full set are available upon request.

23 See Haack, “Breaking Barriers?”

24 The funds and programs include the UNDP; the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD); the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); UNHCR; the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA); WFP; the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC); the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat); UN Women; and the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS). The specialized agencies include the ILO; FAO; UNESCO; WHO; the World Bank Group; the International Monetary Fund (IMF); the Universal Postal Union (UPU); ITU; the World Meteorological Organization (WMO); WIPO; IFAD; UNIDO; the International Organization for Migration (IOM); and the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). The three related organizations are the World Trade Organization (WTO); UNOPS, and IAEA.

25 “Senior Management Group: Current Members,” United Nations Secretary General, n.d., www.un.org/sg/en/content/senior-management-group.

26 Ingvild Bode, “Women or Leaders? Practices of Narrating the United Nations as a Gendered Institution.” International Studies Review (January 2019), academic.oup.com/isr/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/isr/viz004/5300201?redirectedFrom=fulltext.

27 Jina Moore, “U.N. Cases Read like ‘Manual in How Not to Investigate’ Sexual Assault,” New York Times, June 29, 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/06/29/world/united-nations-sexual-assault.html.

28 Haack, “Breaking Barriers?,” p. 42. Other early studies of women in the UN include D'Amico, Francine, “Women Workers in the United Nations: From Margin to Mainstream?,” in Meyer, Mary K. and Prügl, Elisabeth, eds., Gender Politics in Global Governance (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998)Google Scholar; and Jain, Devaki, Women, Development, and the UN: A Sixty-Year Quest for Equality and Justice (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005)Google Scholar.

29 Among the sources are Hannan, Carolyn, “Feminist Strategies in International Organizations: The United Nations Context,” in Caglar, Gülay, Prügl, Elisabeth, and Zwingel, Susanne, eds., Feminist Strategies in International Governance (New York: Routledge, 2013), pp. 74–91Google Scholar.