Pathway to Gender Equality: CEDAW, Beijing and the MDGs

Author/Editor(s): Lee Waldorf

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Beijing Platform for Action must be the touchstones for realizing the potential held out by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The CEDAW and Beijing processes have generated a wealth of understanding and experience that illuminates the nature of gender-based discrimination and clarifies the steps needed to achieve gender equality.

While the MDGs set out concrete, time-bound and measurable goals, targets and indicators for poverty reduction, this framework provides only the starting point for the work that must be undertaken. As the Millennium Declaration has emphasized, it is critically important that the gender equality obligations and commitments that have been made to the world's women are effectively implemented.

"Pathway to Gender Equality" outlines how CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action can be used as a lens to understand and address the gender equality dimensions of the MDGs, which in turn can help to ensure that the pursuit of the MDGs is based on principled conviction and results in effective development.

This publication offers three ways to enhance the synergy between CEDAW, the Beijing Platform for Action, and the MDGs:

• It identifies connecting points between the three processes, including connections relating to monitoring and reporting.
• It highlights some of the most critical gender equality concerns for each MDG, and identifies the specific measures governments are obligated and committed to take in these areas.
• It provides helpful gender equality resources for engaging in this work.