Vital Interests: Amanda, thanks very much for joining us today on the Vital Interests Forum. With the collaboration of Augusto Lopez-Claros, and Ruth Halperin-Kaddari, you have issued an important new report The Gender Equality and Governance Index: Empowering Women for the Prosperity of Nations issued by the Global Governance Forum (The Gender Equality and Governance Index ). Can you give us some background on how this project came about, the mechanics of it, and what you hope it will achieve?

Amanda Ellis: Thank you, John. It's a real pleasure to be with you to discuss this Important work. While the Covid-19 pandemic and its disproportionate impact on women was thrown into stark relief last year, so too was 2020 a landmark year for gender equality and an opportunity to review progress. Unfortunately, there has been much less accomplished than we had hoped for. 2020 marked the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action that was agreed at the Fourth World Conference on women. It was also the 20th anniversary of United Nations Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace, and security, the 10th anniversary of UN Women, and the fifth of Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG 5) on gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. So a really important year in which to take stock.

Progress has been, in a word, pitiful. Not a single country has yet achieved full gender equality. The World Economic Forum estimates it will take another 257 years to achieve gender parity in economic empowerment. Only eight countries, according to the World Bank Women Business and the Law project, had even legislated for full gender equality by 2020 (and all are in Europe, except for Canada.) So the genesis of the Gender Equality and Governance Index was both concern and commitment to help raise awareness and to spur much faster and deeper progress. 

As Global Governance Forum board members Augusto, Ruth and I all had direct previous experience with large-scale efforts to promote progress on gender equality and we share a deep personal and professional commitment to accelerating action given the positive multiplier impact this has, not only for women and their families and communities, but for societies and countries. As the full title of the Gender Equality and Governance Index indicates, there is a direct correlation between empowering women and the prosperity of nations.  Augusto had overseen the development of the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap project and later led the Indicators group at the World Bank, Ruth served for many years as an independent expert to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) treaty body and I founded the Women, Business and the Law project at the World Bank (which was originally the basis for a bigger project with the Economist Intelligence Unit called the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index). During my tenure as New Zealand  Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva Augusto and I began to work together to better educate the diplomatic community about discriminatory legislation. Very specifically we aimed to help spur progress in the context of the Universal Periodic Review every UN member country is subject to, every three to five years, in the Human Rights Council.

While the three of us each brought our own perspectives to this important issue, we were all agreed it was time for a new annual Global Governance and Gender Equality Index (GEGI) that could both draw on a number of robust data sets which now exist and develop some new elements for cross-country comparison around inclusive governance. We engaged an international working group to help us construct the GEGI, drawing on a range of different perspectives. So we saw this very much as a collective effort, bringing together multiple sources to shed more light on the critical issue of gender equality. We hope the GEGI will raise awareness, encourage debate, spur practical action, and then measure annual progress both between countries and over time.

VI: In other words, you're establishing benchmarks that you will be looking at, as the years go forward, to try to measure progress and compliance?

Amanda Ellis: Exactly! And to make that information available and more accessible to a broader audience. The Index is constructed around five core pillars that significantly impact gender equality and the quality of women’s lived experience: governance, education, paid work, entrepreneurship and violence. Each pillar consists of a number of elements to provide detailed information that creates a composite picture. For example, the first element of the Governance pillar examines a country’s legal and constitutional framework, considering whether the constitution includes a clause on gender equality, and if so, does it explicitly reference sex/gender, the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), with any reservations and the Optional protocol. Another considers the “her-storical” context, including the number of years women have been allowed to vote, the number of years a woman has served as head of state and/or Prime Minister, or as Central Bank Governor or Finance Minister, or been appointed to the High Court.  A third considers current participation in governance, such as the proportion of women in legislative and Ministerial roles, and proven mechanisms to promote equality, like quotas for example. We also draw on attitudinal data from the World Values Survey. This gives an overall picture of the legislative framework, track record of progress, current situation and attitudes. 

We think it's so important to be able to measure progress over time and to examine and share good practices between countries. The aim is to help raise awareness and make a constructive contribution to the ongoing policy debates and as a result, to spur practical action. So many people are shocked when they learn that not a single country has yet achieved full gender equality, and even more shocked when they hear how few countries even have a level playing field as far as legislation goes. 

One of the exciting things that we've been doing at the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Lab at Arizona State University to support the use of the GEGI is to work  with a range of partners to spread awareness and promote advocacy for change. We are collaborating not only with the Global Governance Forum, but also with the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Council of Women World Leaders, Women Political Leaders, Commonwealth Parliamentarians, the United Nations, the World Bank, and the Georgetown Institute for Women Peace and Security, under Ambassador Melanne Verveer, to create a campaign for practical change through a series of short videos https://globalfutures.asu.edu/sdg5-training/.

Our students have designed a wonderful, easy-to-use world map which allows people to click on a country and see a summary that has been created by the World Bank Women, Business, and the Law project that shows indicators across a woman's life cycle. It provides a short progress report, including what legal reforms have recently been achieved, where there's still a requirement for action, and then gives an excellent detailed summary of the areas where laws still need to be changed. https://bit.ly/3bg9rpT

We're hoping that going a step further to illustrate data sets from the Index in a very simple way, where people are able to see a brief summary of progress with the simple click of a mouse hovering over the country they are interested in, will encourage more widespread awareness. There is also a notification sign up, open to everyone who would like to be kept informed on a regular basis on progress by countries of interest. This will hopefully spur action not only by legislators and policy makers but also by activists and lobbyists for positive change. We are thrilled that the UN Foundation Girl Up club is building a tool kit for advocacy action around this. https://girlup.org/

So we are hoping that the Gender Equality and Governance Index will provide the bigger context for the importance of this work and the tools we are creating with partners will help popularize the information. Particularly with the COVID-19 pandemic, there's been a real awareness that disadvantaged groups have become increasingly disadvantaged. Of course, women have been the majority of those to lose jobs and the majority of victims of the rapid spike in domestic violence. We hope to provide useful tools for policymakers in particular, but we also want to encourage debate and to spur action right across the spectrum.

VI: Let’s look at some of the antecedents to your work. In 1981 there was the ratification of the UN Convention to End All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) that was then adopted by 189 countries. Interestingly the United States was one of the few exceptions. This Convention called for nations to enact laws ensuring the respect, protection, and fulfillment of women. Why didn't this have the impact that was hoped for? Was it just good for a country image to sign on to the Convention but without any real intention of honoring its purpose?

Amanda Ellis: That is an excellent question. There are still some 59 states that retain reservations to full implementation amongst those who have ratified the Convention, which is indeed an admirable number at 189, as you point out - just shy of the full UN membership of 193 countries.

But let’s consider the very first measure States commit to under CEDAW: “abolish all discriminatory laws”. As we have discussed, as of 2020 only eight countries globally had legislated for full gender equality under the law. The most recent data from the Women, Business and the Law project catalogues an extraordinary 1,669 laws on the books that still negatively impact on women from engaging economically on the same basis as their male counterparts. While declarations may be laudable, action needs to be tracked. There is still a lot of resistance to meeting even this first measure of CEDAW, evident in the attitudes we reference in the World Values Survey. To highlight this, I was personally very disappointed that during negotiations for UN Sustainable Development Goal 5 to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls, a number of countries argued that property rights for women should be in accordance with national laws rather than meeting compliance with CEDAW - and won! So SDG5 is actually less ambitious than CEDAW. Very disappointing - and another reason we need the GEGI. 

VI: The Beijing Platform for Action which you mentioned last year was the 25th Anniversary. Like CEDAW it called for the end of discrimination in all aspects of life. What was the significance of the Beijing meeting and its call for action? Why did not a single country achieve any of its goals? Was it too ambitious?

Amanda Ellis: The Fourth World Conference on Women, which was held in Beijing, is a real milestone in the path towards gender equality. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action is still the most progressive blueprint we have for advancing women’s rights. It speaks to the power of civil society to galvanize action and of governments to come together. Some 17,000 official participants from 189 countries and over 30,000 activists from all around the world engaged in parallel fora, often with different perspectives but with a common purpose. 

Of course, Beijing was where (US) Secretary Hillary Clinton made her famous speech declaring “human rights are women’s rights and women's rights are human rights”. I think until then there tended to be a perspective that the two were not closely aligned. With the advent of the Human Rights Council all 193 UN member countries are examined every three to five years on their progress through the Universal Periodic Review process, including on gender equality. I think it is a very powerful mechanism for public accountability on previous commitments.

While as we have discussed no country has achieved all the goals laid out in the Beijing Platform for Action, many countries have indeed made progress. For example, while less than five percent of Parliaments have reached gender parity in representation, more women serve in political office than ever before (at one in five Ministers and one in four MPs), and more women and girls are protected by laws against gender-based violence. I personally think it is time for a Fifth World Conference on Women where important issues of intersectionality could also be addressed. 

VI: There are many global challenges with the COVID pandemic being the one that is besetting the world at the moment. You mention that countries that have reacted best to COVID are countries that have strong female leadership and their policies are based on feminist principles. Can we go into that? What are, for you, the feminist principles that make for a more effective reaction to the challenges and problems that the world is confronting?

Amanda Ellis: Taking the very salient example of the response to the COVID-19  pandemic, some 40% of what were deemed the most successful responses came from, at the time, 8% of world leaders - and those leaders were all women: New Zealand, Denmark, Iceland, Scotland, Finland, Germany, Taiwan. It was very interesting to see that the common feminist principles in dealing with the pandemic involved privileging human wellbeing and socio-economic security, consultation (especially with scientists), transparency and clear communications (including to explain when there was uncertainty), cooperation and collaboration, compassion, kindness AND strength - because as our New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern emphasized, those are not mutually exclusive qualities as some “strong” authoritarian male leaders would argue. 

Listening to and acting on advice from scientific experts, communicating with the public in a way that was consistent, clear and able to be understood by everybody defined government policies in countries led by women. My elderly mother called me from New Zealand in March last year when New Zealand was in full lockdown, and exemplified the sentiment of the country when she said, "We're all very frustrated by having to be in lockdown, but Jacinda (as our prime minister is commonly referred to) has done such a good job of explaining to us why we need to do this. We need to stay home to save other people’s lives, and we're in this as a team of 5 million."

That kind of inclusive and comprehensive messaging was both clear and science- based, explaining that the situation was a critical one and the strict measures that needed to be taken by all, and compassionate in acknowledging that it wasn't any fun for anybody having to be in full lockdown. Qualities that have been more regularly associated with women, like caring and compassion, are qualities that all leaders can embody for the good of their entire populace.

I would highly recommend an excellent paper, What a “feminist” approach to fighting Covid-19 might have achieved, written by Ruth Halperin-Kaddari and another Global Governance Forum board member, Ambassador Don Steinberg. It really showcases the kinds of feminist qualities that can be aspired to and not just by women. https://globalgovernanceforum.org/a-feminist-approach-to-fighting-covid-19-2/

VI: The notion of extending feminist principles and ideals beyond just women is an important one. I have had the pleasure of working with Carol Gilligan and David Richards who have done significant study on how the characteristics of patriarchy - misogyny, racism, xenophobia, homophobia, and violence - threaten the foundations of democratic societies. Is one of the problems in countries that have not lived up to protecting and enabling their female populations, a problem of patriarchy?

Amanda Ellis: I would certainly agree with you. We have seen some frightening examples recently of this link between overt patriarchal “strong man” approaches and a real threat to democratic ideals. I think you've laid it out beautifully, and I think the value of work like the GEGI is to highlight the importance of women’s differentiated lived experience. While it seems obvious now, Gilligan’s approach was seen as revolutionary at the time: male experience was considered the norm. Feminist scholarship has demonstrated that an inclusive approach that takes differentiated context and experience into account is more positive for all. Longitudinal data sets demonstrate the correlation between higher levels of gender equality, more inclusive governance and prosperity. Carol Gilligan's work I think is fascinating - she provides a crucial voice for understanding the vital importance of validating women’s different lived experience and an inclusive approach to feminist ideals.

VI: Let's look at some of the pillars that you've talked about. The need for the education of women is certainly important as it leads to their ability to actively participate in the workplace. In many countries the workforce consists of a small percentage of wage earners with a majority of people depending for their livelihoods on the gray economy, the non-wage-earning economy. Women are not well-represented in the wage-earning economy, but aren't they the fundamental workers within the gray economy?

Amanda Ellis: Absolutely. As you rightly said, women are the majority of the informal or the gray economy, and in fact, in low-income countries, the estimate of women engaged in the formal labor force is only about 7%. Most of women's work is therefore not counted in official statistics. By comparison, data indicates 47% of women and 70% of men are engaged in the formal labor force globally.

Coming back to the informal economy, we see women working in entrepreneurship, particularly, often running micro and small businesses or engaged in family business. This is an area that I studied a lot when I worked at the International Finance Corporation, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group. Through practical experience in Africa, in the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific conducting Gender and Growth Assessments for Ministers of Finance and Trade, I came to realize how intersectional women's economic empowerment actually is. I remember one of the first countries I worked in when I joined the World Bank Group in 2003 was Kenya. Women confided in me that because of the way the marital laws were structured in Kenya, they were particularly worried about HIV. At that stage, the prevalence rate for HIV-AIDS was five times higher for women in the 18 to 35 age group than for men. Women explained they would be way too frightened to ask their husbands to use contraception, because they had no legal standing in terms of their marital status, including no property rights (this has changed significantly now through a new Constitution in Kenya). As they pointed out, legal equality, including property rights, was not only critical for gender equality and their safety within the family, but also absolutely essential to use collateral to obtain a loan, and then to be able to grow a business.

When we look at the intersectionality of all of the elements of economic empowerment for women, we realize that it's so important to consider education, violence against women, legal frameworks and the conditions in which women work. All of these elements are included in the five pillars of the GEGI to try and demonstrate that there is a comprehensive interweaving of all of many factors that need to be addressed for there to be a level playing field that takes into account the reality of women’s lived experience. This complexity is well worth unpacking. The academic literature and research reveals positive correlations between higher rates of growth and prosperity, higher rates of gender equality under the law, more access to education for girls and higher rates of women's activity as entrepreneurs and as workers in the formal labor force.

VI: There were programs known as microfinancing that started a number of years ago and were intended to help women start small businesses, purchase farm animals, and sell craftwork. These programs were underwritten by the World Bank and other international aid organizations. Are these microfinance initiatives to assist women still ongoing? 

Amanda Ellis: Oh, absolutely. Microfinance has been a real revolution. With the Grameen Bank and Finca International, there was a whole rethinking of the way in which finance could be delivered to the poor. As a former banker myself, the 5 C’s of credit were sacrosanct: collateral, capital, character, capacity and conditions. Microfinance explicitly recognized, for many of the reasons we have just discussed, that women were often prevented from accessing collateral and capital through no fault of theirs. Often the only recourse was a loan shark with usurious rates of interest. Yet women still had excellent character and capacity - qualities that could be leveraged in a group context to overcome the lack of the first two, taking conditions into account. So was born the village banking model of women’s self-help groups. Microfinance has really transformed poor women's ability to be economically active. I'm very proud of the fact that the World Bank Group now has a billion-dollar fund to loan to women entrepreneurs. 

There's a real global recognition in the finance industry now that providing equitable financing for women, and looking for ways to overcome legal and other obstacles so women can advance beyond microfinance, is imperative. For example, when I first worked in Tanzania, the formal property laws were not discriminatory, but Economist Intelligence Unit and World Bank economists together did an analysis where they estimated that the laws on the books were actually being implemented probably only 20% of the time, and the other 80% of the time, customary law was prevailing. Under customary law, women were unable to own property.

One woman called Victoria Kisiyombe really changed our whole approach. She had been widowed and faced some of these challenges. Luckily Victoria inherited a cow named Sero (meaning “hope” in Swahili). That one asset changed everything. The cow provided Victoria the ability to feed her two young children, and to sell the milk for income. Recognizing how different things might have been, Victoria joined four other widows to create a micro-leasing business they called “Serolease'' to help other women in similar situations. They would buy a goat or chickens or a cow to “lease” to other women, who would pay off the asset in installments as they earned income. When I met Victoria, the micro-leasing business was running successfully informally in the gray economy, but she and her partners really wanted to go to scale. We were able to help through the World Bank Group to create the first leasing law in Tanzania, which then opened up the market much further and significantly increased positive impact. 

We were also able to support a dedicated line of credit for women entrepreneurs with one of the local banks, EXIM. Victoria’s “Serolease” with its positive track record became an early beneficiary. For me, it was a very exciting journey to meet women who were actually succeeding against all odds, and who were, as a very feminist principle, identifying entrenched gender inequalities, reaching out to other women in their community to create solutions that could then go to scale, and creating partnerships with the World Bank Group to provide a platform for all of the women in Tanzania to have more opportunities which in turn created more prosperity in the country as a whole.

VI: Economies of nations around the world are being adversely impacted by the ongoing COVID pandemic. Even in the United States the number of those unemployed continues to grow. It is also clear that the predominant number of those losing employment are low wage- earning women. Economists are referring to the prospect of a  “shecession”. Will this reality set back the progress that has been made to bring women economic opportunities or will extra measures be taken to bring in more global assistance?

Amanda Ellis: That is such an important question. Women have indeed been hardest hit by the pandemic through massive job losses because they tend to be more employed in consumer-facing service industries. COVID-19 has exacerbated inequalities on all counts. The big spike in violence against women is of particular concern, too. We know that this is such a costly issue from a work perspective as well as the human cost. In the U.S. alone, the estimate is that violence against women carries an economic cost of around $460 billion per annum - more than any other crime.

UN Women has been taking the lead on a working group for the G7 and a program with the G20 to highlight this important notion of the “shecession”, and to strongly advocate for a gender-informed response to COVID. McKinsey has done some excellent analytical work and their estimate is that $30 trillion could be added to the global economy by 2030 if there is a gender informed response to COVID. It is important to keep shining the spotlight to make sure this happens - not just to help women, but to help the entire economy.

VI: Another group of really impacted women are the huge numbers, in the tens of millions, of women who are migrants and refugees all across the world. How can their dire circumstances be addressed?

Amanda Ellis: This is really a significant problem we are going to see continuing to grow for a number of reasons. We are now at over 70million displaced people worldwide, which is the highest number since World War II. The International Organization for Migration estimates that it could be as high as 200 million by 2050. Some other projections are even higher with the climate crisis. This is an issue which is a serious global challenge, a problem without a passport. 

We can't talk about the migration problem without looking at the intersection of climate change and the threat multiplier it creates. Some estimates are as high as 80% of the victims of the climate crisis are women and girls. This is an issue that particularly worries me, but it's an issue where there has been some very interesting research done by Foreign Policy and the International Finance Corporation that shows why it's critical to have more women in leadership and governance positions. For example, we know from this research that women are much more likely to privilege sustainability and climate issues in their governance approaches. This is sorely needed. 

When we take stock, five years on from the Paris Climate Agreement, I am very concerned that we are headed in the wrong direction as a planet. Despite the temporary reduction in CO2 emissions due the strictures of the COVID-19 pandemic, atmospheric levels of CO2 continue to rise. Scientists have been shouting into the void for the last forty years, warning us that we need to act or the problem will become exponential in nature. We have only to consider that the past five years are the hottest on record; more extreme weather events like droughts and floods; the terrible wildfires on the West Coast of the US; sea level rise in Miami, where they're having to raise streets; extreme flooding in Texas;. Consider the 1.5 billion animals that burned in the tragic bushfires in Australia last year; unprecedented melting of the Arctic. When we look at all of these consequences, and consider the systems approach to what is happening globally with planetary boundaries, it is absolutely critical that we act more rapidly to address the climate crisis. The positive news is, we actually have the technology to do it. We have renewable energy sources now like solar and wind, that are way cheaper than highly subsidized fossil fuels.

The IMF estimate in 2017 was some $5.2 trillion spent on fossil fuel subsidies, both direct and indirect. I think the CEO of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, has really shone a much-needed spotlight on all of these inter-linkages when she talks about the need to build forward better. Not building back better, but building forward better. Governments have spent or committed some $13 trillion to the COVID response and recovery, which is absolutely unprecedented. Yet, to date, only around a quarter of that money is earmarked for use to help create a new green and gender-equitable economy. That I think is a really major issue.

We all need to be holding our governments and policymakers to account, and also voting with our wallets in terms of our purchasing decisions. This recovery is really the opportunity for us to revamp the way in which we build forward better, in addressing both the climate crisis and the gender equality crisis.

VI: Talking about rebuilding better and rebuilding forward after a major crisis and trauma, there's a chart of the percentage of women in parliament by country. The country that has by far the largest percentage of women parliamentarians is Rwanda at 61.3%. Finland, Sweden, and Mexico followed with participation in the high 40% range. Was it the genocidal trauma in Rwanda that motivated women to take control of that country to ensure it had a different future?

Amanda Ellis: The genocide in Rwanda was absolutely tragic. I think Rwanda has since been an excellent example of the communal healing process that went on subsequently, led largely by women. Their engagement in rebuilding social connections and economic foundations, as well as redefining governance, has been nothing short of inspiring. Rwanda is the highest ranking country in Sub-Saharan Africa on the GEGI and is another example of the relationship between inclusive governance and better overall opportunities and performance. 

Building forward better in my opinion has to be an inclusive process. There’s a range of measures to spur progress that isn’t happening fast enough. I think over the years there has been a growing recognition that if we're not able to bring about change through the treaty bodies like CEDAW and commitments like the Millennium Development Goals, and now the Sustainable Development Goals, at the pace we would like to see, we may need to explore other measures. I'm a convert now to properly designed and implemented quotas. In Norway, back in 2008, advocates said we believe that not having women on boards in sufficient numbers is actually a drain on our economic performance. There was initially a lot of skepticism. But Norway's requirement of 40% of women on publicly listed company boards was met, and when you look at the correlations, we can see that the diversity dividend, as it's called, did pay off. Now, a number of other countries have followed suit, such as France, Germany. Iceland, India and Australia, for example, and now individual states are stepping up, too, such as California. 

In the governance context, we're seeing more countries now, both at the national level and the individual party level, cognisant of the diversity dividend. We need to make sure that there are women who have a seat at the table, and who are able to play a full role in governance. We hope the GEGI will raise awareness of these measures for positive change, and the attendant tools will facilitate comparisons between countries and across timeframes to spur a virtuous circle of change. 

VI: Amanda, we are coming to an end in our time delving into the purpose and hope for the Gender Equality and Governance Index. We should all pay attention to how the index measures progress in the five pillars that are critical to understanding gender discrimination in the world. Hopefully, we can soon move beyond the COVID crisis and meet climate change challenges with a feminist perspective that will bring security and prosperity for the global common.

Amanda Ellis: Thank you so much, John. It's been a real pleasure speaking with you today. 

Amanda Ellis leads Global Partnerships for the ASU Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory. Prior roles include New Zealand Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Prime Minister’s Special Envoy to Francophone Africa, Deputy Secretary in the NZ Foreign Ministry and first woman to lead the NZ Aid program, managing an annual budget of $0.6 billion, Lead Specialist Gender at the World Bank Group and National Manager Women in Business Westpac Banking Corporation.