This 08 March, on the occasion of the International Day of Women's Struggles, GI-ESCR releases a new briefing paper on women and public services, aiming to explore the role of public services in the transformation of asymmetrical power relations between women and men. Released on International Women’s Day, the brief argues that public services can play a decisive role in this transformation and puts forward five key elements for a gender-transformative approach to public services.

There has been remarkable progress in the advancement of gender equality in the last few decades, from the strengthening of women’s rights in legal and constitutional frameworks to a lowering of the gender gap in education. Nevertheless, this progress in women’s equal rights has been met with strong political resistance, including from groups claiming to defend family values, religion, and culture. The escalating and intersecting global environmental and inequalities crises, compounded by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, add to the factors that put women’s rights at risk. These compounded adverse impacts on women’s rights are the consequence of deeply ingrained power imbalances between women and men.

In the face of these historic and emerging challenges, public services can play a decisive role in the transformation of the asymmetrical and unjust power relations between women and men. Public services enable us to tackle not only the consequences, but also the systemic and underlying factors—the uneven power imbalances — underpinning gender inequality.

This briefing paper is the first edition of a new series soon to be launched by GI-ESCR Pushing the frontiers of economic, social and cultural rights to be launched soon.