WMC News & Features
Investing in Women and Eradicating Poverty
On October 17, the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty presents a call to action to end poverty and uproot the systems that create it.
WMC News & Features
February 07, 2025 | Rochelle Davidson Mhonde, Ph.D., Jhumka Gupta, ScD, MPH |
Gender-based violence,
International
Femicide Is a Global Issue With Lessons for the United States
A new report from the United Nations shows the prevalence of femicide throughout the world. Two scholar-activists call for addressing root causes.
WMC News & Features
A Next-Generation Feminist Agenda
The UN Generation Equality Forum builds on the promise of the Beijing Conference of 26 years ago.
WMC News & Features
April 30, 2019 | Aviva Stahl |
Disability,
International,
Violence against women,
WMC Loreen Arbus Journalism Program
The United Nations passes a watered-down resolution to end sexual violence in war
The United Nations passed a watered-down version of a resolution to end sexual violence in war on April 23 after bowing to pressure from the Trump administration to eliminate all references to sexual and reproductive health and protections for gay and transgender victims.
WMC News & Features
From the pen of an anti-feminist president, a victory for women
No one is heralding Trump as a feminist hero. Yet on October 6, the president signed into law an act advocates say will make feminist history.
WMC News & Features
March 26, 2015 | Shazia Z. Rafi |
International
Who Runs the World?
The goal from Beijing was for women to be 30 percent of the world’s leaders. We’re not there yet.
WMC News & Features
20 Years After Beijing, How Are We Doing?
A new, in-depth report on the status of women worldwide reveals where progress has been made, and that there is much more to be done.
WMC News & Features
Tunisia's Women—Defying the Odds
The author, secretary-general of Parliamentarians for Global Action, writes that Tunisia is finding its own way while Islamist movements gain power in the region.
WMC News & Features
At UN Climate Talks, Highly Trained Women Play Critical Role
Two decades after first joining together to make their voices heard at the Earth Summit in Rio, women environmental leaders continue to make progress at the recent UN conference, though it produced only limited gains on climate change.
WMC News & Features
In Zimbabwe: She Won't Be Stopped
The focus of the United Nation’s Commission on the Status of Women this year, in annual meetings ending today, is to promote women’s and girls’ access to education, training, science and technology. Here is one woman’s story.
WMC News & Features
The UN Steps Up to Women's Rights Challenges
Upon the appointment of Michelle Bachelet to head the UN's promising new women's agency, Shazia Z. Rafi, secretary-general of Parliamentarians for Global Action, explains how an international coalition of women effectively negotiated the UN power process to get us to this point.
WMC News & Features
I’ve Seen First Hand What CEDAW Can Do
The author, chief of the Africa Division of UNIFEM, explains the power of the UN treaty to eliminate discrimination against women—a potent tool that will only gain in strength with ratification by the United States.
WMC News & Features
Saving the Earth: What Science Can’t Accomplish
As we celebrate the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, the author describes how women have worked to break through the seemingly impervious bureaucracy at the UN to finally impress on world leaders that saving the earth depends on guaranteeing women equal rights and status.
WMC News & Features
New Hope for Progress Among U.S. Delegates to UN Meeting
Women have been stymied for years in efforts to achieve U.S. ratification of CEDAW, the UN treaty to eliminate discrimination against women. Now, meeting at the UN, U.S. women hope to regain influence in establishing rights for women around the world.
WMC News & Features
November 10, 2009 | Colette N. Tamko |
International
Finally, a UN Women’s Agency with Muscle
Recently the UN announced approval of a new agency for women—an event that followed years of complex organizing by individuals and advocacy groups around the world. Here, one of the principle coordinators of that ongoing effort explains what it means for women, and the work that still remains to ensure its success.
WMC News & Features
At the UN, Criminalizing Rape as a Weapon
In the last week of October, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made headlines and sparked anger in travels to Israel and Pakistan. Her role some weeks earlier was less controversial yet critically important, as she led UN diplomats forward in an action that could ease the suffering of countless women and girls living in conflict zones around the world.
WMC News & Features
March 30, 2009 | Peggy Simpson |
Politics
Chances Improve for Ratification of CEDAW
The United States has been an odd holdout in ratifying the UN treaty on women’s rights. Now it’s a priority of the Obama Administration, and Senator Barbara Boxer chairs the subcommittee that will hold hearings. Still, there’s no guarantee.