Consultations on
ICTS for gender equality and women rights – empowerment 
through self government institutions.(Background and brief for panelists)

We mention below briefly a round-up of important issues in this area and the WSIS draft proposals about them. The brief is only suggestive and meant to kick-off effective consultations. Speakers are free to, and rather expected to, bring their full expertise to bear upon the subject and inform the participant and the stakeholders involved in building the Information Society. 

A quite revolution is underway in the villages and towns of India in the way reservations in self-government institutions is throwing forth women community leaders. Though the process is going through all the pains of a difficult transition, the die has been cast. And when a few women are seen to succeed in a political and leadership role, the effect cascades fast to all women in the community, and to the men. It can easily be said that no other single intervention has had such a deep impact and in such a short period on the status of women in the traditional society as their role in the self-government (SG) institutions.

But the stumbling blocks to a complete change over are as evident. Men find it easier to move about government offices, pick up the needed information etc for an effective role in self-government institutions, as well as make contacts with government officials. When women in SG roles have to get these activities done by male relatives, they effectively shed power in their favor. Even otherwise, the male relatives use the traditional weaker position of women in the family to effectively take over the power and position of the women members of SG institutions. However, in places where some women groups or organizations, however rudimentary, get formed, the effect is dramatic. With the support of these groups the women members are able to work much more independently, and effectively.

The new ICTs today hold the potential to help devise strategies to meet all these challenges effectively. In fact, they are indispensable to take this transformation in the position of women through SG bodies to its culmination. These challenges and the ways the new ICTs can be used to meet them should be the focus of our consultations.   

Capacity building: ICTs should be used to develop an effective strategy of continuous capacity building among women for an effective role in SG institutions. Example: initiatives by SEWA in this area.

Access to government information and connecting with the government: Even the not very well informed men, when put into an SG role easily move around government offices, spending a lot of time lounging there, and pick up the information, skills etc needed for their role. For women, often constrained in mobility and access to distant public places, we need to devise a strategy of using the new ICTs to get all the needed information and knowledge to their village and community. And not only that, e-governance channels should also put them in contact with government officials and allow them to avail of government services form their village itself.    

Organizing women; When women get organized even in a rudimentary way, into self help groups or otherwise, it has made a tremendous effect on the effectiveness of the women members of SG institutions among them. The new ICTs can provide innovative ways of networking, organizing and mutual support for women in traditional settings.    

The draft ‘Plan of Action’ for WSIS, among other things mentions that;

• ‘Governments should provide free access on the Internet to information of a public nature’.

• ‘Governments should adopt electronic freedom of information acts and publish all public information on websites.’

(See action lines under point 15 of the draft.)

This requires extensive work on creating content that is in the local languages and is culture and community specific. The draft covers these issues extensively under point 40. But further suggestions are welcome.

However, since probably in many ways the experience of empowering women through SG institutions is in some ways unique to India, there is no specific mention in the draft about using ICTs to promote the role of women and other under- underprivileged groups in SG institutions at the community level. As likely, the reason for this is that it is an issue of political nature and may not get the consensus of governments of all countries that WSIS strives for. In any case, the South Asian civil society should make note of this point.     

The governments should also be encouraged to mediate more and more developmental initiatives through women groups at the community level. They must be involved in managing the community assets. And we should use the new ICTs effectively for this purpose. SG institutions are a movement towards distributed governance and it is most effectively done when the new distributed ICTs, ie the Internet and the related technologies, provides its information and communication infrastructure.