Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl Wu Dunn have a new book- Half the Sky. They hit at the power of women in the developing world to address global woes- security, economics, health, illiteracy, and more. Essentially, the tag line is: help a woman, help humanity.
Last month, the NYTimes ran a special NYT magazine devoted to Half the Sky. You can read it in depth here:
www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/magazine/23Women-t.html
And because I’ve had the fortune of meeting remarkable women through my work in public health and microfinance, I wrote a piece on the book for a LA-area newspaper (below).
Plus, if you haven’t heard of Girl Effect, watch this two minute presentation. It hits at the core of Kristof and Wu Dunn’s book. You won’t be disappointed!
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I went to an all-girls school for six years. Some would describe that as an inconvenience.
I think a better definition would be- it’s a rarity.
As a high school student, I didn’t necessarily grasp that. A school designed solely for educating girls- didn’t seem so unusual or noteworthy. Not till you learn about the plight of girls worldwide.
That’s the crux of Nicholas Kristof’s new book Half the Sky, the title alluding to a Chinese proverb signifying that women hold up half the sky- something even echoed by Communist leader Mao Zedong in the early 1960s. Zedong defined women as an “important force in production” thereby allowing them to join the workforce. In this book, Kristof and his wife Sheryl WuDunn, a Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist as well, explore what they first negated as a ‘soft issue’ with a new-found gravity.
Though women ought to account for half the world’s population, if not more considering that women live longer lives, they’re outnumbered by men. Education, economics, health, and culture explain the gaps.
Approximately one in four girls in a developing nation doesn’t make it to the classroom. Rather many are married; one in seven girls marry before 15 in these countries. Early marriage then correlates with few chances of economic independence and even a higher risk of being beaten and abused by spouses. Plus, a cultural preference for male children, especially in Asia, has led mothers to abort female babies.
Suppose, though, if those women had made it to a classroom instead.
That’s what policy advisers are beginning to contemplate. Women’s issues is not a feminist fight or a gender war. Women are a security concern- their safety and development defines our collective well-being.
The most significant political gesture has been the inception of a new post at the State Department- Ambassador-At-Large for Global Woman’s Issues, granted to Melanne Verveer by President Obama this year. By making Verveer part of the State Department and not USAID, the administration took a ‘development’ topic, or a ‘soft issue,’ generally relegated to aid organizations and NGOs, and planted it in the middle of critical foreign policy discussions. The UN has followed suit. This September, they announced the creation of a UN agency solely for women. Clearly, policy experts are beginning to grasp the magnitude of this idea.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, herself an advocate of microfinance and women’s empowerment, just traveled through Asia and Africa, noting the different obstacles facing women in each region- poor maternal health, lack of finances, rape, etc. In India, she met with SEWA- Self-Employed Women’s Association- stressing economic independence in a country that’s granted women political rights but failed to fully integrate them into the workforce. In Congo, she met with rape victims in Goma and called for arrests and penalties for the sexual violence incurred on these women.
The key now is to turn this rhetoric and recognition into action.
In July, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee issued The Foreign Assistance Revitalization and Accountability Act, which will scrutinize our aid system and asses the effectiveness of foreign aid; this is aid that trickles into contentious regions of the world, places where schools lack teachers, books, even students and clinics are sullied, without clean water, proper medical equipment.
One suggestion- invest more in the girls of these conflict areas. Send them to school. Offer them a financial education. Instruct them about their own health and sanitation. They’ll learn. But they’ll also teach- free of cost- to their families. It’s a cycle in need of a propeller.
In Half the Sky, Kristof and WuDunn write, “In many poor countries, the greatest unexploited resource isn’t oil fields or veins of gold; it is the women and girls who aren’t educated and never become a major presence in the formal economy.” A wasted asset, you could say.
While in India doing polio work earlier this year, I met a gentleman who runs a small school for the children of rickshaw-pullers and maids- people whose jobs are arduous but their wages, meager, leaving little for the luxuries of an education. He offers one year of free tranining in the local language to the children of these workers. Literacy, not primary education, is his objective. One year of Hindi- that’s it. Sounds mediocre.
Then, he told me- leaning out from a metal sheet, sitting haphazardly above the class of children, protecting them from the intense heat- that one year means she can read a bus schedule, she can travel a little further from her home, she can get a job.Reading a sign- that’s her freedom and empowerment.
Imagine if she’d seen my high school classroom and the piles of books we lugged around from class to class drudgingly.
Literacy, though, extends beyond books to financial knowledge, provided by microfinance institutions (MFIs), and even maternal health education. During that same trip, I also learned of a team of women, who themselves come from threadbare homes, yet travel India’s rural communities to offer prenatal and postnatal care to village mothers. ASHA workers, or Accredited Social Health Activists- their task is tiresome but critical in addressing infant mortality, early childbirths, and pregnancy-related deaths. In the postnatal phase, they also educate parents on immunizations for the newborn and the need for better sanitation to avoid illness.
Women assisting other women and contributing to their community: that’s a smart investment.
So, instead of mulling over the endless statics of disfranchised women worldwide, which are grim and disturbing, we can begin taking a critical look at where best to our channel our funds for prosperity and security. If it goes to a girl in the developing world, it’ll destroy the roots of belligerent acts, prevent the folly of illiteracy, alleviate the trappings of poor health, and augment the forecast of economic development.
As Kristof said in a recent interview, “Women are not the problem. Women are the solution.”
original source: http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2009/oct/04/investing-in-girls-and-women-pays-off-in/
Wow, I really want to read this book! Nicholas Kristof write really great articles on the NYTimes.
I'm male and I live 6 months a year in Indonesia and 6 months a year in california. Indonesia is also a hot bed of finger pointing at women. After sharing a meal with several feminests I asked my girlfriend if she wanted to go back to College. The next day she said no. "Just look at the faces of all the people that went to the university, they are filled with stress and worry." She has a job making beaded purses. She loves it. She is happy. She makes enough. If she is a "wasted asset" as you wrote, I sure wish more people filled with such joy, warmth and contentment 'wasted" away near my earshot and eyesight. Do you really believe that having a nameplate on your door makes one a "major presence", in a "formal economy' and is equal to happiness?