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Volume 2, Number 43
September 3, 1999
Feminist NGOs Rev Up For Review of Beijing Women's
(NEW YORK - C-FAM) Feminist NGOs around the world are meeting almost continuously in preparation for the upcoming five year review of the Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China (1995). The parameters of NGO participation for Bejing+5, scheduled for next June, will not be determined until the final preparatory committee meeting next March. Still, it is customary that NGOs participate at high levels during special sessions of the GA.
The Conference of Non-Governmental Organizations (CONGO), an umbrella organization for NGOs at UN headquarters, has assembled an "Interim Working Group" which plans to encourage NGO participation at all levels of Beijing+5. NGOs already began meeting on Beijing+5 during what was the first prepcom last March during the Commission on the Status of Women in New York.
A memo released from the NGO Interim Working Group describes a three-part structure of the official NGO group for Beijing+5. The largest of the three groups is an International Planning Committee which will consist of CONGO, the three NGO Committees on the Status of Women, and various regional groups. The memo claims these groups are not formed for lobbying purposes, but only to disseminate information to NGOs. The memo also claims to seek the broadest range of NGO participation, presumably including those considered conservative and pro-family.
The focal point of NGO activity will be influencing the actual review of governmental adherence to the original Beijing Platform for Action. Last fall, the UN sent a questionnaire to all UN Member States asking them to explain how they have advanced women's rights along the 12 "critical areas of concern" from the Platform for Action, including "poverty," "health," "violence," and "armed conflict." To date, only a third of the UN Member States have responded.
The Interim Working Group memo also encourages NGOs to submit "alternate reports" on countries and regions. Also called "shadow reports," these allow NGOs to criticize governments for non-adherence to feminist norms of women's advancement. Any NGO from any political persuasion can submit "shadow reports." It is expected that conservative women's groups in the United States will submit "shadow reports."
The memo urges interested parties to stay in touch through the newly formed "WomenAction," which is a group of NGO "information and communications networks." The memo says "WomenAction will serve as a vehicle to assist NGOs to continue the discussion around the Beijing+5 review framework; collect and share national and regional NGO alternative reports; act as a clearinghouse for important information devoted to NGO initiatives and information around the Beijing+5 process."
NGO meetings have already taken place, most recently a few weeks ago in Kathmandu, Nepal with another one scheduled for this month in Bangkok, Thailand.
