Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on the 'Proposal for a Council Recommendation on the balanced participation of women and men in decision-making`

(96/C 204/08)

On 30 January 1996, the Council decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under Article 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on the above-mentioned proposal.

The Section for Social, Family, Educational and Cultural Affairs, which was responsible for preparing the Committee's work on the subject, adopted its Opinion on 12 April 1996. The Rapporteur was Mrs Twist.

At its 335th Plenary Session (meeting of 24 April 1996), the Economic and Social Committee adopted the following Opinion by 102 votes to 3, with 9 abstentions.

1. General comments

The Committee welcomes the proposal for a Council Recommendation subject to the following comments:

1.1. Whilst falling short of legitimate expectations in favour of equal participation in decision-making, the proposal nonetheless should help to stimulate an integrated and comprehensive gender equality strategy including 'mainstreaming` and the question of parity (). Reference to the Beijing Platform for Action (agreed by 186 states) and to the Essen and Cannes Summit commitments to equal opportunities might usefully be made in this connection. The Council Recommendation should also address the need to enshrine the goal of equal participation in the future Treaty on European Union.

1.2. The Recommendation calls for strategies and activities to 'promote` balanced representation, rather than for strategies which could help guarantee it. The Committee would nonetheless urge Member States to set clear goals with specific measures, to ensure broadly-based information campaigns and to work in close cooperation with socio-professional organizations on achieving concrete progress towards more equality in decision-making. The reference to targets should at least be backed up by timetables and other monitoring and evaluation mechanisms. Positive actions could be better highlighted in the text.

1.3. Positive actions are particularly necessary in the fields of education and training. The Commission proposal is rightly critical of existing gender imbalances in decision-making resulting from the 'stereotyping` of men's and women's roles by 'education and training`. However, it does not sufficiently address the question at source which is a cultural one. Attitudes must change. Positive actions to promote access to education and training, objective career guidance, and a wider choice of jobs for girls and women are vital if women are to develop to the full their role in economic, social, political and cultural spheres and if they are to be integrated into the labour market on an equal footing. Likewise, it is important that boys and men should be encouraged to enter into labour market areas 'traditionally` occupied by women.

1.4. Although there is a link between women in decision-making and the need for an equal sharing of responsibilities between men and women in all spheres of society, the Commission proposal does not sufficiently underscore the need for measures to encourage men to take a fairer sharing of family responsibilities. The concept, already suggested by the OECD and recently endorsed by Commissioner Flynn, of a new 'gender contract` () could be highlighted. The Committee would also call for concrete measures in the Recommendation concerning childcare and other mechanisms which facilitate the reconciliation of professional and family life ().

1.5. It follows that direct reference should also be made in the Recommendation to 'employment` and to work organization and working time. Labour market segregation, unequal pay, unequal promotion possibilities and career structures and the casualization of women's employment should be addressed if the traditional masculine culture which dominates labour market decision-making is to change.

2. Specific comments

2.1. Point 1 of the proposal could usefully refer to the concept of a new 'gender contract`. It should also make specific reference to employment, the need to combat a segregated labour market, to facilitate new working time arrangements and to promote all measures which make it possible to reconcile working and family life.

2.2. Point 2 should emphasize the need for a climate of sensitivity at school and in training, not just as regards 'textbooks` and 'curricula`, but also and especially as regards access and choice.

2.3. Point 3 should not concentrate on the massive and passive production of statistics. Member Governments and the Commission should instead pinpoint societal trends and attempt to explain how and why, in some instances, good female participation rates in employment, in higher positions of employment and in decision-making have been achieved.

2.4. Point 4 could better point out that under-representation of women in political and other representative bodies in a fundamental challenge for democracy. Clear targets redressing this democratic deficit are required, together with appropriate timetables, monitoring and evaluation mechanisms.

2.5. Member Governments are encouraged, in close cooperation with the appropriate socio-professional organizations and NGOs, to nominate more women to the Economic and Social Committee. Governments should also appoint more women to similar EU representative organs and bodies.

2.6. A single evaluation report on the implementation of the Recommendation to be submitted within three years of its adoption does not suffice. An on-going assessment, on the basis of regularly up-dated proposals, should be foreseen.

Done at Brussels, 24 April 1996.

The President

of the Economic and Social Committee

Carlos FERRER

() Also see COM(96) 67 final, 21. 2. 1996.

() Les femmes et le changement structurel (Women and structural changes), Paris, OECD, 1991.

() See, for example, OJ No C 39, 12. 2. 1996, p. 39, point 2.3 'Objective 3: Women and men combining work with household - family life`.