Real change?

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton was interviewed in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/magazine/23clinton-t.html?_r=3&ref=magazine I totally agreed with one of her statements that “democracy means nothing if half the people can’t vote, or if their vote doesn’t count, or if their literacy rate is so low that the exercise of their vote is in question”. The understanding of this should come to those countries which today face gender inequality problems in their societies. I also agree with the fact that gender equality can be achieved through empowerment of women economically, politically and socially. And here the main question comes: how can this economic, political and social empowerment be exercised in the countries where that deep-seated cultural resistance exists.

Living in a country (Abkhazia) where the culture and traditions play important role in the society, I see the process of women’s empowerment as a quite complex and long-term one. It is a general belief that empowering of women should start with education (ensuring the access to education for girls) – of course education promotes the women’s empowerment process. There is another opinion that economically independent women have more power to make decisions. But my observations of gender problems within my own country make me believe that the real economic, political and social empowerment of women just can be achieved if there is a real understanding of the traditions and culture deeply rooted in the consciousness of the society.

There are a lot of examples when economically independent women are still not independent in decision making. Or like when a woman who was betrayed by her husband still has no right to leave him because of of reasons created by the society in order to follow the traditions. But a boy can refuse to marry a pregnant girl because of his “respected” parents since it is a big shame on his family.

All these are traditions which do not allow us to accept the reality even if we are well-educated, and economically independent. These are the values which are being given to us since the childhood and when you grow up, become educated and try to understand what is good and what is bad through analyzing the existing reality you are still not able to get rid of these traditional and cultural values which are deep inside you… 

/Gayane Chakayran

Gayane Chakayran, Abkhazia, fights for real democracy: "I would like people to understand that they have actual power to define their fates by themselves."