World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples

Why is MRG interested in gender?

While most people agree that women suffer discrimination, women who are members of a minority or indigenous community are often particularly marginalized.

For example, a Roma woman is discriminated against for two reasons: because she is a member of a minority community and because she is a woman. She therefore faces double discrimination. If she also happens to be unmarried, have a disability, be a lesbian or an older woman, she may face additional forms of discrimination.

Men and women from a minority or indigenous community lack access to political power, and face discrimination in their access to education, services, rights and work. Women from these communities face all of these problems and more. This discrimination comes from both outside and inside the community.

We want to tackle problems of discrimination and inequality, therefore, we need to work in a way that tackles gender- and ethnicity-based issues. To quote the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, to 'every human rights violation, there is a gender element'.

What does 'gender' mean?

Gender refers to the roles and social relations that we are expected to have depending on whether we are women or girls, or men or boys. In many societies, girls have traditionally been encouraged to take an interest in babies and the home, while boys have been encouraged to play sports or to study. These roles and social relations are socially-constructed, and depend on the culture of the society in which we live. These socially-constructed roles and social relations vary from place to place, and from people to people, they are also liable to change.

Gender and gender inequality is not just concerned with women and girls. Men and boys from minority and indigenous communities are also discriminated against on the basis of their sex and ethnicity. For example, black men in the UK are more likely to be imprisoned than white men. However, it is women and girls who generally experience the most severe forms of multiple discrimination, and that is why most gender-based campaigns focus on women and girls.

What are the issues?

Working on gender-based issues with minority and indigenous communities is difficult. These communities often face severe forms of discrimination from outsiders, other human rights abuses, conflict and poverty. Some feel that raising issues of gender and gender inequality is divisive. Others feel that it is impossible to raise gender-based concerns within their community for fear of recrimination. For example, an indigenous community may be calling for its land rights, yet indigenous women know that if there are any advances the land will go to the men. They may keep quiet, despite their own grievances, for the 'greater good' of their community.

Women within a minority community may experience domestic violence. However, they may find it hard to talk to others within their community or to outsiders about the problem. Their community may already be under attack from the majority community, and that they fear that if outsiders hear about the violence, they will use this information against the community. (Even though there are likely to be high levels of domestic violence in the majority community, this will be 'conveniently' ignored.)

There are many other gender-based issues for minority and indigenous communities, including: access to education and jobs, access to health, harmful traditional practices, political participation, and sexual violence.

What has MRG done on gender so far?

• We have tried to mainstream gender throughout our work, and we regularly monitor our work from a gender perspective.
• We have published a groundbreaking report Gender, Minorities and Indigenous Peoples by Fareda Banda and Christine Chinkin, which discusses many of the issues raised above in far greater detail.
• We have published a report on a particularly marginalized community, with a strong gender focus, Twa Women, Twa Rights in the Great Lakes Region of Africa by Dorothy Jackson.
• We have held events on gender, minorities and indigenous peoples' issues for two UN committees - the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
• We recently introduced gender awareness sessions into our training programmes with partner organizations.
• We are a member of the Gender and Development Network (GAD) and also sit on its steering committee.

The future

Our gender campaign is being developed with Dalit, Roma and Twa communities, with women's organizations and with bodies such as the UN. We plan to focus on domestic violence and education issues from a minority and indigenous peoples' perspective.

If you would like more information about our campaign, please contact Kathryn Ramsay on kathryn.ramsay@mrgmail.org

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