2024

On 22-23 September 2024, a Summit for the Future of the United Nations will take place in New York and a Global Digital Compact should be negotiated there to «outline shared principles for an open, free and secure digital future for all». This paper makes recommendations for a gender-transformative Global Digital Compact because digital technologies not only give new opportunities to women and girls; they can also perpetuate existing gender equalities.
A.) On the one side, it proposes a stand-alone goal on gender equality which aims to 1.) get free from technology-facilitated gender-based violence and discrimination, 2.) give equitable educational and economic opportunities, and 3.) ensure an equal participation to women in digital governance.
B.) On the other side, it proposes a gender mainstreaming in all Global Digital Compact themes, namely: 1.) make efforts to close the gender digital divide; 2.) integrate a gender perspective in technology, inter alia by tying fundings related to digital technology with obligations to systematically integrate gender analysis; 3.) promote, respect and fulfill the human rights of women and girls from the conception to the deployment of digital technologies, take into account their experiences in the regulations and address the human right violations caused by digital products and services; 4.) ensure an inclusive, open, secure and shared Internet; 5.) increase digital trust and security, inter alia through cooperation and an approach of cybersecurity based on gender-, age- and disability-inclusive standards; 6.) ensure data protection, namely with gender-responsive and human rights based standards, and tackle the gender data gap; 7.) develop the governance on emerging technologies and artificial intelligences which integrates gender perspectives and ensure transparency and accountability regimes; and 8.) build a digital ecosystem with a broadly shared participation and prosperity.

Direct to the paper (https://www.unwomen.org)