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The United Nations
Fourth World Conference on Women
Beijing, China - September 1995
Action for Equality, Development and Peace
PLATFORM FOR ACTION
Women and the Media Diagnosis
Strategic objective
J.1. Increase the
participation and access of women to expression and decision-making
in and through
the media and new technologies of communication. Actions to be
taken.
Strategic objective
J.2. Promote a balanced
and non-stereotyped portrayal of women in the media. Actions to be
taken.
Women and the Media follow-up (Under construction)
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J. Women and the Media
- During the past decade, advances in information technology have
facilitated a global communications network that transcends national
boundaries and has an impact on public policy, private attitudes and
behaviour, especially of children and young adults. Everywhere the potential
exists for the media to make a far greater contribution to the advancement of
women.
- More women are involved in careers in the communications sector, but few
have attained positions at the decision-making level or serve on governing
boards and bodies that influence media policy. The lack of gender sensitivity
in the media is evidenced by the failure to eliminate the gender-based
stereotyping that can be found in public and private local, national and
international media organizations.
- The continued projection of negative and degrading images of women in
media communications - electronic, print, visual and audio - must be changed.
Print and electronic media in most countries do not provide a balanced picture
of women's diverse lives and contributions to society in a changing world. In
addition, violent and degrading or pornographic media products are also
negatively affecting women and their participation in society. Programming
that reinforces women's traditional roles can be equally limiting. The world-
wide trend towards consumerism has created a climate in which advertisements
and commercial messages often portray women primarily as consumers and target
girls and women of all ages inappropriately.
- Women should be empowered by enhancing their skills, knowledge and
access to information technology. This will strengthen their ability to
combat negative portrayals of women internationally and to challenge instances
of abuse of the power of an increasingly important industry. Self-regulatory
mechanisms for the media need to be created and strengthened and approaches
developed to eliminate gender-biased programming. Most women, especially in
developing countries, are not able to access effectively the expanding
electronic information highways and therefore cannot establish networks that
will provide them with alternative sources of information. Women therefore
need to be involved in decision-making regarding the development of the new
technologies in order to participate fully in their growth and impact.
- In addressing the issue of the mobilization of the media, Governments
and other actors should promote an active and visible policy of mainstreaming
a gender perspective in policies and programmes.
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Strategic objective J.1.
Increase the participation and access of women to expression and
decision-making in and through the media and new technologies of communication
Actions to be taken
- By Governments:
- Support women's education, training and employment to promote and
ensure women's equal access to all areas and levels of the media;
- Support research into all aspects of women and the media so as to
define areas needing attention and action and review existing media
policies with a view to integrating a gender perspective;
- Promote women's full and equal participation in the media, including
management, programming, education, training and research;
- Aim at gender balance in the appointment of women and men to all
advisory, management, regulatory or monitoring bodies, including
those connected to the private and State or public media;
- Encourage, to the extent consistent with freedom of expression,
these bodies to increase the number of programmes for and by women
to see to it that women's needs and concerns are properly addressed;
- Encourage and recognize women's media networks, including electronic
networks and other new technologies of communication, as a means for
the dissemination of information and the exchange of views,
including at the international level, and support women's groups
active in all media work and systems of communications to that end;
- Encourage and provide the means or incentives for the creative use
of programmes in the national media for the dissemination of
information on various cultural forms of indigenous people and the
development of social and educational issues in this regard within
the framework of national law;
- Guarantee the freedom of the media and its subsequent protection
within the framework of national law and encourage, consistent with
freedom of expression, the positive involvement of the media in
development and social issues.
- By national and international media systems:
- Develop, consistent with freedom of expression, regulatory
mechanisms, including voluntary ones, that promote balanced and
diverse portrayals of women by the media and international
communication systems and that promote increased participation by
women and men in production and decision-making.
- By Governments, as appropriate, or national machinery for the
advancement of women:
- Encourage the development of educational and training programmes for
women in order to produce information for the mass media, including
funding of experimental efforts, and the use of the new technologies
of communication, cybernetics space and satellite, whether public or
private;
- Encourage the use of communication systems, including new
technologies, as a means of strengthening women's participation in
democratic processes;
- Facilitate the compilation of a directory of women media experts;
- Encourage the participation of women in the development of
professional guidelines and codes of conduct or other appropriate
self-regulatory mechanisms to promote balanced and non-stereotyped
portrayals of women by the media.
- By non-governmental organizations and media professional associations:
- Encourage the establishment of media watch groups that can monitor
the media and consult with the media to ensure that women's needs
and concerns are properly reflected;
- Train women to make greater use of information technology for
communication and the media, including at the international level;
- Create networks among and develop information programmes for
non-governmental organizations, women's organizations and
professional media organizations in order to recognize the specific
needs of women in the media, and facilitate the increased
participation of women in communication, in particular at the
international level, in support of South-South and North-South
dialogue among and between these organizations, inter alia, to
promote the human rights of women and equality between women and
men;
- Encourage the media industry and education and media training
institutions to develop, in appropriate languages, traditional,
indigenous and other ethnic forms of media, such as story-telling,
drama, poetry and song, reflecting their cultures, and utilize these
forms of communication to disseminate information on development and
social issues.
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Strategic objective J.2.
Promote a balanced and non-stereotyped portrayal of women in the media
Actions to be taken
- By Governments and international organizations, to the extent consistent
with freedom of expression:
- Promote research and implementation of a strategy of information,
education and communication aimed at promoting a balanced portrayal
of women and girls and their multiple roles;
- Encourage the media and advertising agencies to develop specific
programmes to raise awareness of the Platform for Action;
- Encourage gender-sensitive training for media professionals,
including media owners and managers, to encourage the creation and
use of non-stereotyped, balanced and diverse images of women in the
media;
- Encourage the media to refrain from presenting women as inferior
beings and exploiting them as sexual objects and commodities, rather
than presenting them as creative human beings, key actors and
contributors to and beneficiaries of the process of development;
- Promote the concept that the sexist stereotypes displayed in the
media are gender discriminatory, degrading in nature and offensive;
- Take effective measures or institute such measures, including
appropriate legislation against pornography and the projection of
violence against women and children in the media.
- By the mass media and advertising organizations:
- Develop, consistent with freedom of expression, professional
guidelines and codes of conduct and other forms of self-regulation
to promote the presentation of non-stereotyped images of women;
- Establish, consistent with freedom of expression, professional
guidelines and codes of conduct that address violent, degrading or
pornographic materials concerning women in the media, including
advertising;
- Develop a gender perspective on all issues of concern to
communities, consumers and civil society;
- Increase women's participation in decision-making at all levels of
the media.
- By the media, non-governmental organizations and the private sector, in
collaboration, as appropriate, with national machinery for the advancement of
women:
- Promote the equal sharing of family responsibilities through media
campaigns that emphasize gender equality and non-stereotyped gender
roles of women and men within the family and that disseminate
information aimed at eliminating spousal and child abuse and all
forms of violence against women, including domestic violence;
- Produce and/or disseminate media materials on women leaders,
inter alia, as leaders who bring to their positions of leadership
many different life experiences, including but not limited to their
experiences in balancing work and family responsibilities, as
mothers, as professionals, as managers and as entrepreneurs, to
provide role models, particularly to young women;
- Promote extensive campaigns, making use of public and private
educational programmes, to disseminate information about and
increase awareness of the human rights of women;
- Support the development of and finance, as appropriate, alternative
media and the use of all means of communication to disseminate
information to and about women and their concerns;
- Develop approaches and train experts to apply gender analysis with
regard to media programmes.
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