UNAIR NEWS – The issue of gender inequality in Indonesian society, especially in the field of decision making, is still widely discussed. The role of women is still considered inferior. In this regard, Human Rights Law Studies (HRLS) UNAIR Faculty of Law (FH) in collaboration with the Women & Youth Development Institute of Indonesia (WYDII) held a Women’s Human Rights Education Workshop which analyzed women’s empowerment policies and challenges on Monday, January 13, 2020 at Room 308 B Building FH UNAIR.
As the guest speaker, Dwi Rahayu Kristianti, SH., MA., said that gender equality has no power if it is not based on a clear legal basis. She explained that Indonesia had ratified the UN convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW) which was explained in Law No. 7 of 1984. However, juridical efforts to protect gender equality and sexual violence are lacking.
“We know for ourselves how the progress of the ratification of the PKS Bill and the discourse on the Gender Equality Bill seem to have been ‘lost’ from the public,” Dwi said.
“The best realization that we got about the issue was only in the form of Presidential Instruction No. 9 of 2000, where the minimum hierarchy to protect this issue should be equal to the Law, ” she added.
For this reason, Dwi Rahayu said that gender mainstreaming is very important in teaching legal courses. However, there are challenges such as the stigma that gender issues are of western culture and the use of the vocabulary of gender-neutral law makes some parties less aware of discrimination against women.
“Developing Gender and Law course is very important, but it lacks support from various parties so it is very difficult,” she said.
Dwi Rahayu ended her presentation by saying that increasing awareness of gender issues in the legal academic environment is not impossible even though it is full of challenges. Encouragement to write scientific articles and integrating issues in existing courses at Faculty of Law will also be very helpful.
Author: Pradnya Wicaksana
Editor: Khefti Al Mawalia
