Ensuring gender equality is not only about human rights, social welfare, and economic growth but also about justice and democracy. That’s why women must actively participate in social, political, and economic matters to prevent gender-based violence and discrimination. But how?  

European Union countries have successful experiences in this field. To explore strategies and achievements, we spoke with Lena Karlsson, the European Commission’s gender expert for the Eastern Partnership.  

Here’s her exclusive interview with Kitabistan.

- Madam Lena Karlsson, it's a great pleasure to have you in our Veritas Dialogues interview series at Kitabistan. You are a national expert from Sweden, working as a gender expert in the European Commission for Eastern Neighbourhood Countries.
Today we had the opportunity to discuss with you the European Commission's gender policy, particularly in the Eastern Partnership Countries. I would like to start with my first question regarding the European Commission's Gender Equality Strategy for 2020-2025.

This strategy outlines key objectives. It includes closing gender gaps in the labour market, combating gender-based violence, and of course, promoting gender equality globally. From your experience, which of these priorities has been the most challenging to implement in the Eastern Partnership Countries? And what strategies have proven the most effective to implement while overcoming those challenges?

- Thank you so much. I am very happy to be here and to contribute to this dialogue.
So first, I would like to say that, of course, gender equality is a core value for the EU, both as a human right, but also as for democracy, economic growth and prosperity more generally. And we have both. We have the gender equality strategy, which you mentioned, which is more for the member states.
But we also have a gender action plan, which is very similar, which is for External Actions when we, for example, support countries, Armenia, Azerbaijan and other countries. The focus is very much the same. I would say the causes, the root causes are also the same. And without really addressing the root causes, such as an equal gender power structure, we will never be successful.
So, a key driver of an unequal gender structure is, of course, stereotypes and norms, which impact women's access to education, health, employment. It affects the level of gender-based violence, women's political participation, etc. So, this is something that we need to be better at in addressing. Just to give an example, because of gender stereotypes and norms and power relations, women are expected to fulfill caregiving and domestic work and domestic roles more than men, and that they spend more than 2.8 hours than men every day on these roles, which affect women's economic empowerment and also to enter male-dominated fields such as STEAM. If I would choose one that is even the most difficult, I would say that gender-based violence is, of course, one of the most persuasive forms of inequalities. And one in three women globally has experienced either physical or sexual violence, mostly by an intimate partner. It is the same in the Eastern Partnership countries. 
So if you look at the strategy, it has recently been looked at to see what has worked, and the result was a combination of legislation.
It is very important to have legislation in place to further gender equality, but also to gender mainstreaming, integrate gender equality in all the policies and processes, but also to have specific actions for gender equality, such as addressing gender-based violence. Even though one of the areas, where I would say, we have been most successful is the labour market, women are still represented in low-paid sectors. We have a gender pay gap and gaps in decision-making.
And as for the Commission, for the External Actions and support to other countries, we have now also targeted 85% of all actions, all the programs so they should either be focused on gender equality or should mainstream gender equality. So, this dual approach, similar as in the strategy, like mainstreaming and at the same time have targeted action, have proven to be successful.
Just to give you some concrete examples of targeted support we have in the EP region, the EU for gender equality.
We have a reform help desk. The governments provide, they get demand-driven support. So they ask, for example, for support in gender mainstreaming in laws, policies, practices.
For example, during the period 2021 to 2024, 81 government documents were mainstream, such as the Ukraine recovery plan and the economic response programme and action plan in Armenia. That programme also has a component on challenging stereotypes and norms by providing grants to civil society organisations, working with youth, faith-based leaders, doing social media campaigns. For example, specific actions to challenge stereotypes against women with disabilities. And they also support what's called father schools to promote, to work with fathers who have newly become fathers on gender stereotypes and to promote and support in childcare and rearing and have discussions on gender-based violence, domestic violence, et cetera, to really try to engage fathers.
Because changing those social norms, it is not enough to work with women and girls. We also need to work with men and boys and look at intersecting forms of discrimination, such as women with disabilities, from ethnic minorities or lesbians living in urban, rural areas. I mean, there are so many intersecting forms that we also need to look at.
And in terms of gender mainstreaming, we have what we call a Neighbourhood Investment Platform, where we look at investments to ensure they have a gender equality perspective. So, it could be complete like big investment, they could have a component to promote female entrepreneurship, invest in childcare as part of the investment and ensuring that sexual harassment and exploitations do not take place at the construction phase. 
And for countries entering the enlargement, human rights and gender equality is part of the fundamentals that they have to adjust to become an EU member in the accession. So, they need to demonstrate their willingness and commitment to address gender equality and to align laws and policies to meet standards on women's economic empowerment, political participation and gender-based violence. These commitments are then followed up through regular reports and monitoring by the commission.

- Women face significant challenges in the Eastern Partnership countries, and you already named a few and several of them. But I believe that this not only impacts their rights and opportunities, but also hinders democratic change and building more sustainable societies. In your view, what role do women play in fostering democratic change and building stronger, more inclusive communities?

- Yes, of course, it is very right what you are saying. Women's rights organisations, human rights defenders, women in the local community have a very important role for democracy.
We cannot have a democratic society unless all, both men and women have their rights heard and are listened to and are also part of decision-making. What women's organisations often do is they track the progress on the implementation of laws and policies by the government. They advocate for accountability to make sure that those laws are also implemented and resourced. And they're also engaged in more international advocacy, align with other women's rights organisations to have common strategies, etc. But what is maybe even more important is in the local community, to mobilise local communities, to promote resilience and gender equality values, to really work in the local areas, to speak with people in the local community, to understand the needs and to see what they can do to support. So, that is an important part of democratic society. So, definitely a big role to play. 
For example, in Moldova, women with disabilities are working with other women with disabilities to facilitate empowerment and to share information about services. Because often women with disabilities in the rural areas may not be aware of what services are available for victims of gender-based violence.
They are also working in partnership with men, as I mentioned also this like the fatherhood group. So, in Ukraine, fathers' groups are not only promoting fatherhood as such, but they are also, due to the war, started to expand to provide psychological support to women and men to deal with traumas and to provide therapeutic games with children who have experienced the horrors of war. 
So, gender equality and diversity is, of course, to sum up, a prerequisite for democracy and sustainable development, for everybody to have their voices heard and to participate.
And for that to happen, we also need to have, of course, more women in the political process and to hold the leadership roles.

- My next question is also about women's participation in politics. Because unfortunately, women are often underrepresented in parliament in mostly developing countries, and the Eastern Partnership countries are among them. And we see this lack of evidence, lack of representation in the slow adoption of the gender equality policies and rules, which results with the marginalization of women's voices.
So what programs and initiatives does the European Commission have in place to promote women's participation in elections at all levels, and also to educate them on this matter?

- Yes, of course, it is key. It is key for us to do, and we are, but of course, we need to do more also here to address the causes that are the combination of societal, cultural, structural factors. Including stereotypes of what qualities are expected for a politician, which are often society expects men to be successful politicians. But also unequal sharing of care would affect women to enter politics, and the lack of female mentors and support for women in politics.
What we also see not only in the Eastern Partnership but globally, is that we have significant level of harassment and cyber violence towards women in politics. Online abuse, hate speech, disinformation, which often target women, and especially younger women and women from minorities in politics. These women in politics also need stronger legal protection. 
We saw, for example, in Moldova, that President Sandu faced a lot of harassment and cyber violence running up to the election in October. We have seen some similar among women in parliaments in Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.
So, we have it, we have it everywhere. And it does not, of course, harm the individual woman, but also it harms the advancement of democracy and representation as some of these women decide, because of safety reasons, and they are afraid it will affect the family, etc, to withdraw from politics. So, we are both providing dialogue and financial assistance. It is also part of the whole enlargement process that countries need to have programs to promote women in parliament.  And we also addressed like through the social norm programs, also women in politics. 
We also have specific programs. We are working with the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, or the ODIHR, to engage directly with parliamentarians to increase women's political participation.
So, it has two strands, both to advance political participation of women, but also youth and persons with disabilities through empowerment, education, etc, to empower women and youth, etc. but also to work with institutions itself. It is not enough just to empower women, you also need to challenge the institution. So, that's done through capacity building with political parties and people in political structures on gender equality, inclusion, etc, to really address and see what can be done to address structural barriers for women and youth and persons with disability to enter.
Of course, it needs systematic changes, just as everywhere with the cultural shift and attitudes. So continued advocacy is also, of course, necessary. And really working together with other actors, with the EU to work with political institutions, civil society, advocates, etc.

- You mentioned in your speech about the gender-based hate speech in digital space and media, which discourages women's representation in the public and political life.
How can the European Commission work with the member states and Eastern Partnership countries to combat gender-based hate speech, also promote safer digital spaces and empower women to engage more freely in these arenas?

- Thank you very much. For me, this is one of the most crucial questions right now, what more can we do? Because it is really escalating, not only here, but globally. And it is not only towards women in politics. It is like female human rights activists, LGBTI activists, etc. It is very much generated by foreign interference and it is very much used in social media, which is with anonymity and the reach is like a very key target for reaching out.
We also have artificial intelligence. If you go into a site against abortion, you will get more and more sites on that. So, it really affects the wider population. It is key really to address.
So, we also have, we are tackling disinformation and we are working with independent media, supporting women's organizations and addressing gender-based violence. For gender-based violence, we have the Council of Europe, the Istanbul Convention, where we are providing support for what we call justice for women, to also support them in the legal processes, working with judges, the legal institutions to have better access and to have better support, remedies, etc. for women. So, that is the key. 
And then, as I said, in the negotiating countries, we also have the Istanbul Convention, but we also have another directive on combating violence against women, which addresses very strongly online violence and hate speech so that the law enforcement must be equipped to investigate also online harassment and cyber violence. So that is a pretty new directive, but I think it will be very, very powerful. 
We also provide, of course, direct support to civil society organisations. Some of our partners have also said they want to have more support on digital security. So we will have capacity building on that, artificial intelligence, cyber violence, cyber security, disinformation. In the coming years, we will have a stronger focus on that.
We also have a rapid response mechanism, so that women's rights organisations who are under threat can get support if they sort of urgently need to leave the country. 
You also said, what is my opinion, what needs to be done? So I think much more, both to strengthen, of course, legal framework and policies, but also digital literacy and through the education systems to work with youth so that they can also understand disinformation and hate speech and how to navigate. Also working with social media platforms and tech companies to promote safety, which is like, I would say, the most difficult.
And support women's digital participation. We need more data and research to really see the consequences and the magnitude and create safe spaces for women. That's like super important, safe digital spaces and to work more on regional cooperation. Because it's a global issue. It is not only in this region, like, how can we also learn from other countries and from member states, from others, what works in addressing this difficult issue.

- But looking ahead, what are the European Commission's key priorities for promoting gender equality in Eastern Partnership countries? And how do you envision progress over the next decade?

- I think we will very much continue with the EU GAP -  Gender Action Plan on the topics that we have been talking about there. But we also have, which I found a bit exciting, we have an Eastern Partnership Working Group for Gender Equality with representatives from governments in all the countries. From Belarus, we have a civil society representative. But from the other governments we have. And from member states are there, and EU delegations, and it's co-shared by EEAS and EU DG NEAR. And to share experience, best practices to learn from each other, we had a series of meetings. We started with a topic on women's economic empowerment, and then the group wanted to learn more about the unequal sharing of care, and what can be done. So, we covered childcare services, gender-sensitive family policies, etc. How can we work also with the private sector? So we had a meeting specifically on that, with also the World Bank, and we will also follow up and see what more we can do here. 
The next topic for this group now is justice for women when it comes to gender-based violence. So, gender-based violence, I would say it's also like a key priority.
What we just discussed, with disinformation, hate speech, of course, is a priority. But yeah, everything is what we will focus on. 
And also another example is gender mainstreaming. I think with this in climate action, we are not so good at mainstream gender equality. During the COP29 in Azerbaijan last year, we also had a panel on investing in gender equality for a fair and green transition, together with Sida, the Swedish National Development Agency, where we highlighted how women are disproportionately affected by climate change, but seldom consulted in decisions and how some of the sectors receiving climate investment, such as energy, is where women are least represented, including as business leaders. So, that's an area I hope we will have more focus on this big investment, how can we further mainstream gender equality.
So, I think moving forward, I said before, collaboration is key, working together. Because it is not the EU alone or member states alone, but it is us coming together and seeing what we can do collectively to address all those gender challenges.

- My last question is a traditional one, because Kitabistan viewers and readers are passionate about books. So we would be very happy if you share your book recommendations with us.

- Of course, there are many books that are good and nice to read. But if I select one that I really like, it is The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood. Probably many of the viewers have seen this series on Netflix.
But it is also a very good book to read from 1985. It is a dystopian novel about the future in a totalitarian society, which is called Gilead. It is about a woman called Offred, who is a handmaid, and her role in the society is just to bear children for the ruling class.
And the government is very theocratic and taking control using religious justification to enform strict social and gender hierarchies. It really explores what we have discussed about gender roles and power. It is focused on power, control, gender inequality, surveillance, and the loss of individual identity and how this Offred, this handmaid, critically views the society.
Of course, I don't think we will have this, I hope we will not have such a society. But it provides a warning of the danger of when ideologies become very extreme, and how rights can be eroded very quickly and how oppressive regimes can emerge in times of crisis. I think it is an interesting book. And we have a lot to learn from it also, how we can prevent such a situation in the future.

- Thank you very much for taking your time and for sharing these comprehensive answers on how the European Commission works in the Eastern Neighbourhood countries.

- Thank you very much. I really enjoyed this talk.

Malak Hajiyeva

04.02.2025