Feminist Talk

Sharon Bhagwan Rolls from FemLink Pacific: Media Initiatives for Women in Fiji talks to Jan Moolman.

Rosemary Okello from the African Woman and Child Feature Service talks go Jan Moolman about how social media is changing the way girls and young women see and use media in Africa

Video interview: There were five speakers in the opening panel and only one of them were women. There was almost no mention to ICTs. Lalaine Viado, part of the APC team in New York, summarises main issues of the conference's opening panel.

The Beijing Platform for Action (BPA) is 15 years old and a global review of the progress of its implementation will be held at the 54th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) on 1-12 March 2010 at the UN Headquarters in New York City. The global review will focus on the link between the BPA implementation and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the outcome of which will significantly contribute to the high-level meeting on the MDGs by the General Assembly in September 2010.

In the article to which the ‘“J” spot’ refers, Maria Suarez explored why Section J was not a priority issue during the Beijing +10 review. Five years later, can we claim that it has happened? Or do circular ‘development’ debates continue to perpetuate the false dichotomy between ‘hard issues' such as access to water and housing and ‘soft issues’ including women’s rights to own, access, use and shape media and communication tools and platforms? Do we still feel forced into ‘choosing’ between the struggle to end violence against womenⁱ or eradicate poverty and the struggle for our rights to freedom of expressionⁱ, access to informationⁱ, and to tell our own stories? We want to, together with other activists and partners whom we have had the privilege of working with and learning from over the years, find women’s “J” spot.

Transparency, democracy, inclusivity, equal access, people centred… sound familiar? These and other concepts have grounded the work of the women’s movement and other movements for social change and justice for decades. They also at the core of the WSIS principles that were highlighted at the ‘WSIS principles: a development agenda internet governance’ workshop that I attended yesterday. So why then do I approach writing this with such trepidation?