Nine out of 10 people hold biases against women, says UNDP's report

The Gender Social Norms Index shows that 25% of the population in 80 countries thinks a husband beating his wife is justifiable

Nearly 90 per cent of both men and women have "at least one" fundamental bias against women, reveals the Gender Social Norms Index 2023 (GSNI). The index is released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

The 2023 index showed "no improvement in biases against women in a decade despite powerful global and local campaigns for women's rights".

Four dimensions of the GSNI

Gender biases are pronounced in both lower and higher Human Development Index (HDI) countries. These biases hold across regions, income levels, and cultures.

According to the GSNI, biases against women can be quantified along four key dimensions.

Political dimension

The two indicators under it are: women having the same rights as men is essential for democracy; and men make better political leaders than women.

Educational dimension

The indicator within it is that university is more important for men than for women.

Economic dimension

The two indicators under it are that men should have a greater right to a job than women; and men make better business executives than women.

Physical integrity dimension

The two indicators under it are proxy for intimate partner violence; and proxy for reproductive rights.

According to the report, 61 per cent of the people in the world hold political bias, 28 per cent educational, 60 per cent economic, and 75 per cent of people hold physical integrity biases against women.

The situation is worse in India. Around 99 per cent of people hold at least one bias against women. Around 69 per cent of Indians hold political, 39 per cent educational, 75 per cent economic, and 92 per cent of people hold physical integrity biases against women in the country.

The report noted that prejudices remain "deeply embedded" in society along with cultural biases that hinder women's empowerment. The report stated that these prejudices "are widespread among men and women, suggesting that these biases are deeply embedded and influence both men and women to similar degrees."

The index shows "no improvement in biases against women in a decade," the UNDP said, "despite powerful global and local campaigns for women's rights" such as MeToo.

It added that while considerable progress for women has been achieved in many capabilities, such as the right to vote and equal participation in education, progress has been tenuous in enhanced capabilities, such as women's voice and power.

The UNDP data showed that while Indians think women can become political leaders and earn well, their husbands can still beat them. Interestingly, the proportion of men and women holding such biases against women is almost equal.

Extreme bias

Around 49 per cent of the world's population think that men make better political leaders than women, whereas 43 per cent think men make better business executives than women.

The report noted that only 27 per cent of people believe that women having the same rights as men is essential for a democracy. Meanwhile, 25 per cent of people or one in four respondents, believe that a man beating his wife is justifiable.

The report showed that 46 per cent of the population thinks that men should have more rights to a job than women, and 28 per cent of the global population thinks that university is more important for men than women. This comes when education is seen as the key factor in improving women's economic status. However, the UN report also said that the data showed a persistent gender pay gap even when education rates are high.

These figures, from data collected between 2017 and 2022, were largely unchanged from the previous GSNI report published in 2020, which used data from 2005 to 2014.

Gender bias

In countries with higher bias in gender social norms, women spend more time than men — as much as six times as much — on domestic chores and care work.

Gender inequality tends to be higher in countries with greater gender bias. Additionally, women remain underrepresented at the highest levels of political office globally.

Pedro Conceicao, head of the UNDP's Human Development Report Office, said, "Social norms that impair women's rights are detrimental to society more broadly, dampening the expansion of human development. Lack of progress on gender social norms is unfolding against a human development crisis."

"Everyone stands to gain from ensuring freedom and agency for women," he added.

Notably, in 57 out of the 80 countries and territories surveyed, where adult women are more educated than men, the average income gap was reported at 39 per cent.

Per capita income

Women, especially those in South Asian countries such as India, need a lot more support than they currently receive.

The per capita income of women was only 21.4 per cent of men's income in India in 2021. In contrast, it was as high as 75 per cent in many African countries such as Kenya, Congo, South Sudan, Uganda, Zimbabwe, etc.

The per capita income was high in Nepal (89.9 per cent of men's income), Germany (73.1 per cent), Israel (72.6 per cent), the UK (70.2 per cent), China (66.9 per cent), and the US (65.9 per cent).

The report is disappointing, say UN officials

Heriberto Tapia, research, strategic partnership adviser at UNDP and co-author of the report, has called the degree of improvement over the past decade or so "disappointing".

The report also said that the "hurdles" created by prejudices against women have "manifested in a dismantling of women's rights in many parts of the world." This, in turn, has been attributed to biased social norms and a broader human-development crisis to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the report.