World politics, executive orders and women’s charters
After a long history of programs promoting diversity in the US, President Obama recently issued an executive order to increase workforce diversity in th Public Sector, thus sending another strong message about his commitment to Diversity. Government agencies are now required to develop plans for reaching specific goals aligned to the executive order. Although not all details are worked out yet, it is certain that the implementation of the initiative will be supported by a council of deputy agency chiefs, the Office of Personnel Management, the Office of Management and Budget as well as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which has been given a period of 90 days to develop an action plan. After that, the individual agencies have to set up own plans reflecting initiatives for diversity in recruitment, training and promotion in a period of 120 days.
In antother part of the world, Egypt is still far away from promoting diversity in politics after just dispossessing its former head of state, Husni Mubarak, a few months ago. All the hope of the people, especially women, now lie in the building of a new government. To ensure the integration of women’s rights in this new era, more than 500,000 (!) organisations and individuals have signed the Egyptian Women’s Charter supporting six basic demands that Egyptian women have expressed to their new government. They want an equal representation in legislative committees, decision making positions and political parties as well as a clearly stated equality between men and women in all parts of life, including employment and education. Other demands are concerning equal opportunities in social and economic rights, legislation, the establishment of a national women structure and a representation in the media that is free of stereotypes.
