The Identification for Development Agenda : Its Potential for Empowering Women and Girls
Gender inequality and related issues remain a major global challenge, particularly for developing countries. Despite considerable progress on gender equality over recent decades, key gender gaps remain in endowments (health and education), in acces...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Report |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2015
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2015/09/25058588/identification-development-id4d-agenda-potential-empowering-women-girls-background-paper http://hdl.handle.net/10986/22795 |
| Summary: | Gender inequality and related issues
remain a major global challenge, particularly for developing
countries. Despite considerable progress on gender equality
over recent decades, key gender gaps remain in endowments
(health and education), in access to jobs and economic
opportunities, and in voice and agency. Lack of data limits
ability to assess gender gaps and measure progress toward
eliminating them. Successfully addressing the incompleteness
of civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) systems
can help fill some of these vital data gaps. In addition,
having official personal identification (ID) is an important
stepping-stone for women and girls - enabling them to access
services, claim their entitlements as citizens, and increase
their voice and agency through participation in voting and
other politics. Global initiatives such as identification
for development (ID4D) promote opportunities to provide
women with access to foundational documentation such as
birth certificates and expansion of other ways to establish
their legal identity. In addition, better data resulting
from personal identity registration will advance gender
equality policy discussions and planning. This paper
examines rates of male and female registration for national
identities globally to identify key registration constraints
and gaps. The authors find no systematic evidence of
gender-based gaps in birth registration; rather, evidence
suggests that poverty, social exclusion, and geography may
constrain birth registration of both males and females.
Drawing on case studies and national-level data, the authors
next examine outcomes in specific policy areas: access to
financial services, access to social protection schemes, and
inclusion in electoral roles and voting. Here, the evidence
suggests, adult women face gender-specific barriers in
getting ID, sometimes related to inability to obtain
foundational documentation such as birth certificates. |
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