Yesterday was International Women’s Day – March 8, established as a day of struggle for women’s rights, their economic, political and social equality. From the first strikes to today, the position of women in society in this part of the world has changed significantly, but complete equality has not yet been achieved. The question remains: what is hindering the full emancipation of women in Bosnia and Herzegovina today – the law or the mentality?
Bosnia and Herzegovina has laws aimed at gender equality, it is also a signatory to international conventions, but – they are implemented by a system that doesn’t seem to believe in them, so discredit, violence, femicide show us that the reality on the ground is dictated by the unwritten law of customs.
“There are people at all levels of government who often don’t even read the existing, binding laws and conventions that bind Bosnia and Herzegovina to the international community, let alone our local, as I like to say, Bosnian laws. This is exactly the biggest obstacle,” said Jadranka Milićević, activist and director of the CURE Foundation.
The Law on Gender Equality in Bosnia and Herzegovina stipulates that at least 40 percent of women must be on candidate lists for elections, and the Election Law of Bosnia and Herzegovina has integrated this obligation. For the first time, women in Bosnia and Herzegovina are at the highest levels of government. But, as the research that our interlocutor worked on shows, they inherit and follow patriarchal patterns:
“Politicians are what the political parties and their leaders created them to be. This is why breakthroughs often do not happen, because they could be sanctioned. I would not like to generalize – there were women who opposed the policies of their parties and were recognized in some of the previous mandates, but in the next election cycle they were often politically punished,” said journalist Kristina Ljevak-Bajramović.
Therefore, their representation is not a reflection of real political engagement. Nor complete emancipation as long as they participate more in public life, exhibit, earn, train, but lack where the power is.
Sarina Bakić, a professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences of the University of Sarajevo, points out that precisely the contradiction between declarative support for equality and actual behavior is one of the key features of contemporary patriarchal societies.
“One of the characteristics of today’s patriarchal societies is that, when we talk about solving problems or strengthening the emancipation of women, there is a clear contradiction between the intention, actual behavior and what remains only at the declarative level,” emphasized Bakić.
As long as emancipation is an item in the reports for the international community, and not a change of beliefs in homes, schools, workplaces, there will be sarcasm in the statement – that is what our struggle has given us, Federalna writes.
