⚡ Women > James
Good morning everybody! If you missed yesterday’s update, here it is.
Today, we focused on two large issues that are especially pertinent today: democracy and gender equality. Read on for more!
Who is democracy’s keeper?
If you’ve been paying attention to the news for the last few months, you’ve probably seen the updates about the protests in Hong Kong between the pro-democracy citizens and the HK police. In fact, for a few years now, democracy has been a big question mark. Even in lands where democracy has always had a stronghold, it seems to be unsteady.
Periodically, we’re going to be including bits, analysis, and news around the state of democracy around the world. We find it to be a critical component to building and sustaining more equal and thriving communities. Today, we wanted to start with some background.
The Strongman Era
Something we need to note at the start is that we’re in a time where many nations around the world are led by a strongman. For those who are unfamiliar:
A strongman is a political leader who rules by force and runs an autocracy or authoritarian regime or totalitarian regime. The term is often used [by whom?] interchangeably with "dictator" in the western world.
They often come into power by building a narrative of protection “us” from “them” and these two groups are often very different depending on the country. “Them” could comprise of the rich, the poor, and/or the different. It can be racially and/or ideologically charged.
The “Free” World
The phrase was used primarily during the Cold War to refer to the Western Block and associated with the countries allied and aligned with the US. The United States has always been an advocate and vocal proponent to democracy. However, with the actions of the current President, including his ability to get elected, some Americans think the US is more in need of structural political reform than China. Systemic elements like the Electoral College and the Popular Vote came into question after the election, exposing potential holes in a process that was the West’s beacon of democracy.
Technology Fails Us
A decade ago, technology that improved access to information and built independent social networks were seen as a form of democratization. If we couldn’t gather physically, we could gather digitally; we could share with each other what we needed to know, especially if the governments were hiding information from us. People thought that these technologies would empower the individual at the expense of autocratic states. Democratic leaders called it “people power.” But, others saw it differently. They realized governments could become the dominant player of information. So we started to see this: social media → attention → echo chamber → further polarization → wider gap between “us” and “them.”
The Old Guard of Democracy is Failing
When the Chinese army was preparing to challenge the pro-democratic activists, President Trump said:
Hong Kong is a part of China. They’ll have to deal with it themselves.
At this moment, the White House’s ambivalence failed to support the cause of democracy by giving Beijing what many around the world considered a green light. Unfortunately, the EU didn’t respond more strongly against what was happening even though their founding treaties list the promotion and protection of democracy—both within and outside of Europe. If more instances occur around the world that challenge democratic ideals, who’s going to stand if the two largest supporters are idling by?
Our Take and Hope for the Community
Though we’re a small group now, we at least need to be watchful. We need to keep paying attention to the forces shifting the pieces around on the board and make sure the values important to us aren’t being taken off. Politics always gets people antsy, but now isn’t a time to keep our personhood and politics separate. If you encounter any news related to the crisis of democracy, please send it our way.
Diving into gender equality
It shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody here that gender inequality is a major problem around the world. When there are more CEOs named James in the Fortune 500 than women, you know there’s a problem (no offense to any of our readers named James here, you know we still love you).
Fortunately, we saw two big steps being made to advance gender equality yesterday:
Melinda Gates’s $1B Pledge
Through her company Pivotal Ventures, Melinda Gates has pledged $1B over the next ten years to “put resources behind new and established partners taking innovative and diverse approaches to expanding women’s power and influence.” This funding will be focused on advancing three priorities:
Dismantling barriers to women’s professional advancement including sexual harassment &discrimination, biased and stereotypical representations, and more
Fast-tracking women in sectors with an outsized impact on our society, like technology, media, and public office
Mobilizing shareholders, consumers, and employees to amplify external pressure on companies and organizations in need of reform
This pledge is another example of financing scalable solutions to achieve the SDGs, as we highlighted yesterday and two days ago.
UN’s Target Gender Equality Initiative
The UN Global Compact announced “ambitious, time-bound corporate targets for women’s representation and leadership across business and at all levels.”
Through the Target Gender Equality initiative, companies will:
Deepen their implementation of the Women’s Empowerment Principles, a set of 7 principles focused on gender equality and empowerment in the workplace
Strengthen their contributions towards SDG 5 on Gender Equality, “which calls for women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making, including in economic life.”
This is an important step, especially in the United States - today, Equileap found that the US is lagging behind other developed countries when it comes to gender equality in the workplace (e.g., funding programs, requiring reporting of gender gap metrics).
Our Take
Gender equality should be a key priority, and we are hopeful that these steps will have a meaningful impact. In fact, the Gates Foundation’s Global Goalkeepers Report, as we highlighted a few weeks ago, stresses the importance of gender equality:
“No matter where you are born, your life will be harder if you are born a girl. If you are born in a poor country or district, it will be even harder. Adolescence is when girls’ and boys’ futures really start to diverge. Boys’ worlds expand.”
Dakota Gruener, Executive Director at ID 2020
“Digital identity is not a question of if, it’s a question of how … [They are being adopted at speed around the world, but] we are very concerned digital identity is not very thoughtfully implemented or designed and carries tremendous risk. A poorly designed digital identity system is a tool for mass surveillance. If you want to consider the worst possible scenario, it’s a tool for genocide.”
The ID2020 Alliance is setting the course of digital ID. ID2020 is coordinating funding for identity and channeling those funds toward high-impact projects, enabling diverse stakeholders - UN agencies, NGOs, governments, and enterprises - to pursue a coordinated approach that creates a pathway for efficient and responsible implementation at scale.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10
Renovating Democracy: He has signed on the “Giving Pledge,” committing the majority of his wealth to philanthropy; now Nicolas Berggruen, Chairman of the Berggruen Institute, is rethinking the way technology and social media are impacting democracy. In his new book Renovating Democracy, Berggruen considers how to govern in the age of globalization and digital capitalism. Berggruen is joined by The WorldPost's editor-in-chief and book co-author Nathan Gardels for a thought-provoking conversation with Asia Society President and CEO Josette Sheeran.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16
Feeding Our Future: Perspectives Across the Value Chain in Food Sustainability
Interested in learning more about the different areas of innovation across the value chain in food sustainability? Please join the NY + Acumen Impact Circle on World Food Day for a discussion on the future of food sustainability. We will explore different perspectives across the various parts of the value chain, including investment, production, distribution and waste/renewability.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17
War Stories from the Trenches - Fundraising for Startups Solving the World’s Greatest Challenges: Typically early-stage startups raise a convertible note from angels followed by Series A, B, C, etc., hoping to continue to seek funding or to arrange an exit. Early-stage fundraising can be very challenging and discouraging as entrepreneurs ‘pound the pavement’. This is even further the case for social enterprises. Join us for a discussion on the best practices of opening and closing a round from the entrepreneurs who have executed successful fundraising rounds to learn how they have raised capital to fund their solutions to the world’s greatest challenges.
MONDAY OCTOBER 28
Conversations with Plant-based Entrepreneurship: Vegpreneur is a global entrepreneurs community that is made up of innovators who are building a plant-based future and they’re hosting an evening panel on the state of plant-based entrepreneurship at General Assembly. Light snacks and refreshments will be served.
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