EBU WOMEN NEWS BULLETIN No 7 - December 2002
Issued by the EBU Commission on the Advancement of the Interests of Blind and
Partially Sighted Women, in cooperation with EBU Paris Office.
The bulletin is a supplement to the EBU Newsletter and can also be found on the
internet : www.euroblind.org
CONTENTS
Welcome
Time flies ! Another year almost gone by. Time to reflect on 2002 and to make
new plans for 2003. Ahead lies a busy year for EBU and for the women´s
commission. We continue with the preparations for the Women´s Forum (WF) and
the General Assembly (GA) of 2003. You will receive more details on these events
shortly. We also are drafting, according to the Board's plan of action, a policy
paper on equality. We hope to present it to you for your information and input
in the first half of 2003. We will, as usual, keep you posted on all our
activities throughout the year.
In this year´s last and extra long edition, we want to share with you
information that we received from EBU Women´s Network members on national,
regional and European activities. We hope it will inspire you. And we hope to
hear from you too ; inform us on the activities you and your organizations have
planned for the ´European year of people with disabilities´, for example.
Inspire and get inspired, participate !
On behalf of the EBU Women´s Commission : Mavzilia, Catherine, Maria Jose,
Dora, Helga, Jivka, Ria, Vanda and Zoya, I wish you all a happy, healthy,
peaceful and active New Year !
Birgitta Blokland, Chairperson
Nationwide DBSV Women´s Seminar in Germany
Every two years blind and partially sighted women have the opportunity to attend
a nationwide seminar.
The host of this seminar is the German Federation of Blind and Visually Impaired
People (DBSV) and, as the women's representative, I am responsible for the
organisation, preparatory work and realization. Usually we have 60 to 70 ladies
who attend the seminar. We receive funds from the Federal Ministry of Family,
Seniors, Women and Youth which however this year is being restructured in
Germany.
From October 3 to 6, 68 participants met at the Aura Hotel in Osterode in the
Harz mountains. The programme included amongst others the following subjects :
- Studying at a university - working abroad - doing a retraining - working
for the industry - rehabilitation organisation - stages of a career ".
The lady speaker who delivered this paper had to face at a very early stage
that, because of her deteriorating sight, she would not be able to achieve
the goals she had set for herself. Today she works for a major blind
organisation in Germany as a public relations expert ; she is successful in
her job and is content.
- The right to be imperfect
tackled the issue of bio-ethics and received many critical comments. A
gerontological paper and a critical discussion of living at a residential
home for the elderly vs living in the family were also very interesting and
important, ecause many participants will probably themselves face this
problem some time in their lives.
- Having children despite the fact I am a blind or partially sighted woman
was the title of a paper which also triggered off many discussions.
And there were many other papers to follow.
Of course throughout these days there was an exhibition where braille products
of a printing house and household appliances were at display. Also the
opportunity of sharing many good discussions must not come off badly.
In a final discussion proposals are made - usually which topics could be put on
the programme for the follow-up seminar.
By Helga Neumann
Women's Representative of the German Federation of the Blind and Visually
Impaired
THE NORDIC WOMEN´S COMMITTEE, NKK
The Nordic Women's Committee consists of representatives from 5 Nordic countries
(Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland), who meet twice a year. A very
important aspect is the possibility to exchange experience and information. At
the meetings each member reports on the Equality work in her country. Susanne
Tarp from Denmark was chosen chairperson in 2002, taking over from Merja Portimo
(Finland).
Plan of Action
NKK is working hard to establish a well functioning women's network in the
Nordic region. For this purpose it intensified the cooperation with the
respective national organizations. The first step will be to set up a
mailinglist through which information can be quickly exchanged over the borders.
The commission also has the ambition to issue a newsletter, which should come
out together with the EBU women's newsbulletin. In order to strengthen the
communication with the EBU women's commission, NKK seeks to translate a summary
of its national reports into English. A Nordic cooperation with the Baltic
states started last year. In this light, the NKK also wants to try and establish
contacts with women in the Baltics.
Another focus point will be the situation of elderly women in the Nordic
countries.
The European year of people with disabilities 2003 coincides with the UN
Standard Rules´ tenth anniversary celebration. The theme for the year of people
with disabilities is human rights, accessibility and awareness.
Every other year the Nordic Cooperation holds a conference, and next year it
will be Norway's turn to host the event. 'The year' will, naturally, be on the
agenda and NKK will urge the organizing committee to include equality matters in
the programme. Also important is, of course, that the Nordic countries make sure
their delegations are gender balanced. More info : Susanne Tarp, Chair NKK,
email : st@dkblind.dk
By Lena Höjdevall, SRF, Sweden
Translation : Birgitta Blokland
Seminar "Women and Disability : multiple
dimensions", Spain
November 11 last, a seminar was held in Madrid entitled ´Women and
disability : multiple dimensions´, organized by the Spanish committee of
representatives of disabled women and the Madrid Community, in which blind women
played an active role in defending the fundamental rights and specific needs
that this group has.
In international social politics, they are a group of invisible citizens,
although there are about 250 million disabled women who have to deal every day
with ´double discrimination´ and other barriers that impede reaching essential
goals in life : higher unemployment rates, lower salaries, less access to health
services, higher lack of education, poor or no access to special programmes and
services directed at women, poor social relations, and a higher risk of sexual,
physical and psychological abuse.
The seminar concluded with the presentation of resolutions that were adopted by
all organizations and participants, and 10 general recommendations to the Public
Services that basically are about reaching a higher employment rate for this
group, higher quality vocational training, better medical service, help in
achieving both independent living and employment, empowerment of rolemodels in
the media, priority attention for women in rural areas, training programs
dealing with new technologies as a basic tool for employment, etc.
These documents will be presented at the International Congres of Women with
Disabilities, which will be held next February in Valencia, Spain, in the
framework of the European Year of People with Disabilities.
By Ana Pelaez, ONCE (Spain)
Email : apn@once.es
Translation : Birgitta Blokland
EBU Women's Network
Are you blind or partially sighted and interested in becoming a member of the
network ? Email to bjb202@hotmail.com
for a registration form or call the Paris Office. As a network member you can
directly get in touch with other network members through the email discussion
list and you receive the EBU Women Newsbulletin. Be informed on EBU women's
initiatives and activities and join the club. Welcome !
The European Women´s Lobby
We congratulate the EWL with its new President, Lydia La Riviere-Zijdel, the
first disabled woman to hold this position. We copied EDF´s press release for
you :
Relevant activist of the European Disability Movement elected new President
of the European Women's Lobby.
September 29, 2002, Lydia La Riviere-Zijdel, an activist of the disability
movement and former board member of the European Disability Forum, was
unanimously elected by the members of the European Women's Lobby to become the
new President of this leading organisation for the next two years.
"I want to guide the European Women's Lobby in a direction wherein equal
opportunities and rights for all women, not only on the labour market but in all
spheres of their lives and life cycles, become more a reality. As a disabled
woman on this important position, I hope to be a real model for other women
regardless of their ability, age, colour, etc., and hopefully to empower them to
speak out about the various forms of discrimination and violence they
encounter", declared Lydia La Riviere-Zijdel, after being elected.
Women with disabilities are a majority within the 50 million disabled people in
Europe and have a bigger chance to become disabled than men. They are often
exposed to multiple discrimination and particularly disadvantaged in the field
of employment or education. Furthermore, some types of violence are almost
always exclusively perpetrated upon disabled women, such as forced sterilisation
or abortion.
"The result of this election is a clear example of the mainstreaming of
disability and a unique opportunity to give greater disability to women with
disabilities in the organisation that represents women in Europe. We firmly
believe that Lydia La Riviere-Zijdel, as a disabled woman herself with a long
experience in defending the rights of people with disabilities and great
commitment to gender equality, will be an outstanding President to the women's
movement ", said Yannis Vardakastanis, President of the European Disability
Forum.
To promote the rights and interests of disabled women in the European Union, the
European Disability Forum has been working very closely with the European
Women's Lobby and became a member of this organisation during the year 2000.
This is the first time a disabled woman takes over the leading position within a
relevant European organisation. EDF believes that this significant step will be
an important contribution to advance the disability agenda regarding women,
particularly in the framework of 2003, which has been declared "European
Year of People with Disabilities" following an EDF proposal.
Contact : Carlotta Besozzi, Membership and Policy Officer
Tel : +32 2 286 5181, E-mail : info@edf-feph.org
The citizens´Forum Prevention of violence in everyday life : Civil
society´s contribution
A report
Council of Europe, Strasbourg, November 18th and 19th 2002
1. Introduction
The Council of Europe does not write laws but it has a very important function
in promoting and defending Human Rights, in collaboration with partners it
publishes resolutions which will be adopted by the Parliament and applied by all
the European member countries. So, in relation with the international non-
governmental organizations (INGO) having a consultative status, the Council of
Europe decided to set up exchanges of views (Citizens' Forums) between
representatives of INGO, of the parliaments, of the local and regional European
powers' congresses, and representatives from the area of intergovernmental
cooperation.
Moreover, this forum on the topic of violence harmonizes with the
"Integrated Project" called "Violence in everyday life in a
democratic society", a project started in 2001 by the General Secretary.
Effectively, violence and security are preoccupations of all the member states
and of all their citizens.
This forum had as a first objective to define action proposals which should be
easy to apply as soon as possible.
A general report will be published and a declaration will be prepared in order
to be proposed to the INGO for their plenary session of 2003.
2. Forum
This conference brought together 60 persons : official representatives and
experts. Under the chairmanship of Michel Albin from the I N G O liaison
commission : introductory speeches by the General Secretary first and by
different official representatives. All the speakers condemned extremism and
terrorism and they declared loneliness, poverty, exclusion, lack of dialogue and
respect and the passion of youth as factors exacerbating violence. But they also
condemned defensive attitudes leading to racism and xenophobia. After the
official opening, Mr. Jean-Pierre Titz, project director, reported on the
progress of the integrated project " The answer to violence in everyday
life in a democratic society ". He explains that this project, set up in
2001, has as objective to give recommendations to the member states of Europe in
order that they can adopt policies against violence while respecting fundamental
values. Some tools must be developed: training programmes, guidelines of good
practice, network, etc, in 6 areas : violence at school, domestic violence,
violence in the town, in sport, in the media, violence and youth.
Other objectives concerning problems of society : research on social cohesion in
such cultural, religious or linguistic differences, human traffic and also
global policies of states -- for example, a common definition of violence.
Mr. Titz explained that already some documents are available, notably for the
mayors or sports managers, some studies about violence against women and
children are in preparation; some meetings on drug-related violence and urban
police or again how to integrate the young in violence prevention, have been set
up; some observers are functioning, a conference on prevention of violence at
school and a meeting of all national correspondents of this project, are to take
place in December, and lastly, creation of a website.
Mr. André Lemaître, criminologist at the university of Liège, explained that
violence is not "one" ; it is physical, economic, symbolic, and we
have to understand its mechanisms. He says that our society promotes competition
: outdoing oneself but above all outdoing others. Driving, in business, at home
or in town, this principle is often the reason for violence. In prevention
strategies, the NGO have naturally a great part to play but they have to take
care not to lose their way, because there is a real risk of reinforcing the
exclusion process.
3. Working groups
After these presentations, 3 workshops were formed : urban and domestic violence
(the group which will be reported here), violence at school and in sport,
violence in the media and young people's contribution. After introductory
presentations, the debates are a question of determining the NGO contribution in
these areas.
First presentation : Mrs. Christiana Storelli, architect and politician
(Switzerland), said that our modern cities are forgetting their past and
history, are without any style or soul, and are often centres of violence.
However, towns are always changing and it is necessary to plunge into them in
order to become familiar with some changes which can seem at first as an
aggression. We have to work for clean towns with areas where people can meet
together, improve places or public squares and participate in the life of the
town, even politically, if we wish to have an influence in its development, its
harmony and its security.
Second presentation : Violence against women
Mrs. Denise Fuchs from the European Women's Lobby spoke about the actions
undertaken by the Lobby in this area ; in particular, she evokes the Beijing
meeting where a general definition of violence against women was adopted. Also,
the Lobby created a European centre for the formulation of policies to combat
violence against women, with observers in place to evaluate the policies
implemented by member states. She recalled two studies led by the Lobby :
"Exposure of the hidden facts on domestic violence in the European
Union" (1999) and "Towards a common scale to measure progress in the
struggle against violence to women" (2001)
She also underlined the permanent work done by the Lobby in collaboration with
United Nations. Violence, she said, stays always the norm more than the
exception; it seems that in this area, imagination is without limits. Zoya
Mutisheva explained that in Bulgaria there is a pilot project called "open
door" a centre for women victims of violence; there is also safe
accommodation for such women and their children, a telephone hotline for
victims, legal assistance, a medical care unit and a service for training
volunteer helpers.
Discussion was animated, especially about gender equality; one of the experts
present thought that it is not such a good idea because in the workplace, men
have many problems with their female colleagues : they do not dare approach
them. Then, there is the question of older people who are so vulnerable and
often victims of violence, from their family as well as from institutional
staff.
Mr. Peter Newell spoke about violence against children: corporal punishment, he
says, is a serious disregard of children's rights ; it is a violation of human
dignity, violence legalized. Nevertheless, there are the partisans of "a
smack on the bottom", and Mr. Fisher, pastor, evoked the problem of
children who are violent to their parents. Someone also invited experts to not
forget violence in institutions, in psychiatric hospitals, in retirement homes,
in prisons, etc. At the Council of Europe, there is an independent committee
which may visit these establishments without prior warning and could intervene.
After much discussion, Mr Keith WHITMORE (policeman and Manchester City
Counseller, UK) spoke to us about a programe set up in his city to combat
violence resulting from alcohol, especialy an education programme in the prisons
so as to prevent a second offence and a programme called one-to-one monitoring
intending to bring together the author of violence and his victim.
Following much further discussion we arrived at the last part of this forum.
4. Strategies proposed
To resume, it seems that a common denominator exists between all these forms of
violence: lack of respect, respect for oneself, respect for others; gender
inequality is also considered as a cause of domestic violence.
Propositions : to reaffirm the sense of the family ; create schools for parents;
organize silent marches, evening debates; organise associations of mediators
(preferably young), proximity people, training programmes for the volunteers ;
real partnership with the Council of Europe so as to obtain finance to realize
certain projects ; take into account gender equality; reach a common definition
of violence ; take measures to help people (about 50 0r 60 years old) trapped
between grandchildren and very old parents ; establish a good code of practice
which will be included in a Human Rights declaration and taught at school ;
design a system of sanctions (for example repair damage committed), establish a
civil abnd social service instead of military service, set up a dialogue between
children and parents ; work on a religious dialogue ; from the consultative
function, give to the NGO real participating power ; mount a challenge for
cities without violence - a friendly city, taking care not to merely transfer
the problems elsewhere.
5. Conclusions
From all the propositions of the three groups, the general chairman will draw
conclusions and trends and then will write a synthesis.
For our first group, Alexandre Lupin conceives his conclusions as the three
sides of a sort of pyramid ; the first side will be the principles, the second
one the strategies, the third one the implementation tools. Along the first one
from the base to the top he writes verbs: educate, answer, guide, promote,
observe and quantify.
In front of these verbs, on the strategies side, he writes : teach respect,
offer assistance to victims but also to the perpetrators, set up mediators
associations in partnership between NGO and the community, the police and
judiciary ; amend existing laws, encourage civic engagement and follow up
policies.
The tools : awareness campaigns, talking shops, telephone hot lines, create
observation posts, training programmes for volunteers, code of conduct, etc.
However, this pyramid does not satisfy everybody because, some people think it
is too abstract, leave out the notion of person while violence is always the
expression of someone dominating someone else. Nevertheless, arriving at the end
of these two working days, we must establish conclusions from the three groups
and now we are waiting for the final declaration which will come from this first
citizens' forum.
By Catherine Oelhoffen, France
EBU women´s commission representative at the Forum
Email : c.oelhoffen@wanadoo.fr
Agenda
- 2003 : European year of people with disabilities
- 31 January 2003 : EBU Women´s Forum and General Assembly organizing committee
meeting, La Grande Motte, France
- 27 february 2003 : International Congres on Women with Disabilities, Valencia
(Spain).
More info: mujdisc_congreso@gva.es
- February / March 2003 : 10th International competition of blind musicians in
Prague (Czech Republic).
More info : Czech Bind United, email : szahr@quick.cz
; Tel : +420 224 817393, Fax : +420 22481 8398
- May 9-11 2003 : EBU Women´s Commission meeting in the Netherlands, including
a joint meeting with the EBU Board
- May 2003 : first meeting of the Balkan Women´s Commission in Bulgaria
- November 2003 : EBU WF and GA, Athens (Greece)
The back page
Next issue : January / February 2003
Articles/info, suggestions and reactions, preferably in Word, can be
sent to the editor by Email, or by fax/mail to the EBU Paris Office to
the attention of the EBU Women Newsbulletin.
Deadline next issue 2003 : January 15th
Editor : Birgitta Blokland, bjb202@hotmail.com
EBU Paris Office
Attn EBU Women Newsbulletin
58 Avenue Bosquet
75007 Paris (France)
Fax : +33 1 47 05 38 21
Email : Ebu_uea@compuserve.com
Please make copies
and share this bulletin with others who are interested.
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