In recognition of the International Day of Families, the Global Campaign for Equality in Family Law (GCEFL), of which Women’s Learning Partnership is a proud member, hosted a webinar on "Family Law Reform: A Catalyst for Women’s Economic Justice" to shed light on the intersection between discriminatory family laws and women’s lack of economic rights.
The discussion was framed by the recently released policy brief released by the World Bank Group’s Women, Business and the Law (WBL) project. Drawing on data from 190 countries, the brief explores family law reform’s impact on women’s economic empowerment.With 1 in every 10 women living in extreme poverty, the brief aims to address the root causes of this inequity, many of which are intrinsically linked to family law.
GCEFL campaign manager, Hyshyama Hamin, opened the session with a brief history of GCEFL’s founding in 2020 by 8 women’s rights and faith-based organizations with Equality Now as its secretariat. The Global Campaign’s mandate is to hold governments accountable to protect and promote the rights of all women and girls in matters relating to the family through legal reforms in an area of law that is entrenched in patriarchal structures.
Julia Braunmiller, co-author of the WBL policy brief entitled Changing Laws, Changing Lives: Family Law Reform as a Catalyst, gave an overview of the findings, reinforcing the link between family laws governing marriage, divorce, property rights, inheritance, and household decision-making and economic prosperity given that these laws set the legal boundaries of women’s agency, mobility, and access to economic opportunity. She reinforced the point that rather than being considered a private sector matter, family law reform needs to be a policy priority to ensure women’s right to work, access to property, and inheritance of assets. These rights can ultimately boost labor participation, reduce poverty, and expand economic opportunities for women. Additionally, legal reforms have also been shown to alter societal expectations about women’s roles, leading to normative and behavioral shifts with influence in shaping economic outcomes. Finally, Julia acknowledged that family law reform lags behind laws around labor, non-discrimination, and violence against women due to its deep connections with religious, cultural, and social norms which are difficult to change.
After the presentation of the global data on family law reform and women’s economic empowerment, regional and national advocates representing the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and Nepal, highlighted the impact of discriminatory family laws and the importance of advancing women’s economic rights through legal reforms. Dima Dabbous, Equality Now’s MENA Regional Representative described the MENA gender paradox: despite rising education rates and labor law reforms, the region has stagnated with low levels of women’s labor participation which she associates with a lack of reform in family laws. Dima also highlighted a discrepancy in Islamic jurisprudence and practice across regions. For example, under Sharia law in North Africa, the concept of joint marital assets does exist, but in much of the Middle East this is not the case. These differences reveal the patriarchal roots of family laws, even when they are “cloaked in religion, customs, and traditions.” Dima called on feminist movements in the Muslim world to challenge these patriarchal practices and advocate for more positive and equal interpretations of Islamic jurisprudence.
Lily Thapa, founder of Women for Human Rights (WHR), an organization that fights for Nepalese widows’ rights, recounted her strategies to empower single women (widows) in Nepal by forming peer groups to build solidarity and confidence among these women. Her organization has launched successful advocacy campaigns to reform discriminatory family laws that relegate young widows to low status and complete economic dependence on their husbands’ families. In just 20 years, 56 discriminatory laws and policies have been amended and changed in terms of gender equality as a result of relentless advocacy. Lily explained how her community of activists and advocates created a dignified space for single women in the constitution of Nepal, allowing them to receive financial aid from local governments. Despite state pressures to eliminate social security allowances for widows, through continued advocacy with the Ministry of Women, Children, and Social Welfare, WHR was able to secure an Emergency Trust Fund established solely for widows as part of the Ministry’s National Action Plan for Widows in Nepal. Despite the law’s support in divorce rights to inheritance rights, Nepalese women are still facing the challenge of implementation. WHR works to combat that by providing training on the role of society, culture, religion, and law concerning single women, increasing the power and economic independence of single women in Nepal by helping them run for office and promoting entrepreneurship.
The panelists concluded that legal literacy and changing mindsets remained the most difficult challenges to family law reform, in addition to rising rates of violence against women and lack of childcare to support women’s labor participation. They called for more research and raising awareness on the inextricable link between equitable legal frameworks governing the family and unlocking the economic potential of half the world’s population — women.