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<DIV><B>From:</B> <A title=surf-hdr-stats@undp.org
href="mailto:surf-hdr-stats@undp.org">Shahrbanou Tadjbakhsh</A> </DIV>
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<P><FONT size=2>After some rumination around the world and pondering on the
meaning of women's empowerment, I’ve come up with a new and improved GEM
for the 21st Century. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT size=2>This GEM 21, also known as HI, actually calculates deprivations
in empowerment through a Humiliation Index, which is proposed here as perhaps a
more apt index to capture women’s collective experiences. Allow me to
expand.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT size=2>The Humiliation Index has three versions. For OECD countries, HI
1 consists of the number of times a woman’s husband/partner runs off with a
secretary/best friend/colleague/neighbor/stranger, leaving the woman stranded in
the boardroom/classroom/courtroom/farm/kitchen, divided by the number of
children of the couple at the time, multiplied by the difference in age between
the two women. Alternatively HI 1 can be calculated by the number of
kindergartens/schools the woman visits divided by the age of the child by the
time she/he is accepted to these institutions and multiplied by the tuition
fees. For developing countries, HI 2 consists of the number of times a woman is
pinched in a bus/metro/bazaar minus the number of times she is able to defend
herself against such violence by raising alarm or hitting back. Alternatively,
HI 2 can be calculated by multiplying the number of children in the household by
the number of actual days between the time the woman rece! ives a salary and the
day she hands it over to the husband/mother-in-law. For extreme patriarchal
societies in hot countries (EPSHC), HI 3 consists of the price the woman fetches
in village auctions or, alternatively, the dowry negotiated during marriage,
minus the size of the original debt of the father/husband divided by the age of
the girl when the transaction takes place.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT size=2>Alternatively, of course, a universal HI can be calculated for
all situations: The number of inches/centimeters of a woman’s shoe/heels,
divided by the number of steps she has to take during work (NB: make no
mistakes, for some women sitting in a Bistrot all day sipping coffee consists of
work.) This number is then multiplied by the price of the shoe then divided by
her monthly earnings. (NB: The index is still imperfect, I still haven’t figured
out the proxy for women wearing no shoes in rice fields)…I have a suspicion that
the results of this index will be very interesting, especially when it comes to
empowerment, North and South. But I am not sure. Where is my
calculator?</FONT></P></FONT><FONT face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"
size=2>Shahrbanou Tadjbakhsh<BR>Visiting Professor, Human Security<BR>Director,
Center for Peace and Conflict Resolution <BR>Sciences-Po,
Paris<BR></FONT></FONT>
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