The year 2009, which is drawing to an end, brought about many recaps and analyses as we celebrated the twentieth anniversary of democratic changes in the old Eastern Bloc. Despite many new studies dealing with the successes and failures of the transformation, an evaluation of the past two decades from the perspective of gender equality was still missing. Looking at the changes initiated in 1989, such as the introduction of market economy and the adoption of neoliberal ideology as the foundation of the new political, economic and social system, it is important to see how they influenced the situation of men and women.

The publication Gender Issues 2009: Gender Equality Discourse in Times of Transformation, 1989-2009: the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia and Ukraine is yet another initiative of the Warsaw Office of the Heinrich Böll Foundation trying to fill this gap and, at the same time, it is also the result of the Foundation’s cooperation with partner organisations from Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Ukraine, which, since 2007, have been monitoring the progress of the implementation of gender equality politics and adherence to EU standards in this field.

The country reports for 2009, compiled in this publication and prepared by ASPEKT from Bratislava, Gender Studies from Prague, Feminoteka Foundation from Warsaw and Liberal Society Institute from Kiev, are concerned with the changes which took place in the past twenty years in the discourse of gender equality and women’s rights. Other areas analysed in the reports include women’s political participation, economic situation, violence against women, reproductive and sexual rights, including the rights of sexual minorities. The authors focused mostly on events which they consider to be the milestones of changes; which influenced the situation of women, the language of the debate, the perception of women’s rights and their place in social, political, economic and private life.

The full publication (pdf, 137 pages, 4,74 MB)