Mollyn Nakabea 
The Social Cohesion and Reconciliation Index reveals a contradiction: while support for women’s leadership is high, 75% of people still endorse patriarchal hierarchies and tolerate violence against women.
Minister for Women and Children Sashi Kiran highlighted that progress is rarely linear, as individuals often support women in leadership while simultaneously clinging to traditional gender beliefs.
“The finding shows that the pathway is not linear. Abandoning gender stereotypes is not a step to supporting women’s leadership. People can support women’s leadership while still endorsing stereotypes and violence.”
Kiran adds that women’s empowerment remains fragile without efforts to change traditional beliefs.
“This tells us that progress in representation alone is not enough. So without deliberate efforts to transform norms, advance gender responsive education and challenge beliefs that normalize violence or exclusion, empowerment will remain fragile.”
See researcher Daniel Martinez says gender equality has progressed in public spaces, but less attention is given to what happens in households.
“Challenges for gender equality have been achieved, but people do not really pay attention to what we were saying before, what’s happening in the household. So this number, sometimes, what it reflects is that in public, there has already been some progress, even though in reality, we see that there’s still a very long journey.”
Martinez adds that this reflects support for gender equality in public, but continued acceptance of the traditional structure in households.
