 Lobbying for
Women with Disabilities
by Maria-Cristina Sará-Serrano Mathiason
TRANSCRIPT OF
AUDIO PRESENTATION
One of the capacities that is essential in the art to advocate successfully for our
rights is what is called Lobbying.
The term comes from politics, where much influence takes place outside meeting rooms --
in halls and lobbies. This skill is using the opportunity to talk with decision makers and
act in the decision making process to put your ideas across.
There is probably no textbook on how to lobby. It depends on your national
circumstances and structures. It also depends on your personality and style.
The best way I can introduce this subject is to talk about [the] lobbying that I did
myself. The issue was women with disabilities. The place was United Nations. In the United
Nations there are two main players: the delegations of member states, who could be ...
national legislators; and the secretariat, who could be ... government officials. To lobby
effectively you have to be able to deal with both.
My colleagues and I with Disabled Peoples International were concerned with the United
Nations instruments dealing with the advancements of women - when not taken to special
concerns -- all women with disabilities into account.
Disabled Peoples International has established a women's committee to guide its work.
And as the Disabled Peoples International United Nations representative, I work with the
committee and it's chair[person], Anneli Joneken from Sweden.
The first problem we confronted was that most of the people working for the Advancement
of Women did not like to deal with issues of particular groups of women. They felt that it
could divide the women's movement. We did not share that view, obviously.
We felt that unless the women's movement and the United Nations recognize the special
needs of all major groups of women, progress could be weak. We felt that our enthusiasm
could help move the general women's movement forward. It was a matter of convincing the
governments and the secretariat that this was the case.
Our first step was to get the attention of the governments. We probably could have
mounted demonstrations and published manifestos. But that kind of activity doesn't work
very well at the United Nations. So instead we began by identifying delegates that would
be sympathetic to our concerns.
Since at least 10% of the world's population has a major disability, there are almost
no families that haven't had someone close who has been disabled. Also there are
government schools, for domestic reasons, that have a concern with disabilities, like
Sweden, and it's always possible to work with those governments. A similar situation
occurs at a national level, by the way.
It was harder to get to the [UN] Secretariat since they were the ones who most resisted
the idea of dealing with specific groups of women. [We discussed with] the Director for
the Division of the Advancement of Women about how they should help us. He kept asking,
"What is gender dimension of disability? Is there one? Show me."
So my colleagues and I put together material and arguments that showed that there were
differences between women and men who had disabilities in the way that society treated
them. And ... when the discrimination faced by women was added to the discrimination faced
by persons with disabilities, there was double discrimination.
The United Nations had been asked to address the subject of vulnerable women in 1991.
We did not consider ourselves vulnerable at all, but we saw this as a way of bringing our
issue to the fore.
We proposed that there be a seminar on Women with Disabilities, and that we would help
organize it. We presented in the way we wanted. The Secretariat was grateful for our help.
That seminar, the report of which has been posted on the World Wide Web at
worldenable.net, produced recommendations and language that we have used since then.
Because the participants came from all over the world and had different kinds of
disabilities, the conclusions were credible. The Secretariat reflected them in their
reports. We then took those conclusions with us when we talked to delegates later. We
could say this is what everyone agrees should happen. At the national level this is what
can happen if you organize a seminar or a symposium on the Standard Rules.
Our main objective was to incorporate language about Women with Disabilities in the
Platform for Action that would be adopted by the Fourth World Conference for Women. Our
strategy was to ensure that our ideas were reflected earlier since it was difficult to add
ideas at a later stage. So we began working to have resolutions adopted by the Commission
of the Status of Women. These resolutions create a language to which governments had
agreed and which they could use in the platform.
We also worked to have language on women with disabilities added to other documents
like the final document of the World Conference on Human Rights. We continually identify
delegates who were sympathetic. I would talk to them in between meetings, sometimes invite
them to coffee, and show them the language already adopted or the conclusions of the
seminar. Often they would be happy to sponsor that language. We would find points and
drafts where our language would fit as a test to delegates to include them.
The result was very successful. The lessons I learned were the following:
1. You have to have a clear objective.
We wanted to have Women with Disabilities considered an important separate issue, but to
be included wherever relevant.
2. You have to have good information on hand.
We had data about how the situation of women with disabilities differ from that of men
with disabilities.
3. You have to find allies among the main decision makers.
We identified delegates who were sympathetic to disability issues.
4. You have to give good reasons for support.
We showed the secretariat how we could help them achieve the wider objective.
5. You have to be patient and persistent.
We worked quietly but steadily for four years.
6. You have to be coordinated.
We were in constant contact with each other so that we could all have the same position
and advocate the same way.
7. Your practices have to match the environment in which you are working.
While confrontation works in some context, we knew that it would never work at the
international level. So, we kept our cool and we were lucky.
8. You have to keep on top of developments and intervene strategically.
We spent a lot of time keeping track of what was happening in the preparations for the
conference, even areas that did not affect us directly.
This helped us to know when we should act and when we should wait. When you have had a
success enjoy it but then move on. We had most of the language that we wanted in the
Beijing Plan of Action but then we moved on Identifying new areas where we needed to work
-- like Internet accessibility.
The job is really never done until we have real equalization of opportunities.
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