KWDI Korean Women’s Development Institute

Abstract

 

Performance Evaluation and Policy Agenda of National Tasks on Gender Equality

 

Yoo Jin Choi

Jung Im Hwang

Ga Won Chung

Sungmi Jung

Young Ju Cho

Yun Mi Jung

Yeongyu Lim

 

Korea’s gender equality policy has utilized laws, institutions and infrastructure to strengthen women’s economic, social, and political influence, create an environment in which nurturing and caring responsibilities can be shared socially, and make progress in reducing structural gender discrimination that can be a cause of violence.

The Moon administration's national tasks actively recognized issues such as the low fertility rate, gender wage gap, changes in family structure and perception of family, women's right to health, reproductive rights, and the gender equality policy system, which led to meaningful progress in these areas. However, it has not fully assumed responsibility for resolving gender inequality and discrimination in work, welfare, culture, and safety. Although the employment rate of women is higher than ever before, women still face barriers in entering the labor force and maintaining employment, and the pandemic is exacerbating gender inequalities due to the unequal labor market structure and problems in the care system.

 

Furthermore, with the development of information and communication technology, there has been an increase and diversification of sexual offences committed online that move around platforms such as online communities, web hard, and telegram, making it very difficult to preemptively respond to with traditional prevention and investigation techniques. Moreover, although dedicated gender equality policy divisions have been installed in eight ministries, it is necessary to evaluate whether major institutional improvements that will affect gender equality in the mid-to long-term are actively intervening in the social exclusion problem experienced by Korean women. In addition, it is necessary to actively search for an alternative to the configuration and operation of the policy system that can find appropriate countermeasures to women's health issues and issues where various social discriminations intersect with gender.

 

With these issues in mind, this study examines the current state of gender equality and explores future policy directions. First, 12 tasks in the field of gender equality were selected from the 100 national tasks of the Moon administration, and after inspecting their performance from 2018 to 2020, policies that should be continued or expanded in the future are suggested. In addition, key theoretical resources for gender equality policy direction, such as a welfare state equipped with a gender equality paradigm, a model of equal division of labor between work and care responsibilities, and other models are analyzed, and the current state of employment by gender, poverty and income, care for infants and the elderly over the past 5 years is examined, leading to the suggestion of key tasks to improve gender equality conditions. Tasks to shape a policy direction for the equal division of work and care responsibilities are also proposed, such as a task to provide support so that everyone can do quality work, a task that can establish care work as a job that is treated equally to other types of work, a task that enhances the social value of care work, a task that increases autonomy, and a task that promotes accountability for gender equality in the administration.

 

Research areas: Gender equality

Keywords: Care work, Gender, Female employment, Reproductive

health, Reproductive rights, Gender-based violence