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EU Rules & Initiatives

Achievements in gender equality

Although inequalities still exist, the EU has made significant progress in gender equality over the last decades. This is the result of:
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• equal treatment legislation
• gender mainstreaming, integration of the gender perspective into all other policies
• specific measures for the advancement of women

Encouraging trends are the higher number of women in the labour market and their progress in securing better education and training.
However, gender gaps remain and in the labour market women are still over-represented in lower paid sectors and under-represented in decision-making positions.

Gender Equality Strategy 2020-2025

The EU Gender Equality Strategy delivers on the von der Leyen Commission’s commitment to achieving a Union of Equality. The Strategy presents policy objectives and actions to make significant progress by 2025 towards a gender-equal Europe. The goal is a Union where women and men, girls and boys, in all their diversity, are free to pursue their chosen path in life, have equal opportunities to thrive, and can equally participate in and lead our European society.

The key objectives are ending gender-based violence; challenging gender stereotypes; closing gender gaps in the labour market; achieving equal participation across different sectors of the economy; addressing the gender pay and pension gaps; closing the gender care gap and achieving gender balance in decision-making and in politics. The Strategy pursues a dual approach of gender mainstreaming combined with targeted actions, and intersectionality is a horizontal principle for its implementation.
While the Strategy focuses on actions within the EU, it is coherent with the EU’s external policy on gender equality and women’s empowerment.

As one of the first deliverables of the Strategy, the Commission proposed binding pay transparency measures  on 4 March 2021.

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On 8 March 2022, the European Commission is seeking, with the new EU-wide proposal for a directive to combat violence against women and domestic violence, to introduce targeted minimum rules on the rights of this group of crime victims, and to criminalise forms of violence against women and of cyber violence.

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