Women have played a vital role in assisting their families in every civilization. In some capacity, women have contributed to the evolution of society since the beginning of time. When discussing women’s empowerment, it is commonly believed that this phenomenon primarily benefits women. The benefactors of women’s empowerment include men, women, society, communities, and the national economy.
For as long as Pakistani women have been, ever-increasing duties and fewer chances, together with limited or no exposure, have been a formidable obstacle. Nevertheless, women, like men, have the right to live with dignity and require the freedom to lead a fearless and fulfilled life. In Pakistan, women’s empowerment has always been of the utmost concern to opinion leaders, reformers, social analysts, and political philosophers.
The empowerment of women is a global program that aims to elevate women to the same level as men and to increase their social, economic, and educational rights. Creating an atmosphere sans gender discrimination is the objective. It ensures equal opportunity in the workplace, family, culture, and community. Women constitute nearly half the world’s population, meaning that a country cannot grow or advance without them. As a result of their active participation in all spheres, women’s empowerment would contribute to society’s overall growth.
According to the most recent figures, Pakistan’s female population is 49.2%, whereas women’s involvement in the labor force is only 28.0%. This ratio is meager. Women’s empowerment can play a magnificent part in Pakistan’s economic growth, but this is only possible with women’s employment.
Gender Equality is a Strategy for Women’s Liberation
It is a fundamental human right, yet men and women have unequal access to opportunities and decision-making power in our culture. Women worldwide have fewer opportunities to engage in economic and fiscal activities than men, have less access to education, and are more vulnerable to health, safety, and security hazards. Not only are such marches essential for achieving gender equality, but also for achieving development goals, ensuring women’s rights, and providing them with the opportunity to realize their full potential and aptitude. Empowered women and girls have the potential to contribute to the health, education, and improvement of their families, communities, societies, and countries; they also have a positive ripple effect that affects the global community.
Empowerment involves personal financial independence, social consciousness, and political consciousness. These factors can be categorized as economic authorization, social authorization, and political authorization.
Pakistan’s Rising Feminist Movement
In the past five years, a new, forceful feminist movement has swept over Pakistan. Pakistan’s Aurat March, or Women’s March, was first held in Karachi in 2018 to bring attention to women’s issues in the country. After feminist collectives and women’s rights organizations, such as the Women Democratic Front and the Women’s Action Forum, established a non-hierarchical steering committee, unaffiliated with social or political groups, under the title Hum Aurtein, the march was organized (We the Women).
It is addressing entrenched patriarchy in the country and demanding dramatic reforms to preserve the rights of other marginalized communities and gender minorities. A younger generation of women leads it. What began as an annual march on March 8 to commemorate International Women’s Day has evolved into a campaign for social, political, economic, and judicial reform. This iteration of Pakistani women’s rights amplifies voices and promotes awareness through protests in key cities, including Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad.
Most Pakistanis have denounced the Aurat March due to the offensive slogans. The phrases and play cards were not designed to appeal to all demographics. These were deemed obscene and inappropriate. Pakistanis are not opposed to the Aurat March, but many have qualms about how the demonstration was conducted. The protest should be so appealing and eye-catching that individuals from all walks of life must respect it. In any case, the Aurat March has given Pakistani women a fresh perspective on their rights for the benefit of their life. In summary, women must continue to struggle for equal rights and empowerment.
The Framework for Rights and Identity
The preservation and protection of identity should be distinct from the promotion of identity by contemporary ‘Islamist’ movements, most visibly through the imposition of various clothing codes and the veil. This is hardly a preserve of tradition; the nature of the cover has little to do with conventional attire. The active promotion of new external appearances and social behavior must be viewed as an inherent aspect of these new belonging-signifying movements. Any similar visible signs do not mark the collective identity of women’s rights activists.
However, the human rights framework application may need to be improved. The human rights framework is situated squarely within the confines of nation-states. It assumes that the state, as the primary protector of rights, has or can be persuaded to have the best interests of all its residents in mind. In Pakistan’s history, the absurdity of this idea is apparent. Such assumptions are ineffective when the state is one of the primary antagonists. In addition, embracing the human rights paradigm tends to focus activists’ attention on realizing citizens’ rights as state-granted entitlements.
Conclusion
A closer examination of the intersection of culture, economics, and politics is necessary. In this regard, the function of culturally expressive aspects of movements as both academic research and activism merits closer consideration. The graphic features of daily activities as signifiers of affiliation and commitment are crucial components of actions linked with essentialist – and essentializing – politics advocated by religious right movements (such as political Islamists) and other identity-based exclusionary efforts. These movements oppose equality based on gender and other bases of collective identity. Comparatively, the cultural components of the pluralism promoted by the Pakistani women’s rights movement and other human rights organizations are weak and incidental, often appearing to be disconnected from the cultural roots of the society in which they work. The rights-based movements must establish more robust artistic expressive signifiers of change and belonging to reject and oppose religious rights movements. The human rights framework must be supplemented by more effective use of the creative arts and the recovery of people-resonating historical and cultural traditions.
