Discrimination against women has been most expressed in the field of work and employment for years, which is a consequence of decades of patriarchal attitudes and gender stereotypes related to the role of women in society – and that is not something that can be changed overnight, by one law, said Commissioner for Protection of Equality Brankica Jankovic at the conference on the new Law on Gender Equality in the context of women’s economic empowerment, organized by the Center for Democracy. Jankovic pointed out that the process of changing such attitudes is long-lasting and that these changes are being worked on and added that it’s wrong to perceive gender equality as a women’s issue, but that it is necessary to actively include men, because it is the right path to true equality.

Along with a number of good provisions, thanks to which equality will be promoted, this law encounters resistance and many people reduce it to the issue of linguistics with a tendency to abuse it for the sake of cheap political points. The law is good but ambitious, since it sets great expectations which are important for encouragement, but opens the issue of capacity for the implementation, said Commissioner. In practice, the problems of reconciling work and parenthood remain, which can hardly be changed by any law without changing the cultural patterns. Some employers still unjustifiably include questions about family and marital status in job vacancies and interviews and women still have insufficient access to managerial positions and the highest paid jobs. However, one of the most important provisions of the new Law on Gender Equality is that unemployed women who did not have health insurance will now be able to acquire this right on the basis of unpaid work at home, such as running a household or caring for and raising children. Another extremely important provision relates to balanced gender representation, but the situation on the labor market indicates that it will be very difficult to achieve that, said Jankovic and pointed out that there is a long road ahead of us, but we must not give up.

Commissioner emphasized the need to create public policies but also to continuously empower women and take various measures to achieve equality, including strengthening control and inspection bodies, developing the possibility of using flexible working hours, regulating work engagement in crisis situations, etc.