Gender in Rwanda

Tomorrow I start working at WFP as a Gender Analyst. I'm doing some background reading on gender in Rwanda and thought I'd share:

In 2016, the World Economic Forum ranked Rwanda 5th out of 145 countries in terms of gender equality. To compare, the US ranks 45th. This ranking considers economic participation, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment. Rwandan parliament is 64% women, which is the highest in the world. Women also slightly outrank men in terms of labor participation and enrollment in primary education.

These pushes towards gender equality came about after the 1994 genocide, when an estimated 500,000 women were raped over the course of the 100 days (and around a million people were killed). Afterwards, women banded together and demanded power. They changed the constitution to require gender quotas and introduced new laws to give women the right to inherit land, obtain credit, and share the assets of a marriage.

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So what I am I doing here, then, if the country I come from ranks so much lower on gender equality than here? That's something I'm asking myself (and about the paternalism in all of international development), but things are also by no means perfect for women here. In fact, one sobering statistic used by WFP here is that 56% of women in Rwanda currently experience intimate partner violence. In the fifth best country for women (in terms of the gender gap), more than half experience violence in the home.

Either that says a lot about the rest of the world or there's a methodological problem in the ranking of countries.

I haven't decided yet if I do think that GBV should figure more prominently into ranking of gender equality. Political and civic participation matter, and it's impressive what Rwanda has been able to do in such a short period of time. However, women's ability to be safe in their homes also has to be considered an important part of closing the gender gap. Would love to hear others' thoughts.