Stakeholders

Social Partners

European social partners – the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), BusinessEurope (formerly known as the Union of Industrial and Employers’ Confederations of Europe), the European Association of Crafts, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises and Services of General Interest Europe (formerly the European Centre of Employers and Enterprises Providing Public Services) – are key stakeholders in European social dialogue, working in a number of specific policy areas, including gender equality, at the European level. They are strongly committed to enhancing gender equality in the labour market and workplace. A prime example of an action put forward by European social partners is the framework of actions on gender equality, which was signed in 2005. This framework sets out four priority areas for action: addressing gender roles, promoting women in decision-making, supporting work–life balance and closing the gender pay gap.

Social partners at the EU level are also active in 44 sectoral social dialogue committees, operating with the support of the European Commission. Currently, half of their work programmes include actions related specifically to gender equality. ETUC has its Women’s Committee, established in 1975 and comprising experts working in the field of gender equality from all of the national affiliates. The committee adopts positions on issues relating to equality between women and men and monitors the implementation of gender mainstreaming in the policies of ETUC.

Civil society

Among the conditions for the effective implementation of gender mainstreaming, the Beijing Platform for Action identifies the involvement of civil society, including centres for women’s studies and research; academic and educational institutions; the private sector; the media; and non-governmental organisations, especially women’s organisations.

Institutionalised advisory bodies have already been established especially to assist the Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, namely the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) and the European Committee of the Regions. The EESC contributes to strengthening the democratic legitimacy and effectiveness of the EU by enabling employers, workers (trade unions) and civil-society organisations from the EU Member States to express their views at the European level. It helps ensure that European policies and legislation tie in better with economic, social and civic circumstances on the ground, making use of EESC members’ experience and representativeness, dialogue and efforts to secure consensus serving the general interest. Since 2020, the EESC has focused on key gender equality issues, such as promoting pay transparency, women’s entrepreneurship, women’s participation in the labour market and the gender dimension of energy poverty. In its rules of procedure, the EESC commits to ensuring that all of its bodies comply with the principles of gender equality and non-discrimination.

The European Committee of the Regions is an advisory body to the Council, the European Commission and the European Parliament. It is composed of locally and regionally elected representatives from the 27 Member States. One of its initiatives, the for more women in politics initiative, aims to improve gender balance in politics, especially at the local and regional levels.

In addition to contact through the institutionalised advisory bodies of the EU, the European Commission interacts with civil society through less formalised direct contact with interested parties.

The European Women’s Lobby (EWL) is the largest umbrella organisation of women’s associations in the EU, working to promote women’s rights and equality between women and men. It aims to introduce a feminist dimension into the EU political agenda and maintain gender equality and women’s rights as top priorities. The EWL’s work focuses on seven key areas:

• the continuum of violence against women and girls,
• sexual and reproductive health and rights,
• women’s rights online,
• feminist transformation of economic and social policies,
• gender mainstreaming,
• women in decision-making,
• international processes.

The EWL’s membership extends to organisations in 26 Member States, 4 candidate countries, Iceland, Norway and the United Kingdom, along with 17 European bodies, representing a total of more than 2 000 organisations. The EWL was founded in 1990 with 12 national members’ organisations, and it has become one of the oldest and best established European-level civil-society organisations.

Women Against Violence Europe (WAVE) is a non-profit, non-governmental feminist network organisation working to protect women and children from violence and prevent this violence from occurring. WAVE is the largest European network of women’s specialist services, representing more than 1 600 women’s organisations through over 180 members based in 46 European countries. Founded in 1994, WAVE is the only network that dedicates its work solely to the prevention and combating of violence against women and girls.

WAVE’s central office is located in Vienna, coordinating the network’s operations, advocacy, research and capacity building, and supporting collaboration among its members and external partners.