THE IMPORTANCE OF WOMEN IN TODAY'S SOCIETY

 

By Lynda Ekoue

 

The situation of women in contemporary society is the culmination of a long-term evolution that began as a struggle for rights that would match those of men. The state of affairs on specific continents, for example, in Europe, shows us that this struggle has had positive effects, and other continents like the African continent are following suit. According to some demographers on 7.4 billion people worldwide in 2016, there are 3.6 billion women. Usually, there are about the same number of women as men on the planet. However, there is part of the world with a little more women,  and there are other parts of the world were male births are slightly higher. Europe is the region of the world where the proportion of women is higher because of the ageing of the population.

 

As noted in the early 1990s the Nobel Prize for economics Amartya Sen is missing more than 100 million women and girls,  and this is because millions of baby and fetus of women disappear every year.

 

Formerly in traditional societies and especially in rural areas, the role of women is reduced to their ability to give birth, take care of the household and ensure that there is food for men when they return. Women are essential because they participate in the cultivation of the fields and ensure the continuity of the lineage. In France, for example, women are complementary to men because,  in times of world war II, they have ensured the succession of men gone to the front. It was then that the idea of gender equality between men and women was born.

 

Nowadays all young women have the idea that it is possible, as the man to reconcile at the same time the family life with professional life. The women thank to their insertion more and more increased in the family entity despite a sexist education, are predisposed to associative life (association of women for such things and others, tontines ...) that protect them by allowing them to have an independent life. Nowadays, other forms of association develop in the form of co-operatives, groupings, committees and will enable them to carry out income-generating activities, to follow training courses, and to have a good expression.

 

For example, in the Sahelian countries, women play a valuable role in desertification by being at the origin of several pioneering activities. Women are involved in many activities, but their efforts are always invisible, and as we know it. They are heroines of obscure.
 

The invisibility of women's work has been recognised and internationalised by the UN which initiated the decade of the woman which resulted in the multiplication of works and publications on the subject to lead to the concept of "gender and development.