Leave no girls behind – post-2015 and the empowerment of girls
Ellen Wratten - Deputy Director of Policy Division, Department for International Development (DFID)
Speakers
Tanya Barron - Chief Executive, Plan UK
Professor Grace Bantebya - School of Women and Gender Studies, Makerere University, Uganda
Lakshmi Sundaram - Global Coordinator, Girls Not Brides: The Global Partnership to End Child Marriage
Discussants
Caroline Harper - Head of Social Development Programme and Research Fellow, ODI
Jessica Woodroffe - Director, Gender and Development Network
Description
Despite this knowledge, however, girls remain mired in poverty and exclusion, and this especially includes those subject to the most intractable social norms – preference for sons and for girl’s early marriage and resulting pregnancy, discrimination against girls in education and in the home, and the normalisation of violence – all being some of the hardest norms to shift. Accordingly the status of girls and young women has become high profile in development agendas and in the mainstream press.
The post 2015 agenda currently speaks of leaving no-one behind. This public meeting asks how the post 2015 agenda can tackle social norms in order to ensure millions of girls are not left behind. Speakers at this public event will reflect on the challenges and opportunities in changing the lives of even the most excluded girl child.