United Nations

The first legally binding international document prohibiting discrimination against women and requiring governments to take steps in favour of equality for women and men is the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Since coming into force in 1981, CEDAW has comprehensively addressed the fundamental rights of women in politics, health care, education, law, property, marriage and family relations. Since 2000, individual women or groups of women are eligible to file complaints of rights violations with the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women.

Council of Europe 

The European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention) is Europe’s core human rights treaty: Article 1 of the Convention guarantees the rights and freedoms it includes to everyone in the jurisdiction of the 46 member states of the Council of Europe. The principle of non-discrimination on the basis of sex is guaranteed by both Article 14 and Protocol 12 to the Convention. In addition, the European Social Charter establishes enjoyment of economic and social rights without discrimination. The “Istanbul Convention” has a strong focus on women and girls in as far as they experience gender-based violence, such as stalking, sexual harassment, sexual violence, domestic violence, forced sterilisation and forced abortion. The Convention contains a range of measures to prevent gender-based violence against girls, aiming to protect girls against such violence and prosecute the perpetrators.

The Committee of Ministers adopted several recommendations in this field: 

• Recommendation on Gender Mainstreaming in Education (CM/Rec(2007)13) puts forward a set of comprehensive measures which the member states need to put in place to ensure effective gender mainstreaming in education.
• Recommendation on Gender Equality and Media (CM/Rec(2013)1) provides specific guidelines and suggests action to ensure gender equality and to combat gender stereotyping. 
• Recommendation on Preventing and Combating Sexism (CM/Rec(2019)1) contains the first-ever internationally agreed definition of sexism, and proposes a set of concrete measures to combat this widespread phenomenon, including the use of legislation and policies and awareness raising initiatives. The Recommendation proposes specific tools and measures to prevent and combat sexism and sexist behaviour in the areas of language and communications, the Internet and social media, media and advertising.

More information on the work for gender equality can be found here
 

Gender Matters is a Council of Europe manual on gender-based violence affecting young people. The manual is addressed to youth workers and educators and provides information about gender-based violence and related social, political and legal issues. It provides very practical methods and resources for education and awareness-raising activities with young people based on non-formal education.