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“НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЧЕРВЕНЬ 2010 17 and thos e in the diplomatic community. In addition to social gatherings, cultural programs, and travel, the club members engage in major fund raising for a Ukrainian charity. The small Ukrainian contingent at the working session of the UN to prepare for the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in July, 1995, was learning the ropes to assert the existence of the Ukrainian organizations. 46 Non - governmental organizations in Ukraine now play a more visible role on the overall NGO forum at the United Nations than previously. By early 1997 , a Gender Center was set up in Kyiv to work with the UN and with the Ministry for the Issues of Family and Children. The United Nations Development Fund, with the aid of the British Council, supported the publication of a brochu re on the whole issue of gender as an aid for “ workers in the media and organizers of courses on gender issues.” 47 The Center for the Study of Gender will help acquaint civil servants in the new gender relations. It is supported by the UN, headed by Larysa Koby lian - ska, and it is to promote awareness of gender issues as well as gender equality. Their first project is to prepare a critique of the new constitution of Ukraine from the standpoint of gender relations. In the document on the activities the gover nment should embark on to better the position of women, still in draft form, the following sentences sum up the situation: “ . . . although in its legislation Ukraine fully measures up to the statutes of the Convention against the discrimination of women - th ere is a clear discrepancy between the legislation on gender equal - ity and the reality in practice. So far, Ukraine still lacks a state mechanism to ensure the enactment of the laws relating the welfare of families, mother hood and children, and to ensure the rights of women.” Cultural patterns are changing slowly, but the government has begun to use a language that suggests a more nuanced understanding the needs of women. Such concepts as feminization of poverty, double burden, violence against women, the need to develop legal outreach programs for women , and stress on the enactment of laws, offer further proof of the changed conditions. The government of Ukraine is working on a statement on women that even takes into consideration the need to actively prom ote the overcoming of sexual stereotypes through the media. Its practical program, with planned conferences, leadership workshops, special programs for women, and provisions for the keeping of current statistics on the employment and pro - motion of women is most commendable. The problem, as all agree, will be implementation. 48 The increased openness to the outside world, the grow - ing international community in Ukraine, especially in Kyiv, and more open travel, particularly study for students abroad, contribu te to the changed attitudes toward the whole issue. In terms of overall con - tentment of their life, the professional women are basically content with the way their lives are going; the workers are most uncomfortable with their lot. Women who do not pursue a higher education are most concerned to marry a good man, one who will be a good provider and who w ill care for the family. Next on their order of priorities is concern for health, domicile, and fear of losing their job s . There appears to be a growth in s hared household duties between wives and husbands, but the sharing is still slight. 49 Women are now aware of the discrepancy between the relatively high educational level of women — women constitute 61 percent of graduates of universities, higher, and middl e schools — and their absence in “ organs of power. ” 50 Both spe - cialists and women activists in general look toward societal reasons for the discrepancy, not toward drawbacks of women. The burdens of housework and child rearing, which were almost exclusively borne by women during the Soviet period, are now being decried. The dissolution of day care facilities that accompanies the decline of Soviet industrial enterprises and the growing dissatisfaction with communal childcare is working at cross purposes to wom en's involvement in the public sphere. Pressures of family life are cited as the single most salient factor in keeping women from participating more fully in political and public life. But dis - illusion ment in the efficacy of any political changes, and ina bility to see the direction in which the various political parties are headed are also important factors in preventing women from finding time to become politically active. Hence, the women activists within the government bureaucracy are encouraging progra ms that would raise the con - sciousness of women and encourage their fuller participation in public life. All the while, of course, they remain cognizant of the negative sexual balance: “F or each 1 , 000 men in Ukraine there are 1 , 154 women; in the cities the ratio is 1 , 000 to 1 , 137, in the villages it is higher — 1 , 192 women per 1 , 000 men. 51 There is some talk of pushing for affirmative action, but the leftists in the Supreme
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