Gender equality and inclusion as skills for future citizenship

We live in increasingly diverse societies. As the OECD stated in its 2021 report on promoting inclusive education in diverse societies, inequality and an increasing gap between rural and urban areas have led many citizens to take to the streets to voice their concerns and demands. Moreover, digitalisation has made it easier to disseminate inaccuracies and outright lies (cf. fake news), and there is growing concern about the algorithms and echo chambers that serve only to confirm the prior beliefs of individuals. 

The right to equality and anti-discrimination as stated in EU Law, and in the Members States' constitutional laws, has the power to reduce inequality gaps and intrinsically transform the way policies are made so that they better reflect and serve today's diverse societies.

Companies too recognise the need for more inclusive working environments. The focus on diversity and inequalities, and the need to build pathways towards a more inclusive landscape, both in workplaces and in the wider social and economic environment, is increasingly recognised as something of urgent concern.

Implementing an inclusive approach to research, policy, education and business is not only a matter of sensitivity, but also of knowledge.

Global socio-economic factors in conjunction with legislative initiatives have increasingly pushed work environments to become more inclusive. In 2021 the International Standards Organisation (ISO) issued a standard for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). This specified a set dimensions related to diversity and inclusion included in the SA8000 certification focusing on corporate social responsibility first issued in 1997.

In some countries, recent legislatives measures have introduced gender equality certification for companies. In Italy, for instance, the implementation of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) introduced a national "Gender Equality Certification System" that guides and incentivises companies to adopt policies designed to reduce the gender gap across all business areas. 

Increasingly, certification and compliance with standards are seen by companies as useful tools with respect to reputation with clients and gaining access to public procurements.

According to UN Women (2017), the United Nations agency for gender equality, gender-responsive procurement in the selection of services, goods and civil works can have a positive impact on gender equality and women's empowerment. While certification measures are sometimes perceived as merely formal commitments, there is evidence that organisations are increasingly interested in promoting change to become inclusive workplaces.

Both for organisations truly committed to the promotion of more inclusive work environments, as well as those more interested with formal compliance, the procedures which need to be in place to obtain certification necessarily activate data collection analysis of gender-related issues. Legislative push factors accordingly contribute to a shift from DEI competences being ‘nice to have’ to ones that provide crucial competitive knowledge.

From this perspective, DEI becomes a lifelong learning competence, which needs to be updated as society changes. Experience suggests that DEI competence needs to include the following: 

• the capacity to analyse from a DEI perspective the context, including the capacity to collect and analyse quantitative and qualitative DEI data starting from gender disaggregated data and trying to expand from there to include other dimensions of potential employment disadvantage; 

• knowledge of international standards and EU legislative framework on fundamental rights and anti-discrimination, or at least the basic references, to ensure that there is awareness of the fact that discrimination is not allowed in the EU or any member state; 

• knowledge of the theory of change. In order to promote institutional change from discriminatory to non-discriminatory working environments using methodologies and tools to produce inclusive GEPs; 

• knowledge of feminist and anti-discrimination history. A vast volume of research, case studies and action proposals have been produced over the last 60 years. Not learning lessons from this evidence base represents a waste of energy in the process of finding the best way to promote more inclusive environments for all; 

• advocacy and communication skills. A key part of the work of promoting change is providing arguments for DEI policies and practices to counter resistance to change); 

• capacity to build alliances and networking. In order to contrast the resistance to change of the groups benefitting from the status quo alliances should be created among groups facing exclusion and discrimination, trying to overcome the differences among them. 

Diversity equity and inclusion, as a combined competence, provides an asset for future workers and future citizens to be able to navigate an increasingly diverse world. It will be increasingly needed to support social justice and to help each, and everyone, build a world where a sense of belonging wins out against feelings of being excluded.

This text is an extract from Chapter 14 of Re-thinking Europe’s Skill Needs: Reflections following the European Year of Skills, published by Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini in 2024 as part of the activitites of the Horizon-Europe funded project SkillsPULSE: Skills - Predicting, Understanding, and Locating Shortages in Europe.