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Topic Discussion III
Participation in
Democratic Decision-Making:
The Vital Voices of Women, Civil Society and
Pluralism
Room 3
(8 of 16 pages)
For example, we find in emerging democracies that recent experiences have not
only dealt with human rights for women but also a selection of leaderships and alongside these we should devote
particular attention to developing the conditions of women stemming from the existing predominant culture. In the
case of Guatemala and other Latin American countries, with large indigenous populations, we should take these matters
into consideration and devote particular attention to them. When we hear representatives such as the representative
of Mali speaking of the large percentages and we spoke of proportional representation of women, this is a mechanism.
If these countries truly practiced democracy there would be no need to determine such quotas for the representation
of women, for what we would have would be the representation of various sectors. But these are legal mechanisms
that aim at assisting these peoples to move along the path of democracy and they allow these peoples the mechanisms
to establish participation and awaken consciousness in all sectors. As this relates to women, we have a major challenge,
a very important challenge, which is to establish and build the identity of women. If we determine legal and practical
standards for political performance and behavior we also have to define the political identify of women in order
to assist them in providing true political participation.
Hon. Gonchigdorj: My name is Gonchigdorj from Mongolia. I am Chairman of the Mongolian Parliament and I
am here with my colleague [Inaudible] who distributed his ideas 'Managing between transitional economic and political
reforms in emerging democracies', especially involving the NGOs participation, also an English translation of our
law on NGOs, so it will be some information from our side. So I would like to share with you the six issues which
have been noted by Margareta.
To look at institutional channels, which should be exercised. In my country there is a channel in two sides, one
from the citizen to the government, government officials and also from the government to the citizen. This is an
implementation of human rights for a petition to the government and so any petition should be answered, also by
law in a limited time. It must be between two weeks; in some cases between one month, that the petition must have,
by law, an answer to the citizen. This law on NGOs gives legal foundation for the existence of such institutional
channels and legal guarantee for these two sides. Also in institutional reforms, which can help improve public
access and support for the policy-making process. Most importantly institutional reform is recognized by law for
NGOs, which should be two kinds of NGOs, public benefit, NGOs, and [Inaudible] NGOs. By law there are some special
NGOs: for women, for handicapped people and [Inaudible], for which there must be some necessary support from the
government. Some others will have their own.
In general, how do they give support? Government locates some funds and loans from the state budget to support
NGOs activities in order to implement their own projects and programs, as well as many types of concession are
guaranteed, including tax exemption of the income from membership fees, donor contributions, income generated from
business activities related to the implementation of the charter mission. So it is clearly important in this stage.
What about the balance between civil liberties and public order? For those countries, as emerging democracies,
which are in transition from totalitarian or similar kind of regime, this public order should be second. Civil
liberties must be first in line. Otherwise, in the name of public order, there could be very strong limitations
for the exercise of civil liberties. That's by law and by constitution as one important human rigjht. In the exercise
of rights, civil liberty must be guaranteed by law. Public order must be given some help from the government side
to implement their own missions for NGOs, for civil organizations. It is very important and that is why this guarantee
is given by constitution and by laws. In the first stage it was very difficult, but now it has become very normal
and now this balance has become a normal tradition.
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