Gender Equality Is The Goal, But How To Get There? Case Study Of South Africa And Australia Shows That Context Matters

(MENAFN- The Conversation) It will take an estimated 131 years for the world to achieve gender parity, defined as equal access, opportunities and outcomes for women and men across economic, political, educational and health dimensions. That's according to the World Economic Forum's Global Gender Gap Report 2023 .

Most of us alive today will never see it happen.

Gender parity matters because women make up more than half of the world's population, and excluding them from full participation has economic and social costs. Closing the gap is not only a matter of fairness. It's a condition for sustained growth, innovation and societal wellbeing.

The slow pace of progress raises a question about what more needs to be done. Are countries pursuing the right kind of policies? It's tempting to look for“best practices” and replicate them. But a closer look at how different nations approach gender equality shows there is no universal path.

Our research team of economists examined how different countries design gender equality policies. In our paper , we set out to compare South Africa and Australia to understand how context shapes approaches.

The two countries have very different histories, economies and institutions. Nevertheless, both aspire to gender equality.

We found that South Africa represents an equity-based approach, rooted in redress after apartheid. Australia has an equality-focused strategy that emphasises workplace reforms, reporting and institutional mechanisms. Equality can be defined as access to the same rights, freedoms, and opportunities for each citizens. Equity refers to providing social justice by assisting the most disadvantaged members of society. Equality implies treating all individuals similarly while equity involves differentiated treatment.

Our analysis shows why context matters more than copying models. What works in one place may not translate elsewhere. Importing Australia's corporate gender strategies into South Africa without tackling issues that matter most in the country would miss the core issue.

Similarly, Australia does not need South Africa's equity-based affirmative action framework in the same way. Instead, Australia aims to dismantle persistent gender inequalities in pay, workforce participation and leadership representation.

The better approach is to share lessons rather than adapt strategies. South Africa can learn from Australia's corporate and fiscal gender mainstreaming. Australia can take note of South Africa's insistence that equity requires actively putting things right when past discrimination lingers.

South Africa's equity-based path

South Africa's gender policies are deeply connected to its post-apartheid transformation. This sought to dismantle the structures of racial segregation and inequality.

Apartheid not only excluded the majority population from political, social and economic participation, it also compounded gender inequalities. Black women in particular faced a“double exclusion,” denied rights and opportunities both as Black citizens and as women.

After the first democratic elections in 1994 gender measures were therefore framed as part of the broader project of redress, seeking to dismantle these intersecting structures of racial and gender disadvantage.

With this history of exclusion and structural injustice, the country had to focus on equity and redress.

South Africa has prioritised laws and frameworks addressing gender-based violence and reproductive rights. It has also introduced employment equity legislation, gender-sensitive budgeting initiatives, and affirmative action measures to improve women's representation in the workplace and politics.

The approach recognises that simply treating everyone“equally” on paper is not enough in a society historically hurt by systemic discrimination.

Yet progress across these areas – from reproductive rights and workplace participation to tackling gender-based violence – has been uneven.

South Africa continues to face very high unemployment, deep income inequality and persistent workplace discrimination on both racial and gender grounds.

The Gender Social Norms Index (2023) found that 97.3% of South Africans hold at least one gender bias. For example, many respondents agreed with statements such as“men make better political leaders than women” or“men have more right to jobs when jobs are scarce”.

This is among the highest rates globally. It shows how policy targets often are not in synch with cultural and social norms.

Australia's equality-oriented path

Australia pursued a more institutional and corporate-focused route. Its stable liberal democracy and high-income economy provided the foundation for a series of workplace equality reforms. Beginning in the 1980s it introduced successive laws, including the Sex Discrimination Act and, later, the Workplace Gender Equality Act.

This focus stemmed from long-standing advocacy for women's workplace rights and recognition that gender gaps in pay and leadership positions persisted despite overall prosperity.

Such workplace reforms are not absent in South Africa. But in Australia they have been at the centre of the strategy, supported by strong corporate governance structures and economic stability.

Australia has also used fiscal tools. It reintroduced the Women's Budget Statement in 2013 after it was discontinued in the mid-1990s. It requires government budgets to assess how spending and tax measures affect women differently. This ensures that economic policy is evaluated through a gender lens.

A Women's Economic Equality Taskforce was also set up in 2022 to advise the government. This approach prioritises equality in participation and opportunity, ensuring women have the same access to jobs, pay and leadership roles.

The results show measurable progress. Australia improved its position in the Global Gender Gap Index , ranking 13th in 2025.

But challenges remain, particularly in narrowing the wage gap and achieving parity in leadership positions.

Cultural change has proven slower than institutional reform.

What the comparison shows

On paper, both countries are relatively high performers in terms of gender parity. In the Global Gender Gap Index 2025, South Africa ranked 33rd and Australia 13th out of 146 countries. Yet their policy emphases and challenges differ sharply.

Using indicators such as the Global Gender Gap Index, Gender Inequality Index, and employment-to-population ratios, our study shows that while both South Africa and Australia rank relatively high in global comparisons, their challenges diverge sharply.

In South Africa, women's labour force participation – defined as the share of women aged 15 and older who are either employed or actively seeking work – remains low at 35.4% in 2022 compared to 59.1% in Australia. By contrast, men's participation rates were 55.5% in South Africa and 69.5% in Australia.

This means the gap between men and women is much larger in South Africa.

Australia performs better on participation and pay gap reforms, but progress is slower in shifting underlying cultural attitudes.

Closing the gap

Our findings confirm that gender equality advances through different pathways, shaped by each country's social, historical and institutional context. And that no universal model can address such diverse realities.

Gender equality is not just about ticking boxes in international rankings. It is about recognising that different societies need different tools – and that tailored, evidence-based policies are our best hope to close the gap in less than 131 years.

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