Gender-mainstreaming the EU Accession

Programs

The Kosovo Women’s Network (KWN) mission is to support, protect and promote the rights and interests of women and girls throughout Kosovo, regardless of their political and religious beliefs, age, level of education, sexual orientation and abilities. KWN has a vision of a Kosovo in which women and men are equal and have equal opportunities for education, employment, political participation, health care and a life without violence. KWN’s Strategy includes four program areas, described below. KWN implements its Strategy in close cooperation with its 140 member organisations and partners.

Gender-mainstreaming the EU Accession

Women in Politics and Decision-making
Gender-responsive Budgeting
Right to Health

The Problem

Kosovo’s EU Accession Process lacks sufficient women participation. While the Government and EU Office in Kosovo are willing to increase women’s involvement, only a few women’s CSOs have actively contributed to commenting on draft laws and policies related to the Accession Process. Consultations on IPA (Instrument for Pre-Accession) program planning have been limited, except were KWN was directly involved in supporting the EU. This not only hinders women’s understanding of the process but could also result in their needs being overlooked in related reforms The EU Gender Action Plan (GAP) III – through which the EU commits to promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment in external action – can serve as an important document for further integrating attention to gender equality as part of the EU Accession process. However, its implementation remains limited in this regard.

KWN’s Strategy

Improving implementation of the EU GAP III and a gender perspective in the EU Accession process, realized through:

Further increasing the awareness and capacities of EU officials on how to implement GAP III, especially by including, as well as financially and politically supporting diverse women’s rights CSOs;
Improving inclusion of a gender perspective in documents related to Kosovo’s EU Accession and their implementation;
Improving the knowledge and capacities of EU officials, National Gender Equality Mechanisms (NGEMs), and line ministries regarding integration of a gender perspective in documents related to EU Accession and to the importance of including CSOs in the EU Accession process;
Improving and increasing the participation of CSOs in the EU Accession process.

Main Activities

Continue providing training, mentoring, and information resources for the EU and EU member states, towards implementing GAP III. This includes regular monitoring of the implementation of GAP III and advocating that recommendations resulting from monitoring are implemented;
Regularly review relevant EU Accession documents from a gender perspective, send recommendations to officials, and advocate for their implementation.
Based on request, continue providing training and mentoring to key actors on how to include a gender perspective in documents related to Kosovo’s EU Accession.
Inform women about the EU Accession process and how they can be involved, through meetings, social media posts, and articles in KWN’s e-newsletter.
Where relevant, invite CSOs to be involved in specific processes and mentor them.
Inform key actors about the vital role of CSOs in the EU Accession process and encourage their greater involvement, through meetings, advocacy, and consultative structures like the SAA.

Our Achievements

Successfully advocated for the European Commission (EC) to incorporate 43% of KWN and its members’ gender-focused recommendations in the EC Kosovo 2024 Report, and as much as 70% in the 2023 Report, across multiple chapters; the Report finally treats gender-based violence as a rule of law issue.
Published a Gender review of the EU Growth Plan.