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What impact will AI have on gender equality?
At the current rate of progress toward gender equality, the World Economic Forum estimates it will take 131 years for women to attain parity in income, status, and leadership.
While technology is a powerful tool to help close the gender gap, it can also be weaponized. GZERO’s special presentation “Gender Equality in the Age of AI” featured candid conversations about the opportunities and threats that exist online, and how artificial intelligence will impact them.
Produced on the sidelines of the 68th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, the program featured leading experts from government, technology, and philanthropy. Moderator Penny Abeywardena, former NYC Commissioner for International Affairs, was joined by Jac sm Kee, co-founder of Numun Fund; Vickie Robinson, general manager of the Microsoft Airband Initiative; Michelle Milford Morse, the United Nations Foundation’s vice president for Girls and Women Strategy; and Lucia Ďuriš Nicholsonová, a member of the European Parliament from Slovakia.
“The beauty and the promise of digital technologies is the opening up of democratic and civic participation space,” said Jac sm Kee. “But what is happening right now is the direct closing down of these spaces through deliberate attacks.”
The discussion focused on three key areas: gender-based online violence, the need for greater digital inclusion and access, and increasing leadership roles for women in all aspects of public life.
In a recent study from UNESCO, 58% of women and girls surveyed globally said they had experienced online violence, defined as a range of abuses including harassment, stalking, and defamation. Female journalists and politicians experienced these threats in even higher numbers.
During GZERO’s program, European Union parliamentarian Lucia Ďuriš Nicholsonová shared incredibly disturbing messages she has received throughout her years in office, many including violent and profane language and graphic sexual threats.
“These words are real. The people who are writing these words are real,” Nicholsonová said. “We can erase them through algorithms online, but they will still exist. I think we really need to know what is out there because it's a real threat.”
Michelle Milford Morse of UN Foundation explained to the crowd gathered at the NYC event that these kinds of abuses have compounding impacts on victims. “More than half of young women are experiencing some form of abuse and harassment online, sometimes as young as eight,” she said. “I don't think that we're thinking enough about the accumulation of that over time and the real harm to their mental health.”
But technology, when used for good, is also a powerful tool that can help close the gender gap. Microsoft’s Vickie Robinson described the importance of connectivity and digital skills. Of the estimated 2.6 billion people worldwide who lack internet access, the majority are women and girls.
“It's critically important, now more than ever, we need to make sure that we close the digital divide once and for all, but that we bring along with that the skills, we make it affordable, we make it accessible,” Robinson said.
The conversation then turned to leadership, and the need for more women in positions of authority in all industries and sectors of public life.
“Parliaments and legislators that have more women, they prioritize social services for children and the most vulnerable. When they engage in peace agreements, those peace agreements last longer. They're more likely to protect biodiversity,” said Morse. “There is no argument for half our human family to be shut out of society.”
The program was part of the Global Stage series and produced by GZERO in partnership with Microsoft and the United Nations Foundation. The series features politicians, private sector leaders, and renowned experts in conversation about issues at the intersection of technology, geopolitics and society.
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No internet, no education, says Vickie Robinson
The pandemic accelerated the shift to digital. But that left behind those offline, widening the digital access gap — with big implications for education.
Vickie Robinson, general manager of Microsoft's Airband Initiative, recalls how she dealt with school closing as a mother.
Having in-home connectivity helped her children transition from middle to high school with some sense of normalcy. But two-thirds of school-aged kids around the world didn't have that opportunity, she says during a Global Stage livestream conversation.
What's more, offline kids mostly come from marginalized backgrounds, which for Robinson makes the case for closing the digital access gap even more urgent.
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How to get students back on track after the Great Education Disruption
As the 77th UN General Assembly gets underway, much of the attention will go toward how to breathe new life into the Sustainable Development Goals. Why? Because the pandemic wiped out years of progress on meeting the 17 SDGs, especially No. 4: ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all.
COVID disrupted the lives of some 1.6 billion students around the world. Almost 150 million missed about half of in-person classes in 2020, and 24 million will never return to school.
So, how can we get education back on track before it's too late? Several experts weighed in during the Global Stage livestream conversation "Transforming Education" hosted by GZERO Media in partnership with Microsoft.
The data on the pandemic's crippling effect on education are not enough to get a real sense of the "picture of this time," said Leonardo Garnier, special adviser for the UN's Transforming Education Summit. Still, now we have an opportunity to invest in education like we've never done before — including in low-income countries where the government and businesses actually benefit from a cheap, uneducated labor force. Investing in education, Garnier added, is not only a moral imperative but a wise economic decision because it comes with big long-term payoffs like more educated women entering the workforce.
American Federation of Teachers Executive VP Evelyn DeJesus, for her part, explained how during the pandemic kids were walloped by multiple traumas, arguably the least of which was having to learn on Zoom. She believes it would have been a miracle if test scores hadn't dropped. While recognizing the failures of remote learning, DeJesus still thinks we need to spend big — no more belt-tightening — on broadband access for all, and resents how education has become a political football in America.
COVID's wrecking ball to education exacerbated divisions not only between but also within countries, which in the future will disrupt politics when people get angry from losing out on opportunities, said Eurasia Group Vice Chairman Gerald Butts. How can we stop this? With more global cooperation on education, which should be a "continuum" for everyone, everywhere.
Vickie Robinson, general manager of Microsoft's Airband Initiative to expand global broadband access, said that despite the disruptions caused by the abrupt switch to remote learning during the pandemic, we still need to invest in digital infrastructure because it might just happen again and we can't afford for our kids to lose any more school time. Who should do this? Robinson believes the responsibility for digital inclusion should be shared by governments and the private sector.
Finally, one silver lining from COVID on higher education is that for many workers it shifted the focus from going to the right school to having the right skills, noted Jonathan Rochelle, VP of Product Management, Learning Content & Instructor Experience at Linkedin. And it'll continue, since acquiring skills in lifelong learning must be "a moving target."
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Is global economic inequality getting worse?
Yes, said the majority of respondents in a recent GZERO poll.
What's happening in Ukraine has undone much of the momentum for narrowing the equality gap created during the pandemic, said Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group and GZERO Media, during a Global Stage livestream conversation hosted by GZERO in partnership with Microsoft. The event was held on site at the headquarters of the World Bank in Washington, DC , and was moderated by Jeanna Smialek, Federal Reserve reporter at The New York Times. The war has aggravated pre-existing problems like high inflation and supply chain disruptions. A cease-fire would help end all this, but don't count on it.
This week the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are holding their annual spring meetings. The conflict is top and center on the agenda, as is financial assistance to first help Ukraine keep the lights on and someday rebuild when the Russians leave.
"We're working on that," World Bank President David Malpass said upon joining the discussion just minutes after meeting Ukrainian officials. Beyond the conflict itself, Malpass is now more broadly concerned about the global economic slowdown and whether central banks have the tools for a soft landing after raising interest rates to fight inflation.
One country that's successfully stood up to the Russian threat is Lithuania, whose Finance Minister Gintarė Skaistė talked about her country's long-term energy independence strategy. Lithuania recently became the first EU member state to completely wean itself off Russian fossil fuels.
And what about the ripple effects from the conflict in other parts of the world, like food security? This is a big deal in countries in the Middle East and North Africa that rely heavily on Russian and Ukrainian wheat imports like Egypt.
Rania Al-Mashat, Egyptian minister for international cooperation, explained how her country diversified its food imports to soften the impact of such disruptions.
Later this year, Egypt is hosting the COP27 climate summit. But even more importantly, right before that meeting there will be a G20 summit in Indonesia — and Russia's invited.
What'll happen? Will the US and its allies walk out of rooms when the Russians show up? The G20 consensus has been fragmented, said Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati. Indeed it has, added Bremmer, who believes the war in Ukraine is "ripping up the fabric of geopolitics" for years to come.
Finally, Vickie Robinson, head of Microsoft's Airband Initiative to expand broadband access throughout the developing world, shared her perspective about how getting more people online will help achieve global equality.
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Want global equality? Get more people online
We think we live in a digital-first world — but there's no "digital" at all for 37% of the global population.
That's a big problem in today's economy, where you'll miss out on many opportunities for advancement if you're not connected. The digital divide is thus widening the equality gap.
Being offline "places an automatic limit on your ability to be productive and has major ramifications for our society," says Vickie Robinson, head of Microsoft's Airband Initiative to expand broadband access throughout the developing world.
Robinson believes major progress on connectivity is crucial in order to meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals by the 2030 deadline because getting people online can be a catalyst to achieve all the other SDGs.
"If we really want to tackle some of these big problems and meet these SDGs in a fundamental way ... getting our arms around digital access for all is a way that we can do it."
GZERO's Global Stage is nominated for a Webby Award! Vote for us
Learn more about Global Stage: https://www.gzeromedia.com/global-stage/
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Join us for our Global Stage event live from Washington DC
WATCH : Today at 3:30 pm ET, GZERO Media streamed from the World Bank headquarters in Washington, DC, to discuss "Financing the Future" as part of our Global Stage series.
Moderator Jeanna Smialek, Federal Reserve reporter at The New York Times, led the conversation with Eurasia Group and GZERO Media president Ian Bremmer, World Bank president David Malpass, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Minister of Finance, Republic of Indonesia, and Rania Al-Mashat, Minister of International Cooperation, Egypt. We also heard from Vickie Robinson, General Manager, Microsoft Airband Initiative, and Gintarė Skaistė, Minister of Finance, Lithuania.
GZERO Media's Webby Award-nominated Global Stage series is produced in partnership with Microsoft.
Live from Washington, DC: Financing the Future
Thursday, April 21
3:30 pm ET/12:30 pm PT
Sign up to get email alerts about this and other GZERO events.
Make internet affordable, but not free for all
Robinson weighed in during a Global Stage livestream conversation hosted by GZERO Media in partnership with Microsoft during the 76th UN General Assembly.
Learn more: Should internet be free for everyone? A Global Stage debate
Should internet be free for everyone? A Global Stage debate
Half of the world's population is currently offline, and COVID has further widened the digital gap. Providing more than three billion people with affordable, reliable internet access sounds like a no-brainer, but the devil is in the details. Who'll pay for it, how do we measure success, who should be on board, and what are the potential benefits?
Several experts weighed in during a Global Stage virtual conversation hosted by GZERO Media in partnership with Microsoft during the 76th UN General Assembly, moderated by the UN's Melissa Fleming.Don't miss our next event: LIVE on Wednesday Oct 13 11am ET/ 8 am PT:
Vickie Robinson, head of Microsoft's Airband Initiative to expand broadband access throughout the developing world, what's really important is for the internet to be accessible, not necessarily free. The problem, she explained, is that it costs money to build and maintain networks, so no costs for end users could have unintended consequences. Instead, Robinson would focus only on giving access to people who really need it and can't afford to be online.
Make Internet Affordable, but Not Free for All | Global Stage | GZERO Mediayoutu.be
Even developed countries have their own problems getting everyone online. Jessica Rosenworcel, acting chair of the US Federal Communications Commission, said that mapping the real state of America's broadband access is currently flawed because a single subscriber in a rural area doesn't mean everyone is online. Until the US comes up with a better way to show who actually has internet access and who doesn't, the problem will likely never be fixed.
We'll Never Fix America's Internet Without Measuring Access Properly, Says FCC Chair | Global Stageyoutu.be
Then there's another important question: whose responsibility should it be to bridge the "digital Grand Canyon" of exclusion, asthe UN refers to the digital divide? For the International Communications Union's Doreen Bogdan-Martin, the only way is to get all concerned parties — the UN, governments, international institutions, the private sector, and civil society — to work together.
How can we bridge the "digital Grand Canyon"? | Global Stage | GZERO Mediayoutu.be
If everyone who needs access to the internet gets it, the world's least-connected continent — Africa — could benefit tremendously. Eurasia Group's top Africa analyst Amaka Anku explained that getting all Africans online could spur economic growth by formalizing the informal sector, which is very large and hard to tax, as long as African governments help out by cutting red tape for investment.
Want Africa to Grow? Get People and Businesses Online: Africa Expert | Global Stage | GZERO Mediayoutu.be
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