This statement was delivered by Hija Kamran, content coordinator for the APC Women’s Rights Programme (WRP), at a side event held during the 70th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW70), entitled “Empowering Women and Girls in the Digital Age – Action Toward WSIS 2035” and aimed at exploring how World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) partners can translate WSIS+20 gender commitments into concrete action by 2035.
I work at the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), which is a global network of civil society organisations working for digital justice. For more than three decades, APC has been working at the intersection of internet governance, digital rights and feminist movements, advocating for a digital society that is grounded in human rights and gender justice.
Gender justice has been central to APC’s work since the early days of global digital governance. In fact, APC played a role in shaping Section J: Women and the Media of the Beijing Platform for Action, which recognised the importance of women’s access to media and communication technologies and the role that communication systems play in shaping gender equality. That moment was important because it placed information and communications technology (ICT) rights firmly within the global gender equality agenda.
Building on that legacy, APC has worked consistently to ensure that gender equality is not treated as a peripheral issue in digital governance discussions, but as a core pillar of how the information society is designed and governed.
Since then, APC has played a key role in integrating a gender perspective into global internet governance processes, including the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), Internet Governance Forum (IGF) and Global Digital Compact (GDC).
Within the WSIS process, we have been actively involved in bringing civil society and Global South perspectives into conversations about the future of the internet and digital governance, alongside civil society coalitions like the Global Digital Justice Forum (GDJF), the Global Digital Rights Coalition for WSIS and the Gender in Digital Coalition (GiDC). As part of the WSIS+20 review, APC contributed analysis and advocacy calling for stronger commitments to digital inclusion, financing connectivity, accountability of political and corporate powers, and human rights protections within the evolving digital ecosystem.
Our assessment of the WSIS+20 outcome document recognised some important progress, but also highlighted continuing gaps, particularly around financing, open dialogue among stakeholders, and the need to ensure that commitments to gender equality translate into concrete action across all WSIS Action Lines.
We also delivered formal submissions and statements to the UN General Assembly WSIS+20 review process, emphasising that the future of the information society must be grounded in a human rights framework and must address persistent inequalities in access, participation and governance.
APC was also represented on the WSIS+20 Informal Multistakeholder Sounding Board and contributed to identify the topics of interest in the Global South, civil society priorities, and facilitate cross-stakeholder collaboration.
Alongside this advocacy, we have helped build the evidence base needed to inform policy. Through the 2024 special edition of the Global Information Society Watch report, we focused specifically on WSIS+20, examining how the next phase of the information society must prioritise dignity, equity and justice.
Our advocacy consistently emphasises that digital rights are women’s rights, and that digital governance must actively address the structural inequalities that shape women’s access and participation online.
One of the key lessons from this work is that closing the gender digital divide is not only about connectivity or technical skills. It requires addressing deeper systemic barriers, including economic inequality, discriminatory social norms, lack of public interest infrastructure, and insufficient accountability mechanisms for online harms like technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV).
Looking ahead to the WSIS 2035 process, there are several areas where we believe multistakeholder actors should focus their attention.
First, gender equality must be operationalised across all WSIS Action Lines, not simply referenced in high-level commitments. This means setting measurable targets and ensuring that policies and programmes actively support women’s access to technology, leadership in digital spaces, and participation in digital governance and digital economies.
Second, the future of WSIS must place stronger emphasis on rights-based governance of digital technologies, including protections against online gender-based violence and stronger accountability from technology companies for harms that occur on their platforms.
Another critical issue is the growing role of artificial intelligence and data governance in shaping digital futures. While these areas are increasingly central to global policy debates, gender perspectives are still insufficiently integrated into many of these discussions.
It is essential to protect and strengthen meaningful civil society participation in digital governance spaces. Many of the most transformative ideas around feminist internet principles, community-led connectivity, and gender-responsive digital policy have emerged from civil society networks and grassroots movements.
And finally, all the above are permeated by the urgent need to address financing for WSIS implementation. We urgently need financial ecosystems that support viable, innovative demand-driven initiatives – drawing on public, private and community-based sources.
APC continues to collaborate with partners to envision a gender-just digital future. And we believe that for any inclusive information society agenda to succeed, gender equality cannot be treated as an add-on to digital policy discussions. Rather, it must shape how we design infrastructure, govern technologies, allocate resources and build accountability mechanisms.
And APC remains committed to working alongside stakeholders to ensure that the next phase of the information society is one that works for everyone.