For the purposes of this conference the terms “female empowerment,” “female risk factors,” and “evidence-based” are defined as follows:
- Female Empowerment is defined as control of a girl or woman over her health, safety, equitable opportunities, violence-free and stable life conditions; and access to opportunities for leadership, decision-making and problem solving within family and society.
- Risk Factors to Female Empowerment are beliefs, values and practices in society instilled or promoted through media, entertainment, political, social, educational, health, economic/business, legal and other systems which compromise the image, value, safety, health, and equal opportunity for girls and women, and may be considered as risk factors to female empowerment. Risk factors to the empowerment of girls and women may include, but are not limited to the practice of gender-inequality/stereotyping; sex-selective abortions; domestic violence; sex-trafficking; rape; sexual harassment; gender-based homicide; inferior treatment of orphan girls; inferior treatment of women who are single, poor, old, LGBT, refugee, ethnic minority, sex-worker; limited access to fair/paid employment; marginalization; normalization of violence against women in the media; limited opportunities for participation and leadership in politics, governance, sports, business, cultural and other arenas of society; lack of meaningful research, protective policies and effective policy implementation methods; lack of control over one’s health and welfare; and other examples of risk factors that are identified and discussed by conference participants.
- Evidence-based refers to any strategy/model/approach/program/policy that is derived from or informed by research and/or evaluation.