On 8 March 2025, join us to celebrate International Women's Day under the theme, "For ALL Women and Girls: Rights. Equality. Empowerment."
This year's theme calls for action that can unlock equal rights, power and opportunities for all and a feminist future where no one is left behind. Central to this vision is empowering the next generation-youth, particularly young women and adolescent girls-as catalysts for lasting change.
The year 2025 is a pivotal moment in the global pursuit of gender equality and women's empowerment, as it marks the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. Adopted at the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 in Beijing, China, by 189 governments, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action remains the most progressive and widely endorsed blueprint for women's and girls' rights worldwide. The Platform guides policies, programmes and investment that impact critical areas of our lives, such as: education, health, peace, media, political participation, economic empowerment, and the elimination of violence against women and girls. Addressing these issues, along with emerging priorities around climate justice and the power of digital technologies, is urgent, with just five years left to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
The 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action also comes amid growing insecurity and compounding crises, diminishing trust in democracy and shrinking civic space. Last year alone, 612 million women and girls lived amidst the brutal realities of armed conflict, a disturbing 50 percent increase in just a decade.
Under the banner of UN Women's global campaign to mark the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, "For ALL Women and Girls", this year's International Women's Day is a rallying cry to take action in three key areas:
- Advance women's and girls' rights: Fight relentlessly for women's and girls' full range of human rights, challenging all forms of violence, discrimination, and exploitation.
- Promote gender equality: Address systemic barriers, dismantle patriarchy, transform entrenched inequities, and elevate the voices of marginalized women and girls, including young people, to ensure inclusivity and empowerment.
- Foster empowerment: Redefine power structures by ensuring inclusive access to education, employment, leadership, and decision-making spaces. Prioritize opportunities for young women and girls to lead and innovate.
Engage media, corporate leaders, governments, community leaders, civil society and youth, and others with influence to take action in your communities. Ask leaders to take action and invest in promoting women's rights and gender equality. Share International Women's Day stories and messages on digital platforms to spark dialogue and inspire action.
Together, we can be the generation to close the gap to achieve gender equality.
The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action transformed the women's rights agenda.
- Legal Protection:Before 1995, only 12 countries had legal sanctions against domestic violence. Today, there are 1,583 legislative measures in place across 193 countries, including 354 targeting domestic violence specifically. These laws represent a collective refusal to tolerate abuse and impunity.
- Access to services: The Beijing Platform for Action demanded essential services like shelters, legal aid, counseling, and healthcare for survivors of violence. These services have expanded globally, offering critical lifelines for countless women and girls.
- Youth engagement: The Beijing agenda inspired a new wave of young feminists who are now shaping movements for gender justice, leveraging digital platforms, and driving activism for equality.
- Changing social norms: The agreement adopted at the Fourth World Conference on Women agenda ignited women's rights movements worldwide, challenging harmful stereotypes, ideas and practices, and paving the way for gender equal policies, laws, and institutions.
- Women's participation in peace: The Beijing Platform for Action emphasized the need to increase women's full and equal participation at all levels of conflict resolution and prevention, including at decision-making levels. Today, there are 112 countries with National Action Plans on women, peace and security - a significant increase from only 19 in 2010. These National Action Plans have been key in facilitating women's participation in peacebuilding and post-conflict recovery, enabling their access to decision-making positions, and paving the way for new laws to address sexual violence in conflict.
Despite significant progress for women's rights since the adoption of the Beijing Platform for Action in 1995, the world is experiencing new and overlapping crises and the erosion of rights. This International Women's Day, join UN Women to march forward for women's rights. The world cannot afford a step back.
