Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Women in Guatemala
One of the goals of the 1996 Peace Accords was to improve women's rights in Guatemala.
By 2003 the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights had to report that laws discrim-
inating against women had yet to be repealed. Women got the vote and the right to stand
for election in 1946, but in 2013 only 13% of congressional deputies were women. Wo-
men's leaders repeatedly criticize Guatemala's
machista
culture, which believes a woman's
place is in the home. The situation is, if anything, worse for indigenous women in rural
areas, who also have to live with most of the country's direst poverty.
The international organization Human Rights Watch reported in 2002 that women work-
ing in private households were persistently discriminated against. Domestic workers, many
of whom are from Maya communities, lack certain basic rights, including the rights to be
paid the minimum wage and to work an eight-hour day and a 48-hour week. Many domest-
ic workers begin working as young adolescents, but Guatemalan labor laws do not provide
adequate protection for domestic workers under the age of 18.
Probably of greatest concern are the reports of escalating violence against women, ac-
companied by a steadily rising murder rate. These victims were once brushed off as being
'just' gang members or prostitutes, but it is now clear that murder, rape and kidnapping of
women is a serious issue. The international community has begun to put pressure on
Guatemala to act, but the realities of
machista
society mean that crimes against women are
seldom investigated and rarely solved.
For information on Guatemalan women's organizations (and much, much more) visit
