The CEDAW and the State of Chile: old and new debts with the gender equality

This paper addresses the CEDAW as a public action program designed to eliminate discrimination against women and achieve formal and substantial equality between women and men. Clearly, it is ambitious and tests the sociocultural structures of the countries. In October 2012, the Chilean State presented to CEDAW Committee the fifth and sixth national report regarding its compliance with the Convention. The observations and recommendations of CEDAW Committee of Experts to the Chilean State which took into account a report of the Instituto Nacional de Derechos Humanos (National Human Rights Institute of Chile) and various shadow reports prepared by society organizations, show many old and new debts of Chile with CEDAW, and reveal a country marked by social inequities and gender discrimination with a democratic deficit in participation and representation, with conservative and authoritarian enclaves that do not recognize the objectives of the Convention.