Questions/Answers

Seodaemun-gu was first designated as a female-friendly city on November 21, 2012 and was redesignated in December 2017, striving to make a female-friendly city with the vision of "Let’s Make Seodaemun into a Female-Friendly City." (※ A female-friendly city is designated by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family of the central government through written and on-site examinations every five years, indicating "a city where men and women equally participate in processes of the city's policy-making and developments, prosperity and safety of women are ensured, and all residents feel happy.”) Seodaemun-gu has five objectives of policy including (1) building a foundation for promoting gender equality policies, (2) implementing economic and social equality for women, (3) making a safe, convenient city, (4) creating environments that coexist with local areas, and (5) strengthening women's competency in community activities--objectives that have been achieved by 95 projects under 11 initiative tasks. The 11 initiative tasks specifically refer to (1-1) settling gender mainstreaming systems within the initiative, (1-2) establishing and invigorating foundations for public-private partnership, (2-1) strengthening women's economic capabilities, (2-2) strengthening foundations for balance between work and child-rearing and socialization of care, (3-1) setting a community where women are safe from violence, (3-2) creating an urban environment where women are safe and comfortable, (4-1) setting a community with culture, (4-2) creating a family-friendly village, (4-3) administering women's health according to life cycle, (5-1) expanding women's participation in local governments and organizing pools of female talents, and (5-2) strengthening capabilities of women leaders and extending female-friendly environmental cultures. To realize a substantial female-friendly city reflecting local needs, we has focused on creating environments where women are safe, strengthening socialization of care, and consisting of female local experts and the resident group, making efforts to build a community of gender equality.

We have delivered safety projects for women and children to improve women's rights and prevent crimes against women being supported by counseling centers dealing with domestic and sexual violence, and constructing the community safety net. Socialization of care is essential to support employment and start-ups of women and to prevent discontinuance of women's careers. We have implemented gender-equal public services (such as expanding national and public daycare centers) and provided customized job training. Lastly, we make efforts to satisfy a variety of residents' demands by inducing the participation of local women in the initiative with a project of gender-equality funds.

Seodaemun-gu's initiative for a female-friendly city is linked to Gender Equality, the fifth goal of the Sustainable Development Goals (“SDGs”). The detailed objectives are set as (5.2) eliminating all forms of violence against women and girls both in public and private sectors, (5.4) providing policies of public services, infrastructure, and social protection, sharing responsibility for family, and appreciating values of domestic labor, and (5.5) making women participate in political, economic, and public areas and guaranteeing equal opportunities. We have supported childcare by operating the Seodaemun-gu Child Care Support Center to prevent discontinuance of women's careers. Also, we expanded national and public daycare centers and Kium Centers for after-school care for elementary school students. To support women's social participation and economic independence, we annually hold the Academy of Women's Employment and Start-ups to implement entrepreneurship education programs. We provide job training customized to the era of the fourth industrial revolution. Meanwhile, since there are a large number of single female households Seodaemun-gu, we have created safe environment by building safe streets applied of the crime prevention design in areas where single female households are concentrated. We also monitor restrooms in order to address the anxiety of women about illegal cameras.

Based on the 2016 Gender Equality Survey, women had a lower percentage of employment than men, and a higher rate of experience in career disruption. According to the 2018 National Gender-Equality Index, women's safety index was lower than that of the composite index, and 89.8% of victims of violent crimes were women (Source: the Korean Women's Development Institute). These indicate that we must establish a social infrastructure to support caring. Meanwhile, the crime prevention design through monitoring from women's aspect is vital for the safety of female households, ones that are statistically vulnerable to crimes.

Cooperating with local social welfare facilities, multicultural family support centers, and single-parent family welfare facilities, we have made efforts to help women from vulnerable families return to economic activities, women from multicultural, disabled, or single-parent families. We have focused on finding and providing jobs that are suitable for women. We have changed child-rearing, typically women's responsibility, into the responsibility of all the residents within our community. For instance, we have discussed and created spaces for cooperative childcare within apartment complexes to promote childcare sharing among the residents, while operating a "Fathers' School" in which fathers can participate in self-help groups. In addition, we have expanded caring area such as community tables for meals, an area led by the residents and public administrators not by public institutions alone, filling out the parts that are marginalized from public service. Lastly, we operate a resident group and a consultative group for a female-friendly city, consisting of resident groups with gender-sensitive perspectives. The groups consist of experts by field or local residents, who let the community know the values of gender equality and the significance of women activities through regular meetings and monitoring.

While establishing and implementing major projects, we have systematically analyzed and evaluated the characteristics of women and men and factors such as socio-economic gaps to realize gender equality in the initiative. We have improved the initiative by actively providing continuous bond of sympathy and education so that all the projects can be promoted from gender-equal perspectives. We have also reduced the emotional gap between men and women and enhanced sensitivity to gender and gender violence by providing opportunities in which gender violence against women is clarified and solutions are sought such as talkconcerts for reviewing safety from gender-equal perspectives.

The target of a female-friendly city is women, the socially weak. As a result of our striving to expand public services and infrastructure for women's caring, the Segye Times(newspaper) selected us Seodaemun-gu in 2018 as the best local government community. In its analysis of the big data of 250 Korean local governments' public caring (including daycare centers, after-school care, etc.), the average percentage of national and public daycare centers in South Korea was 5%, but that of Seodaemun-gu was 29.7%. Usually, national or public daycare centers are preferred because the former has lower fees and guaranteed quality of service. The analysis of the Segye Times may prove our efforts to provide the child-care service required by the residents in the quickest way in the country. Approximately 60 women per year complete our employment supporting training, which is provided to improve women's job skills and link them to actual employment. The average employment rate is over 60%. In particular, all the graduates who finished the 3D Makers Instructor Course have been employed every year since 2018. In addition, we have strengthened housing safety and investigating safety needs in areas where single female households are concentrated.

We were designated as a first-stage female-friendly city in 2012 (2013-2017) and conducted the first mid-to-long-term plan research service for women's policies in 2013 (2014-2018). We were then designated as a second-stage female-friendly city in 2017 (2018-2022) and conducted the second mid-to-long-term plan research service for women's policies in 2018 (2019-2023). We have selected projects for promoting a female-friendly city every year based on the five initiative goals, establishing and implementing all-out plans. Meanwhile, we have reflected on the policies for women presented by the consultative group for a female-friendly city and the monitoring of the resident group, promoting various projects from female-friendly perspectives. Since designated as a female-friendly city in 2012, we established the consultative group for a female-friendly city in 2012 and the resident group for a female-friendly city in 2014. In 2014, we implemented projects such as safe return service on village buses and woman safety packages, finding blind spots of women safety and preventing crimes in vulnerable areas. After being redesignated as a female-friendly city in 2017, we established a female-friendly theme street, our specialized project, trained resident guides, and implemented the “Street of Women’s Memory" tour in 2019. In early July of every year, we host the Gender Equality Week, an event that is held in local attractions such as Ansan and Yonsei-ro and participated by women of the consultative group for a female-friendly city, councils of women, and local social security consultative groups. This event has been an opportunity in which the public and public, including residents, social welfare facilities, and public institutions, share the project to promote female-friendly city developments and think about where and how to proceed in the future.

Public policies are comprehensive targeting all the residents. Policies for women are targeted for women, but many of them are not woman-only policies. Childcare programs to prevent career disruption of women are projects for both infants and parents. Projects to create a safe environment for women are also to create where all the residents are safe. Some residents are hesitant to participate in such projects of which targets are restricted to women. We present the academy of a female-friendly city and its promotion at the same time, in order to change the existing awareness and to encourage the residents' participation.

We have been providing differentiated childcare service. when identifying a recent trend of skin diseases occurring in children, we constructed an eco-friendly, atopy-specific daycare center in 2019. The center operates atopy care programs and provides alternative meals for children with food allergies and counseling services with specialists. In addition, we have created contents such as the Happy Daddy Festival and the Kids Clean Plus Project, which has been extended to all the other districts in Seoul, content that enables us to win the best gu in the evaluation of “Women and Childcare Policy Projects" of Seoul for eight consecutive years.

In Seodaemun-gu, there is a famous landmark called Ansan Jarak-gil, a road that was built in consideration of weak pedestrians. We made a female-friendly theme street in the Jarak-gil to show the life stories of female independent activists and began the “Street of Women’s Memory" tour with resident guides. The tour was inspired by the Haenggung Tour project, in which tourists walk together and listen to an explanation on Namhansanseong Fortress, a World Heritage located. The tour was promoted as a public-private cooperative work from the beginning, and we continue to enhance its quality by creating stories and providing online tours.

With the expansion of contact-free job markets due to the spread of COVID-19, we conducted the Korean version of digital New-Deal AI job interview training customized for women residents who wanted to be employed. It was a system in which the facial expressions, pronunciation, and gaze of the applicants were analyzed on the basis of big data and the AI evaluated the applicants via in-depth structured questions and brain science games. The satisfaction of the applicants was high, or 85.7%; we are planning to expand the training to be an education program customized to the era of COVID-19.

The female-friendly theme road, or “Street of Women’s Memory," was established as a specialized program for a female-friendly city in 2017. We have set up storyboards on the street. The storyboards display female independent activists, female human rights activists, female writers, and OX quizzes about women. It is a project that reminded us of the roles of women in male-centered history. The project was benchmarked in Eunpyeong-gu, Seoul. Eunpyeong-gu made the "Street of Gungnyeo" in the Bukhansan Dulle-gil Trail ※ Gung-nyeo is a female official in charge of food, clothing, and shelter of kings in the Joseon Dynasty. The "Kids Clean Plus Project" since 2017 is the nation's first project to recruit women dealing with career disruption as specialists in environmental management and dispatch them to daycare centers. This project provided stable jobs for 53 women, reduced tasks of nursing teachers, and created safe caring environments. The triple performances enabled the project to be selected as a superior model in 2018 after it won the Creativity Award by Seoul and the Award of the Minister of Welfare in the Korea Local Governments Fair hosted by the central government. This project was eventually accepted by all the 25 districts (gu) in Seoul.

Non applicable.

The initiative has been promoted by relevant divisions related institutions, and local residents in terms of women's jobs, caring, and safety. The 26 divisions of Seodaemun-gu Office have been conducting 95 projects. Funding for each project is a mix of expenditures from the central government and the gu. The consultative group for a female-friendly city, currently in its 5th term, consists of 22 experts in gender equality, job, caring, and local residents to suggest, advise on, and perform the initiative. The resident group for a female-friendly city, currently in its 4th term, consists of 22 local women residents.

We are able to continue the female-friendly initiative because we annually conduct gender-sensitive training for all employees to apply gender-sensitive perspectives to planning and implementing the initiative and gender impact assessments on major projects and projects on budget for annual expenditure to build foundations on which gender equality policies can be promoted.

Yes

The internal evaluation was conducted by the Women's Family division, which manages policies of a female-friendly city, providing an analysis of performances from five domains. The external evaluation was conducted on 86 cities designated as female-friendly cities nationwide by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family (of the central government), providing a qualitative analysis of the female-friendly cities that established gender-equal communities and contributed to the improvement of the quality of life of local residents. We Seodaemun-gu won the Prime Minister Award of the Female-Friendly City Government Award. The evaluation was qualitative, consisting of document review and on-site verification.

The internal evaluation was conducted on the five individual projects as the five performance indicators. 1) Gender equality policies: participation rate of female members, gender equality funding, gender-sensitive education, and gender impact assessment 2) Childcare: building infrastructure 3) Women's safety: installation of safe facilities, monitoring illegal cameras, making safe mirror streets 4) Women’s jobs: education, job placement, job creation 5) Female-friendly cultures: operation of the Academy, suggestion and share of policies The external evaluation was qualitative, analyzing local governments that act as models by faithfully implementing projects to achieve the goal of creating a female-friendly city.

Seodaemun-gu has promoted a variety of projects with the vision of "Let’s Make Seodaemun into a Female-Friendly City," its performances appreciated externally. For the safe return of women, we have run the Women's Safe Return Scout, and have strived to attach mirror sheets to the entrance doors, install “dead end” signs and emergency bell signs, perform special painting to power poles, and install "solar signs" that glow at night, in the area of ​​one-room houses in Yeonhui-dong. We held talk concerts against gender violence and checked whether illegal cameras were instilled in public restrooms with women's security guards and the resident group for a female-friendly city. We created a female-friendly theme street in the Jarak-gil to show the life stories of female independent activists. We have strived to support the balance between work and child-rearing by building the Child Care Support Center to systemize caring support services, creating spaces for cooperative childcare and Kium Centers to strengthen after-school care for elementary school students, and establishing the 3D Makers Instructor Course for women dealing with career disruption. We will continue to promote a culture of female-friendly education with which we can support women's jobs and strengthen capabilities of women's activities.

We are promoting the female-friendly city policies based on Article 8 of the Framework Act on Gender Equality (establishment of annual enforcement plan) and Article 3 of the Enforcement Decree of the same Act. In other words, we have strived to realize gender equality policies by creating tasks reflecting the policies of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family of the central government (the 1st Gender Equality Basic Plan 2015~2017 and the 2nd Gender Equality Basic Plan 2018~2022) and by reflecting gender-sensitive perspectives in the general administration of the gu. The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, since 2009, has designated local governments as female-friendly cities when they focused on policies of women's job, caring, and safety to improve the quality of life of women and the other residents. The Ministry have redesignated the cities every five years through examinations by stage. We Seodaemun-gu is currently a second-stage city that was designated in 2012 and redesignated in 2017. We have undergone an annual inspection on implementing projects for establishing a female-friendly city, reflecting the results in our projects to be improved.

The consultative group and the resident group for a female-friendly city are our private partners that share and promote the initiative. The former consists of experts and local women, who can integrate gender-sensitive perspectives, participating in planning, realizing, and evaluating policies for a female-friendly city. The group held the academy of female-friendly cities, forums, and talk concerts with annual subjects, contributing to expanding a culture of female-friendly education. The resident group presents improvements by on-site monitoring in terms of women's safety and urban spaces, contributing to women's safety by monitoring safety facilities and illegal cameras in public restrooms, which are most feared by women. We are performing projects to collect ideas from local communities, organizations, and corporations in order to establish a female-friendly city and to identify the direction of gu administration. They can participate in our policies by creating and suggesting projects to enhance gender equality, expand women's participation in society, and protect and improve women's human rights. In addition, we have a system of public officials, local experts, and residents to escalate governance; the system has been run approximately 40 times a year to create policies for female-friendly cities and perform policy monitoring.

A female-friendly city is not just for women. A female-friendly city is where women and men are equal, women and children are safe, and children, the elderly, and the disabled are cared for without any inconvenience and loneliness. Seodaemun-gu’s female-friendly city is a community where “all the residents” feel happy within the harmony of the economic activities of women. Since our designation as a female-friendly city in 2012, we have made steady and persistent efforts to realize detailed projects so that women should be encouraged to participate in local policies and developments and all the residents share the benefits equally. Reflecting on women's perspectives and experiences in our administration, we have strived to implement female-friendly Seodaemun, where both women and all the other residents can feel happy. In addition, we have made efforts to grow out of performing central government-oriented policies to move toward implementing resident-participating administration. It is the task of a local government to understand its local needs, accept opinions, and develop together. We, Seodaemun-gu, will continue to develop cooperative projects between divisions to be redesignated as the third female-friendly city, communicating with local female residents and improving women's jobs, safety, and caring with gender-sensitive perspectives.