Participation as Human Rights: The United Arab Emirates, Australia, and the United Kingdom - Thesis Example

A point of concern has been the United Arab Emirates where there have been recognitions that citizen engagement in federal policy development is a human right, especially for women’s participation in policy framework and development. In light with United States Resolution 1325 that have advocated for women and citizen participation in policy frameworks, UAE has adopted different measures, seen as an approach to recognize human rights, to attain citizen inclusivity across social, economic, and political realms of the state as well as encouraging its citizens to broaden women’s participation.

Taking the case of Vicente and Novo (2014), this was an indication that the government was realizing that indeed, citizen participation and for this matter, women were human right and refused to marginalize women in society in all roles that complied with Sharia. These decisions were reached after deliberations with clerics (ulema).Recent data from United Nations Development Programme’s Gender-Related Development Index for 2015/2016 the UAE is ranked 40th among 177 countries and 20th in the world on the Gender Empowerment Measure when it comes to women participation in policy frameworks and decision making (Kayman 2017).

This is evidence that UAE is not only recognizing citizen engagement as a human right approach but it does so by ensuring that women are given equal rights to shape public policy. The public policy is not only made by politicians but by thousands of UAE women of public servants and tens of thousands of others at home through different forums including the government’s eGovernment portal (Spiro 2014).From this position, UAE is in a situation where they recognize that citizens have rights and among these rights include the right to participate in making the decisions that affect the public welfare.

When it comes to civic engagement and participation, citizens are referred to as the drivers of change. To mean that citizens are responsible for the democratic change and also it is an effective way to empower citizens (Wills 2016).