World Conference on Women: The Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action on Women and Health.

The article focuses on World Conference on Women. The Fourth World Conference on Women met in Beijing from 4 to 15 September 1995. The main results of the conference are embedded in two documents: the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action. The Platform for Action is a massive document, divided into six chapters and containing 361 paragraphs. The first three chapters provide a mission statement, present a global framework, and describe critical areas of concern. Chapters V and VI discuss institutional and financial arrangements needed for fulfilling the objectives of the Platform. The bulk of the document, Chapter IV, "Strategic Objectives and Actions, " sets out the program in detail. It is divided into 12 sections, addressing the following topics: women and poverty, education and training of women, women and health, violence against women, women and armed conflict and women and the economy. Passages in the Declaration and in the Platform that governments apparently considered less centrally "women's issues" attracted relatively little attention and elicited few clarifying statements at the conference.