Target 5.c: Policies and laws for gender equality
Adopt and strengthen sound policies and enforceable legislation for the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls at all levels
Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
Why shareholder democracy is helpful
Adopting and enforcing gender-equality laws is a legislative task. Business lobbying, however, is a documented obstacle, and that is a corporate-political-influence lever owners can address. BusinessEurope and allied employer groups have pushed to scrap the 7 June 2026 transposition deadline and weaken the EU Pay Transparency Directive. Maine's state and regional chambers of commerce and HospitalityMaine opposed the state's 2023 paid family leave bill. Investors filed nine 2023 proposals on political donations misaligned with reproductive access at companies such as AT&T, Coca-Cola and Disney. Shareholders have thus used lobbying and political-spending resolutions to confront corporate opposition to gender-equality policy. Legislatures decide, so owners help at the margin.
How this was scoredHelpful
Helpful. Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
- Deregulation Demands Threaten the EU's Best Chance to Close the Gender Pay Gap, Social Europe, 2026-04-15
- Business groups come out against paid family leave proposal, Portland Press Herald, 2023-05-23
- Shareholders File Numerous Proposals Addressing Access to Reproductive Health Care for 2023 Proxy Ballots, Rhia Ventures, 2023-01-24
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is UN Sustainable Development Goals's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.