What Rights Do Women Still Lack Around the World? Global Data & Examples
Women’s rights have advanced enormously over the past century. Girls’ access to education has expanded. Discriminatory laws have been repealed. Women lead countries, businesses, universities, and movements. Millions more women can own property, work, vote, and make decisions about their futures than in previous generations.
But equality under the law is still not universal—and equality in everyday life remains even further away.
The World Bank’s Women, Business and the Law 2026 assessment of 190 economies found that women globally enjoy only about 67% of the economic legal rights available to men under the areas it measures. Just 4% of women worldwide live in economies close to full legal economic equality, and none of the 190 economies studied provides complete equality of economic opportunity.
At the same time, United Nations data show continuing legal gaps involving violence, employment, marriage, inheritance, land ownership and bodily autonomy. Among 131 countries with comparable legal data, nearly half still restrict women from doing at least some of the same jobs as men, only 38% have consent-based rape laws that explicitly criminalize marital rape, and just 23% set age 18 as the minimum age of marriage without exceptions.
So what rights do women still lack around the world?
The answer depends on where a woman lives. In some countries, women are explicitly denied particular rights by law. In others, legal equality exists but enforcement is weak. And in many places, poverty, violence, discrimination or social barriers make formally guaranteed rights difficult to exercise.
Understanding that distinction is essential to understanding women’s rights today.
What are women’s rights?
Women’s rights are human rights that women and girls must be able to enjoy equally, without discrimination on the basis of sex.
The United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, known as CEDAW, defines discrimination against women as distinctions, exclusions or restrictions based on sex that impair women’s equal enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Importantly, CEDAW is concerned with both de jure equality—what the law says—and de facto equality—what happens in practice.
Women’s rights therefore include freedom from violence and discrimination; education; equal access to employment and economic opportunity; property and inheritance; equal citizenship and nationality rights; healthcare and bodily autonomy; equal rights within marriage and divorce; freedom of movement; and meaningful participation in political and public life.
These are not separate or “special” rights for women. They are the application of universal human rights to people who have historically been excluded from exercising them equally.
The difference between legal rights and lived equality
One of the most important distinctions in global women’s-rights data is the difference between having a right in law and being able to use it in real life.
A country may legally prohibit workplace discrimination, for example, while women still encounter unequal hiring, harassment or inadequate mechanisms for enforcing the law.
A country may outlaw domestic violence while survivors have limited access to police protection, shelters, legal representation or financial independence.
A country may formally give women equal property rights while customary practices make it difficult for them to inherit or control land.
The World Bank’s 2026 analysis illustrates this gap clearly. Across the economic rights it measures, countries average 67 out of 100 for their legal frameworks, but just 47 out of 100 for the policies and institutions needed to make those laws effective. Perceived enforcement scores approximately 53 out of 100.
Equality on paper matters enormously.
But ultimately, rights must also work in practice.
1. Women still lack equal protection from violence in many countries
The right to live free from violence is among the most fundamental human rights. Yet violence against women remains extraordinarily widespread.
The World Health Organization reports that approximately 840 million women—nearly one in three worldwide—have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner or sexual violence by someone other than a partner during their lifetime. The global prevalence has changed remarkably little over the past two decades.
Legal protections are also incomplete.
According to the UN’s 2026 Sustainable Development Goal data, only 38% of the 131 countries with available data have consent-based rape laws that explicitly criminalize marital rape.
This illustrates why the right to safety is about more than criminalizing the most extreme acts of violence. Effective equality also requires accessible justice, survivor support, prevention, protection from sexual harassment and laws that recognize sexual consent.
2. Women still lack equal employment rights in parts of the world
Women’s ability to participate economically has expanded dramatically, but legal restrictions remain.
In 61 of 131 countries with available data, at least one restriction still prevents women from performing the same jobs as men.
Restrictions can involve occupations considered dangerous, industrial work, night work or particular sectors.
But economic inequality goes beyond whether a woman is legally permitted to take a job.
The World Bank’s 2026 framework examines ten areas affecting women’s economic opportunities, including safety, mobility, employment, pay, marriage, parenthood, childcare, entrepreneurship, assets and pensions. It concludes that no economy among the 190 assessed offers women complete economic equality across the areas measured.
The gap between legal permission and actual opportunity matters. A woman may legally be allowed to work while lacking childcare, protection from harassment, equal access to finance or realistic opportunities for advancement.
3. Women still lack equal property and inheritance protections
Property rights influence far more than personal wealth.
Owning land or other assets can provide housing, food security, collateral for a business, income, protection after divorce or widowhood, and greater economic independence.
Yet significant gender gaps remain.
Among 78 countries with agricultural land data, the UN reports that in 68 countries fewer than half of women in agricultural households own or hold secure rights to agricultural land. In 23 countries, men are at least twice as likely as women to hold those rights.
Legal protections are incomplete as well. Nearly two-thirds of reporting countries provide no or low legal protection for women’s land rights, while more than 40% lack protections involving areas such as spousal consent or equal inheritance.
Property equality therefore requires both equal laws and the ability to register, inherit, control and make decisions about assets in practice.
4. Girls still lack adequate protection from child marriage
Marriage should be entered freely by consenting adults.
For millions of girls, that principle is still not fully protected.
UNICEF estimates that approximately 650 million women and girls alive today were married before their 18th birthday. Around one in five girls globally still marries before age 18.
Legal loopholes contribute to the problem.
Among 131 countries assessed by the UN, only 23% establish 18 as the minimum marriage age without exceptions.
Exceptions involving parental permission, judicial authorization or customary systems can undermine a general legal minimum.
Child marriage is also closely connected to other rights. Girls who marry young face increased risks of disrupted education, early pregnancy, economic dependency and intimate-partner violence.
Protecting girls from child marriage is therefore not only about marriage law. It is also about education, safety, health and the ability to determine the course of one’s own life.
5. Many women still lack full bodily autonomy
Bodily autonomy means having meaningful power over decisions concerning your own body and healthcare.
Global data show that this remains far from universal.
Across 78 countries with available data, only 56.3% of married or partnered women ages 15–49 reported having full decision-making power across three areas measured by the UN: sexual relations, contraceptive use and reproductive healthcare.
Regional differences are substantial. The corresponding figure is approximately 36.8% in sub-Saharan Africa compared with 87.2% in Europe.
Access to reproductive healthcare also varies dramatically around the world.
The World Health Organization describes lack of access to safe, timely, affordable, and respectful abortion care as a public-health and human-rights issue. WHO estimates that approximately 45% of abortions globally are unsafe, although that estimate is based on earlier global data and should be understood in that context.
Bodily autonomy is therefore not one single policy question. It encompasses consent, contraception, reproductive healthcare, access to accurate information and the ability to make healthcare decisions without unnecessary coercion or discrimination.
6. Women still lack equal nationality rights in 24 countries
Citizenship is one of the lesser-known areas where explicit sex discrimination remains written into law.
As of 2026, women in 24 countries cannot pass their nationality to their children on the same basis as men. More than 40 countries retain other forms of gender inequality involving the ability to confer nationality on a spouse or to acquire, change or retain nationality.
These laws can have consequences far beyond a passport.
Gender-discriminatory nationality laws can increase the risk of statelessness and create barriers affecting education, healthcare, employment, property rights and freedom of movement.
Equal nationality rights are fundamentally about whether women are recognized as equal citizens whose relationship to their country carries the same legal weight as a man’s.
7. Girls and women still lack equal access to education in some places
Globally, girls have made enormous educational gains.
But progress is neither complete nor evenly distributed.
UNESCO estimates that approximately 122 million girls remain out of school worldwide. Poverty, conflict, displacement, child marriage, violence and other barriers all contribute.
Afghanistan represents the most extreme contemporary example of a right being explicitly removed.
Girls there have been prohibited from formal education beyond primary school since 2021, while women have been barred from university education since 2022. UNESCO estimated in August 2026 that approximately 2.4 million Afghan girls had been systematically excluded from secondary education.
Afghanistan remains the only country where girls and women are formally excluded from secondary and higher education at the national level.
The global right to education therefore requires more than enrolling children in school. Girls must be able to enter school, remain there safely, learn and progress into higher education and employment.
8. Women still lack equal political power
Formal political rights and equal political power are not the same thing.
As of January 1, 2026, women held approximately 27.5% of seats in national parliaments worldwide. Only 19.9% of parliamentary presiding officers were women.
Women held just 22.4% of cabinet positions, and only 28 countries were led by a woman serving as Head of State or Head of Government. More than 100 countries had never had a woman national leader.
These figures do not mean women legally lack the right to run for office in all of those countries.
They reveal a different kind of gap: women have political rights in law across much of the world while remaining significantly underrepresented in the institutions where political power is exercised.
Candidate recruitment, political violence, harassment, financing, caregiving responsibilities and entrenched gender expectations can all influence who realistically has the opportunity to lead.
9. Millions of girls still lack protection from female genital mutilation
Female genital mutilation, or FGM, is internationally recognized as a violation of human rights and bodily integrity.
More than 230 million girls and women alive today have undergone FGM, according to UNFPA. The practice has been documented in at least 94 countries.
In 2026 alone, an estimated 4.5 million girls are at risk of undergoing FGM, more than half of them under age five.
There is no health benefit from FGM, and it can cause immediate and long-term physical, psychological, sexual and reproductive health complications.
But progress provides important reason for hope. Prevalence has declined in a number of countries, demonstrating that harmful practices can change through sustained education, community leadership, legal protection and support for girls and families.
10. Some women still face severe restrictions on movement and public life
Freedom of movement affects almost every other right.
Being able to leave home, travel, study, work, seek healthcare, participate politically and connect with other people is fundamental to independence.
Most women globally do not live under sweeping national restrictions on everyday movement. But extreme examples remain.
In Afghanistan, restrictions imposed on women and girls extend beyond education to employment and participation in public life.
Women elsewhere can also experience less visible limitations through unsafe public transportation, harassment, economic dependence, discriminatory family rules or documentation requirements.
This is another reason women’s rights cannot be measured solely by reading a country’s constitution. The meaningful question is whether women can actually participate in society safely and independently.
A global snapshot of women’s rights in 2026
The newest global data make the scale of unfinished progress easier to see.
Women have approximately 67% of the economic legal rights of men across the World Bank’s 190-economy framework, and only 4% of women live in economies close to full legal economic equality.
Approximately 840 million women—nearly one in three—have experienced physical and/or sexual violence during their lifetime.
In the UN’s legal assessment, 61 of 131 countries retain at least one restriction preventing women from doing the same jobs as men.
Only 38% of 131 countries have consent-based rape laws explicitly criminalizing marital rape, and only 23% establish age 18 as the minimum marriage age without exceptions.
Around 650 million women and girls alive today were married during childhood.
Only 56.3% of partnered women represented in available UN data report full decision-making autonomy over sexual relations, contraception and reproductive healthcare.
Women in 24 countries still cannot pass their nationality to their children on the same terms as men.
At least 230 million girls and women have undergone female genital mutilation.
Women hold only about 27.5% of national parliamentary seats worldwide.
And in Afghanistan, approximately 2.4 million girls have been excluded from secondary education under restrictions that prevent girls and women from studying beyond primary school.
The numbers describe different problems, populations and datasets, so they should not be combined into a single measure of global inequality.
Together, however, they reveal something unmistakable: the global project of equal rights is unfinished.
Women’s rights are not experienced equally by every woman
Global statistics can also obscure enormous differences between women.
A wealthy woman living in a stable democracy does not experience the same barriers as a girl displaced by war, a woman living in extreme poverty or a woman navigating discrimination related to disability, race, ethnicity, caste, migration status or another part of her identity.
Conflict can intensify gender-based violence. Poverty can make theoretically available healthcare inaccessible. Disability can create additional barriers to education, employment and justice. Displacement can weaken access to documentation, property and citizenship.
That does not diminish the idea of universal women’s rights.
It strengthens it.
Every woman deserves equal human dignity, while achieving meaningful equality requires understanding the different barriers women face.
Are women’s rights getting better globally?
In many areas, yes.
Between 2019 and 2025, the United Nations recorded 99 legal reforms strengthening gender equality, including reforms addressing domestic violence, rape, child marriage and restrictions on women’s employment.
The World Bank separately found that 68 economies enacted 113 reforms strengthening women’s economic opportunities between 2023 and 2025.
Child marriage has declined globally. Women’s parliamentary representation has increased over the long term. Girls have made extraordinary educational gains. Countries have reformed discriminatory nationality, property and employment laws.
Progress is real.
But progress is neither automatic nor irreversible.
Rights become stronger when laws change, institutions enforce them, communities support them and people continue to insist that equality applies to everyone.
Frequently asked questions about women’s rights around the world
What rights do women still not have?
There is no single right denied to all women globally. Depending on the country, women may face unequal laws or inadequate protections involving employment, property, inheritance, marriage, divorce, nationality, education, bodily autonomy, healthcare, freedom of movement, political participation and protection from violence.
The most accurate question is therefore not simply “What rights don’t women have?” but “Where do women still lack equal rights, protections or the practical ability to exercise those rights?”
Do women have the same legal rights as men everywhere?
No.
The World Bank’s 2026 analysis finds that women globally have about 67% of men’s legal rights across the areas of economic opportunity it measures. No economy among the 190 studied achieves complete equality across the full framework.
Other UN datasets also document legal inequalities involving employment, marriage, land, violence and nationality.
Which rights are most commonly unequal?
The answer varies by country, but persistent global gaps involve protection from gender-based violence, employment, property and inheritance, marriage, bodily autonomy, nationality and participation in political leadership.
Weak enforcement can also undermine rights that technically exist.
Can women own property everywhere?
Women can legally own property in much of the world, but equal property and inheritance protections are not universal. UN data show significant gaps in women’s secure agricultural land ownership and in legal safeguards surrounding inheritance and land governance.
Can women pass citizenship to their children everywhere?
No. In 24 countries, women still cannot confer nationality on their children on the same basis as men.
What country has the fewest rights for women?
There is no single universally accepted ranking that measures every aspect of women’s human rights.
Afghanistan, however, represents one of the clearest contemporary examples of systematic restrictions on women and girls. Girls and women are excluded from secondary and higher education and face extensive restrictions affecting employment and participation in public life.
Using specific rights and reliable indicators is generally more informative than trying to label one country definitively as “the worst.”
Equality is possible
The scale of the remaining gaps can feel overwhelming. But the history of women’s rights is also the history of change.
Laws have changed. Girls have returned to classrooms. Harmful practices have declined. Women have gained property, citizenship, workplace and political rights that previous generations were denied.
Supporting that progress does not require knowing everything or agreeing on every policy.
Start by learning from credible sources. Listen to women closest to the issues. Support trustworthy women-led and community organizations. Challenge discrimination without dehumanizing others. Vote, advocate and contribute where you can.
A world where every woman is safe, equal and valued is not beyond reach. Every healthy step toward dignity and equality helps move us closer.
Are women’s rights improving?
Yes—but not fast enough, and progress is uneven.
Between 2019 and 2025, the United Nations tracked 99 legal reforms strengthening gender equality, including reforms addressing domestic violence, rape, child marriage and restrictions on women’s employment. (unstats.un.org)
The World Bank separately found that 68 economies enacted 113 reforms strengthening women’s economic opportunities between 2023 and 2025. (World Bank)
Child marriage has declined. FGM has fallen substantially in some countries. Girls’ educational attainment has transformed globally. Women’s political representation has increased over the long term.
But the remaining inequalities are not trivial.
Hundreds of millions of women still experience violence. Millions of girls are married in childhood. Discriminatory laws governing work, property, citizenship and family life remain in force. And even strong laws can mean little when they are not enforced.
Progress is real.
So is the work still ahead.
Source:
World Bank — Women, Business and the Law 2026; United Nations — 2026 SDG 5 Gender Equality Data; WHO — Violence Against Women; UNICEF — Child Marriage Data; UNESCO — Girls and Women in Afghanistan, 2026; UNFPA — Female Genital Mutilation Data; UNHCR — Gender-Discriminatory Nationality Laws; and Inter-Parliamentary Union — Women in Parliament 2026.