Dimension four – gender equality – is part of a sub-dimension in the ILO decent work framework. However, in the Just Jobs Index, the sub-dimension of gender equality has been lifted to an additional dimension due to its importance on the international agenda. For instance, promoting gender equality and empowering women is part of the UN Millennium Development Goals. In this version of the index, only data on gender is included, but it is an aim to include data on discrimination related to other social groups in the future. This, of course, depends on states’ willingness to collect such data.

Legal base and framework

Discrimination at work involves the denial of equality of treatment and opportunity to individuals in their own right or as members of a social group. The ILO’s Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention, (1958), identifies possible discrimination as follows: “any distinction, exclusion or preference made on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, political opinion, national extraction or social origin, which has the effect of nullifying or impairing equality of opportunity or treatment in employment and occupation” (Article 1, para. 1(a)).