Women make up only 12% of lawyers in the country
A new report on a training programme for women in Nepal’s legal profession has been released by the International Bar Association. According to the report, International training of women lawyers in Nepal: A case study, only 12 per cent of Nepali lawyers are women (approximately 2,200).
The report was commissioned by the IBA and written by New Perimeter – a nonprofit affiliate of DLA Piper. It highlights a training programme developed by New Perimeter, the Nepal Bar Association, the United Nations Development Programme and other organisations seeking to advance women in the legal profession in Nepal.
The challenges faced by women lawyers in Nepal are also included in the report, together with the reasons behind the creation of a network of women lawyers, as well as the need for continuing legal education for women lawyers in various areas of law. Also included are the project’s goals, successes, and challenges.
In 2021, the IBA began a nine-year research project, 50:50 by 2030: A longitudinal study into gender disparity in law (the Gender Project). It focuses on women in private practice, in-house legal teams, the judiciary and the public sector in 16 jurisdictions across the globe.
Although Nepal was not one of the 16 jurisdictions initially selected as part of the study, New Perimeter’s work in Nepal, in collaboration with the Nepal Bar Association and other organisations, serves as an example of a programme aimed at supporting women’s development in the legal profession and has been included on the IBA website as a supplemental study to the IBA Gender Project.
The IBA Legal Policy & Research Unit and the LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation began collaborating on the Gender Project with the intention of identifying the reasons for the statistical disparity between men and women at senior levels of the legal profession, as well as considering whether diversity initiatives introduced to address this disparity are having a positive impact.
Research revealed female lawyers in Nepal face common gender stereotypes, with Nepali society generally holding the view that a woman’s role is in the home; the title of ‘senior advocate’ (awarded by the NBA after a lawyer has served for at least 15 years) only having been granted to 30 women – with 660 titles being awarded to men; and that the number of women in leadership positions in law firms is limited.
The NBA is currently working to increase the participation of women in the judiciary through affirmative action policies and training programmes and has already developed training programmes for women lawyers on mediation and arbitration.
