The Gender Legislative Index

The Gender Legislative Index is a tool created to evaluate legislation for compatibility with women’s human rights. It was designed and created by Chief Investigator Ramona Vijeyarasa with collaborators Rapido Social (UTS Faculty of Engineering & Information Technology, FEIT) and the UTS Connect Intelligence Centre.

The GLI involves human evaluators and a machine-learning algorithm to evaluate the extent to which domestic laws respond to the different needs of men, women and non-binary people when measured against criteria derived from the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).  

The Gender Legislative Index and Chief Investigator Vijeyarasa’s research was referenced by MP Ruth Forrest in Forrest’s motion that ‘Australian laws should not be gender-neutral where there are important differences between men and women that need to be taken into account’ (Forrest MP, 2022). The motion’s success saw Tasmania establish Australia’s only parliamentary committee in any state, territory or federal jurisdiction focused exclusively on gender-auditing of new bills: A Gender and Equality Committee. 

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The GLI has, to date, been used to evaluate over 130 laws from Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Philippines and Australia, facilitating a study published by Oxford University Press on the different women leaders make on the lives of fellow women through the law: The Woman President: Law, Leadership and Legacy for Women based on Experiences from South and Southeast Asia.

This research and industry engagements laid the groundwork for a successful application for an ARC Discovery Grant (2025-2027), as lead CI, with CIs from University of Sydney and University of Canberra.