it requires that women are empowered to take an active part in the development of laws economic systems and policies that will govern themselves and society as a whole in accordance with article of the universal declaration of human rights within this context this chapter explores institutional mechanisms and tools that are designed to support womens advancement and to ensure that a gender perspective is systematically taken into account it also discusses women s participation in political decisionmaking as both an intrinsic objective and a lever for the adoption of gendersensitive policies a key element of the platform s strategy is the establishment of institutional mechanisms for the advancement of women as a means of ensuring systematic attention to gender issues some arab governments had already set up rudimentary women s divisions under various ministries typically those for social and family affairs in the late s and s with the adoption of the beijing platform those institutions became more formalized they took a leading role in advocating for women s issues and moving gender discourse into the halls of government