1999
Human rights, more rights
Susana Chiarotti
CLADEM, Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women's Rights
In 1948, representatives of national governments recognised the equality, dignity and freedom of people worldwide. They recognised on paper the freedom to move about freely in the streets and in the country, but not in the home.
They
set forth the right of citizens to elect and be elected as governors, but only
for men. Women were denied these possibilities in over half the world. States
were prohibited from harming the physical integrity of citizens, but women
living in danger in their own homes were forgotten.
Recognition of work was partial and given only to work performed outside
the home.
As
a result, recognition of these rights did not imply any change whatsoever in the
lives of millions of women.
Their work in the
home and in the fields remained "valueless". In a theory of human
rights born of a hierarchical vision of which rights were important and which
were not, their rights were irrelevant.
From
the inception of international human rights laws, women sought to participate in
the preparation of provisions and mechanisms for equality. This participation
grew in strength and in diversity of spaces and forms of involvement over the
years.
From
non-governmental spaces, women sought unceasingly to influence the discourse on
human rights. As isolated individuals or in organised groups, women have
participated in the definition of rights and in their interpretation and
decodification. Women began to understand that discourse on rights provides a
space for negotiation and political dialogue at national and international
levels.
In
1946, the United Nations Economic and Social Council created the Commission on
the Legal and Social Condition of Women as an advisory body on the status of
women. The Commission has carried out many activities, including preparation
for the Decade of Women (1975-1985), which gave a big push to the promotion of
equality between women and men worldwide. In 1974, work began on drafts for
the Convention on Women, which would be signed in 1979 as the first
comprehensive convention on women's rights. The United Nations 1967
Declaration on Elimination of Discrimination Against Women was the basis for
the text. The Commission was responsible for organising four world conferences
aimed specifically at women and at resolving the problem of discrimination, in
Mexico (1975), Copenhagen (1980), Nairobi (1985) and Beijing (1995). These
conferences brought together thousands of women from across the world (from
the 6,000 who participated in Mexico to the 30,000 who went to Beijing) under
the watchwords of equality, development and peace. At all of them,
well-attended non-governmental fora were organised along with the official
conferences. Women did not limit themselves to participating in conferences
devoted exclusively to them, however. They became involved in all spheres,
fora and conferences where they were allowed to attend. They did so at the UN
Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro (1992), the World
Conference on Human Rights in Vienna (1993), the International Conference on
Population and Development in Cairo (1994), the World Summit on Social
Development in Copenhagen (1995), and the Conference on Human Settlements in
Istanbul (1996).
INFLUENCING
THE THEORY OF HUMAN RIGHTS
Women
are going
from being defined to being definers. In this effort, we can point to two
stages. In the first, women sought to enjoy full civil and political rights,
dispose of property, etc, just like men, without questioning the content of the
rights as set forth. In the second stage, the discourse on human rights was
analysed and found to be male: it did not take into account or reflect the
specific experiences of women. Based on this analysis, the content of rights was
questioned.
This
second stage began in the late 1970s and culminated at the World Conference on
Human Rights in Vienna (1993), where hundreds of women from all regions of the
planet actively participated. It was proclaimed in Vienna that the human rights
of women and girls are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of
universal human rights. This constitutes progress not only toward the visibility
of a broad spectrum of needs that had been prevented from becoming rights, such
as those pertaining to sexuality and reproduction, but also toward a revision of
all human rights from a gender perspective.
In
Vienna, a remarkable change took place in the theory of human rights when, at
women's initiative, it was accepted that human rights are to be enjoyed in both
the public and the private spheres and, therefore, can be violated in both
spheres. Violence against
women was recognised as a violation of human rights. This is a revolutionary
change, since prior human rights discourse was based on the notion that
violations are committed by the State in public and social spaces. For the first
time, private acts occurring in private spaces could give rise to public
liability. Ethnic cleansing, forced pregnancies and systematic rape of women in
situations of armed conflict were also condemned.
The
following year (1994), a transformation took place in the rights of citizens
when the Action Plan of the International Conference on Population and
Development in Cairo proposed that "it
is necessary for women and men to participate and intervene on equal terms in
productive and reproductive life, including the division of responsibilities in
child rearing and maintenance of the home." The barrier between public
and private was torn down, and the recognition of the problems of everyday life,
of rights enjoyed or denied within the home, began to occupy more and more space
in human rights' discourse.
These
concepts were strengthened in the 1995 Beijing Platform of Action, the most
complete document on women's rights produced by a United Nations conference. The
Beijing Platform of Action incorporates the achievements of previous conferences
and treaties, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the
Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women
(CEDAW), and the Vienna Declaration.
THE
CAMPAIGN
An
important landmark in this attempt to reconceptualise human rights is the
Declaration of Human Rights from a Gender Perspective, which CLADEM (Latin
American and Caribbean Committee for Defense of Women's Rights) has promoted
since 1992. The idea emerged at a meeting of a group of women in Costa Rica that
year in preparation for the Vienna Conference. CLADEM continued to work on the
draft declaration and it was discussed and approved by the entire network.
CLADEM printed the declaration and circulated it. In 1993, the declaration was
discussed at all the United Nations world conferences. Suggestions, criticisms
and comments were received from over 180 organisations and individuals
worldwide. These inputs were incorporated in a new version that was presented to
the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva, where following the
pertinent formalities it was accepted as number E/CN.4./1998/ngo/3. CLADEM's
objectives in promoting this declaration are: first,
to make women visible in human rights discourse by including women's
perspectives, needs and claims; secondly, to assume the right to draft the law,
not only for women, but for all humanity.
For
hundreds of years women were denied the right to draft laws. Attempts by women
to change, amend or transgress laws often ended tragically. From time
immemorial, our culture has repeatedly warned women not to meddle in law. In
ancient Greece, this warning came through the theater, eg, in Sophocles' play Antigone.
There the king of Thebes, Creon, punishes Antigone for trying to change his
orders and bury her brother's corpse. Creon says: "As long as I rule this
city, no woman shall make the law." Antigone is punished for her daring by
being buried alive in a cave. The penalty had to be stiff to teach women not to
dare change the law.
During
1998, CLADEM organised a campaign in 17 countries in the region to promote the
Declaration of Human Rights from a Gender Perspective. With the help of
communications experts, advertising materials were prepared—videos for
television, radio spots, press releases and other materials—and, with the
little funding available, disseminated through the media.
It was the first time that a proposal of this sort and scope had been
launched. Carrying out a campaign on human rights from the perspective of women
simultaneously in so many countries, and getting involved with the
communications media, provided many important lessons for the women's movement.
On
December 10th 1998 at United Nations Headquarters in New York, CLADEM
representatives delivered thousands of signatures collected worldwide in support
of the Declaration. It was presented to the Commission on the Legal and Social
Condition of Women, with a request that governments support the proposal and
take it to the General Assembly for adoption and promotion in the coming
millennium.
SEXUAL
AND REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS: THE LAST FRONTIER
The
Declaration of Human Rights from a Gender Perspective consists of a preamble and
five chapters. Each chapter focuses on a specific axis of the spectrum of human
rights: citizenship, development, the right to peace and a violence-free life,
sexual and reproductive rights, and environmental rights.
In
talks with governments to promote the Declaration, two issues were problematic
in principle: self-determination of peoples and self-determination of bodies. In
the chapter on citizenship, governments, particularly the European ones,
questioned the article providing for self-determination of peoples. Other
governments would have accepted the declaration, had it not been for the chapter
on sexual and reproductive rights. This chapter addresses, among others, the
rights to reproductive autonomy, freedom from discrimination based on sexual
orientation, and access to safe and legal abortion.
Self-determination
of bodies was most vehemently resisted by governments who were pressured and
supported, in the majority of cases, by conservative religious leaders or
sectors. While there have been interesting conceptual developments in this area,
these have taken shape in action plans or platforms, ie, in conference documents
that do not have the binding force of conventions and treaties. Transformation
of these rights into binding international and national provisions is still
pending.
ITEMS
FOR THE AGENDA
Even
though we attribute great importance to human rights, we have to accept that
internationally recognised human rights are considered subsidiary to national
systems. That is to say, the primary responsibility for guaranteeing those
rights rests with the State. Moreover, claims made in the international arena
are often processed in a slow and complicated way. Mechanisms for legal redress
are unknown to most people and generally require connections, money and time.
This means that most victims of human rights violations receive no compensation
whatsoever.
We
know that laws are not magic wands guaranteeing the exercise of rights. We
believe, however, that work in
international law implies symbolic progress, not only by naming rights that
still have to be defined, but also by legitimising claims in areas that formerly
went unquestioned. This work can also have a positive influence on national
legislation.
The
challenges foreseen for the coming years in the human rights arena could be
summed up as follows:
1.
deepening theoretical development, especially in the area of economic,
social and cultural rights;
2.
strengthening the articulation between local, national and international
organisations, for harmonious collaboration in use of resources and
participation in international and national fora;
3.
increasing feminist participation vis-ŕ-vis
and within the different human rights bodies;
4.
creation of a gender-sensitive jurisprudence through preparation of
comments and general recommendations, on the one hand, and prosecution of gender
discrimination cases, on the other;
5.
awareness-building among attorneys and judges as to international human
rights provisions, encouraging their increasing use in local law;
6.
dissemination and information on the existence and possibilities of
international treaties and procedures.
The
initiatives launched by women in the human rights field have enriched human
rights discourse and broadened paradigms. As a result, they increasingly reflect
the aspirations for justice of a humanity that cannot be truly human if it is
divided against itself.
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