Lost in legation: the gap between rhetoric and reality in international human rights law governing women’s rights

Abstract Does practice demonstrate the legitimacy of international human rights law? This article explores this question via a case study of the women’s rights movement in Iran. Current human rights sceptics question the system’s legitimacy because of a lack of universality and an excessive top-down approach. However, the Islamic Republic of Iran has a remarkable community of grassroots activists. The bottom-up women’s rights initiative of the One Million Signatures Campaign utilised human rights discourse in combination with local, indigenous values in pursuit of gender equality. The article argues—via the case study of this movement—that there is practical evidence to support a theory of human rights universalism, as positive human rights law empowers the existing subjectivity of individuals. The universal legitimacy of international human rights law does not primarily come from a global network dictating common values, but from members of civil society mobilising their status as rights holders.

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United Nations endorsement and support for human rights: An experiment on women’s rights in Pakistan

Journal of Peace Research ◽

10.1177/0022343320912839 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 002234332091283

Author(s):

Gulnaz Anjum ◽

Adam Chilton ◽

Zahid Usman

Keyword(s):

Human Rights ◽

United Nations ◽

Women's Rights ◽

Women’S Rights ◽

International Human Rights Law ◽

Policy Reforms ◽

International Human Rights ◽

International Human ◽

The United Nations ◽

New Policies

The United Nations is one of the organizations charged with developing and promoting international human rights law. One of the primary ways that the United Nations tries to do that is by regularly reviewing the human rights practices of member states and then recommending new policies for that state to implement. Although this expends considerable resources, a number of obstacles have made it difficult to empirically assess whether the UN’s review process actually causes countries to improve their human rights practices. To study this topic, we conducted an experiment in Pakistan that tested whether respondents were more likely to support policies aimed at improving women’s rights when they learned that the reforms were proposed by the United Nations. Our results indicate that the respondents who were randomly informed of the United Nations endorsement not only expressed higher support for the policy reforms, but also were more likely to express willingness to ‘mobilize’ in ways that would help the reforms be implemented. Our treatment did not have any effect, however, on respondents that did not already have confidence in the United Nations. This suggests that the international human rights regime may only be able to aid domestic reformers when there is already faith in those institutions.

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What is the future of polygyny (polygamy) in Africa?

Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal/Potchefstroomse Elektroniese Regsblad ◽

10.17159/1727-3781/2017/v20i0a1357 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 20 ◽

pp. 1 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Lea Mwambene

Keyword(s):

Women's Rights ◽

Family Law ◽

Women’S Rights ◽

International Human Rights Law ◽

African Continent ◽

Human Rights Law ◽

International Human Rights ◽

Traditional Practice ◽

International Human ◽

Legislative Reforms

The traditional practice of polygyny, whereby only a man is allowed to marry more than one wife in a customary marriage, has long been perceived to be an offender of women's rights. Recent family law reforms on the African continent show that the focus has been on promoting and protecting the rights of women as defined in international human rights law, as well as on respecting the practice of polygyny. These legislative reforms in jurisdictions such as Kenya, Mozambique and South Africa show that the approach to regulating polygyny has been either to legalise, abolish, or regulate the practice. In view of the focus in these reforms on both women's rights and respect for the practice of polygyny, this paper examines the different approaches of the selected countries to regulating the practice. In particular, this paper investigates how these countries are striking a balance between polygyny and the protection of women's rights. It will also highlight the difficulties that law reformers face in regulating the practice in such a way as to protect women's rights, as well as the gaps in the law reforms that need to be addressed.

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