scholarly journals Rethinking the Anti-FGM Zero-Tolerance Policy: from Intellectual Concerns to Empirical Challenges

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 266-275
Author(s):  
Sarah O’Neill ◽  
Dina Bader ◽  
Cynthia Kraus ◽  
Isabelle Godin ◽  
Jasmine Abdulcadir ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
Zero Tolerance ◽  
World Health ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Tolerance Strategy ◽  
Zero Tolerance Policy ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Female Genital

Abstract Purpose of Review Based on the discussions of a symposium co-organized by the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and the University of Lausanne (UNIL) in Brussels in 2019, this paper critically reflects upon the zero-tolerance strategy on “Female Genital Mutilation” (FGM) and its socio-political, legal and moral repercussions. We ask whether the strategy is effective given the empirical challenges highlighted during the symposium, and also whether it is credible. Recent Findings The anti-FGM zero-tolerance policy, first launched in 2003, aims to eliminate all types of “female genital mutilation” worldwide. The FGM definition of the World Health Organization condemns all forms of genital cutting (FGC) on the basis that they are harmful and degrading to women and infringe upon their rights to physical integrity. Yet, the zero-tolerance policy only applies to traditional and customary forms of genital cutting and not to cosmetic alterations of the female genitalia. Recent publications have shown that various popular forms of cosmetic genital surgery remove the same tissue as some forms of “FGM”. In response to the zero-tolerance policy, national laws banning traditional forms of FGC are enforced and increasingly scrutinize the performance of FGC as well as non-invasive rituals that are culturally meaningful to migrants. At the same time, cosmetic procedures such as labiaplasty have become more popular than ever before and are increasingly performed on adolescents. Summary This review shows that the socio-legal and ethical inconsistencies between “FGM” and cosmetic genital modification pose concrete dilemmas for professionals in the field that need to be addressed and researched.

Legal Impact of Female Genital Mutilation: Special Reference to Penal Laws and Human Rights Perspective in the Criminal Justice System of Sri Lanka

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 222-237
Author(s):  
Aruni Wijayath
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Sri Lanka ◽  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
World Health ◽  
African Region ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Female Community ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Female Genital

Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a ritual and religious and cultural practice among the Moor, Malay and Dawoodi Bohra ethnic communities in Sri Lanka. The process of FGM is ensconced from the general public in Sri Lanka; therefore, few pieces of research pertaining to the practice of FGM are available. A considerable number of international organizations profess that the percentage of FGM/cutting is zero in Sri Lanka through their reports, although newspaper articles and country reports disclose that FGM actually exists among the Muslim community in Sri Lanka. The knowledge regarding the process of FGM is in the backwater in Sri Lanka, even though a considerable number of feminism activists have created a platform to discuss the bad consequences emerging from this harmful practice. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 30 countries of African Region, selected countries in the Middle East, and countries of Asian Region practice this custom among the female community in some ethnic and religious groups. Through this practice, the female community has not gained any advantage or benefit. The purpose of this research is to explore the municipal laws and human rights regarding FGM in the Sri Lankan context. Furthermore, international conventions which are ratified by Sri Lanka will be analysed in this manner. This research is mainly based on the normative method and retrieved Internet documentary analysis in a qualitative manner.

Female Genital Cutting and the Health Care Provider’s Dilemma: A Case Study

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krista Blanton
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Health Care Providers ◽  
World Health ◽  
Female Genital Cutting ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Quality Health Care ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Female Genital

According to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2010), 100–140 million women have been subjected to some form of female genital mutilation, also called female genital cutting (FGC). WHO (2010) defines FGC as any “procedure involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons” (para. 1). To provide culturally sensitive quality health care, providers must have a basic understanding of the types of FGC, the cultural implications associated with FGC, the physical and emotional sequelae of FGC, and the legal and ethical dilemmas surrounding FGC.

The need for a unified ethical stance on child genital cutting

2021 ◽  
pp. 096973302098339
Author(s):  
Brian D Earp ◽  
Arianne Shahvisi ◽  
Samuel Reis-Dennis ◽  
Elizabeth Reis
Keyword(s):  
World Health ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
American Academy Of Pediatrics ◽  
Concept Of Health ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
Nurse Midwives ◽  
American Society ◽  
Ethical Stance ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Female Genital

The American College of Nurse-Midwives, American Society for Pain Management Nursing, American Academy of Pediatrics, and other largely US-based medical organizations have argued that at least some forms of non-therapeutic child genital cutting, including routine penile circumcision, are ethically permissible even when performed on non-consenting minors. In support of this view, these organizations have at times appealed to potential health benefits that may follow from removing sexually sensitive, non-diseased tissue from the genitals of such minors. We argue that these appeals to “health benefits” as a way of justifying medically unnecessary child genital cutting practices may have unintended consequences. For example, it may create a “loophole” through which certain forms of female genital cutting—or female genital “mutilation” as it is defined by the World Health Organization—could potentially be legitimized. Moreover, by comparing current dominant Western attitudes toward female genital “mutilation” and so-called intersex genital “normalization” surgeries (i.e. surgeries on children with certain differences of sex development), we show that the concept of health invoked in each case is inconsistent and culturally biased. It is time for Western healthcare organizations—including the American College of Nurse-Midwives, American Society for Pain Management Nursing, American Academy of Pediatrics, and World Health Organization—to adopt a more consistent concept of health and a unified ethical stance when it comes to child genital cutting practices.

Peran World Health Organization dalam Menangani Isu Female Genital Mutilation di Sierra Leone

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-88
Author(s):  
Ardli Johan Kusuma ◽  
Isabella Putri Maharani
Keyword(s):  
World Health Organization ◽  
Sierra Leone ◽  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
World Health ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Female Genital

Penelitian ini menjelaskan tentang peran WHO dalam menangani isu Female Genital Mutilation di Sierra Leone. Dalam penelitian ini peneliti berfokus pada implementasi peran WHO melalui CEDAW dan Maputo Protocol yang telah diratifikasi oleh Sierra Leone dalam penghapusan praktek FGM yang merupakan budaya dari masyarakat Sierra Leone untuk proses wanita menuju dewasa serta gerakan dari aktivisi internasional dan organisasi internasional yang berfokus pada penghapusan praktik FGM. Budaya FGM sendiri merupakan salah satu bentuk diskriminasi terhadap perempuan. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode kualitatif, dengan pendekatan deskriptif analitik, dimana data-data yang dikumpulkan dengan menggunakan studi pustaka.  Dalam menjelaskan penelitian ini Peneliti memperoleh data melalui Jurnal, Buku, Tesis, Laporan Ilmiah, internet dan laporan pemerintah serta respon organisasi internasional yang berfokus pada FGM di Sierra Leone. Teori yang digunakan adalah HAM, Organisasi Internasional dan Peran. Data-data yang diperoleh kemudian diklasifikasikan untuk kemudian dianalsis dengan menggunakan teori yang digunakan untuk menarik kesimpulan. Dari hasil analisi, peneliti mengambil kesimpulan bahwa implementasi CEDAW oleh pemerintah Sierra Leone dalam masalah penghapusan Female Genital Mutilation tidak diterapkan secara baik oleh pemerintah Sierra Leone dikarenakan pemerintah tidak memasukan undang-undang kedalam hukum nasionalnya mengenai penghapusan praktik tradisional berbahaya yaitu FGM. Alasan pemerintah adalah dikhwatirkan mengancam kepentingan nasionalnya.

Understanding Physiology and Pathology of Sexual Health

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sana Mohamed Abasher Haj Ali
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Health ◽  
Sexual Pleasure ◽  
World Health ◽  
Broad Area ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Health Related ◽  
New Treatment ◽  
Health Organization ◽  
Treatment Procedures ◽  
Female Genital

According to world health organization, Sexual health is a broad area that encompasses many inter-related challenges and problems. Key among the issues and concerns are human rights related to sexual health, sexual pleasure, eroticism, and sexual satisfaction, diseases (HIV/AIDS, STIs, RTIs), violence, female genital mutilation, sexual dysfunction, and mental health related to sexual health. The present review presents physiology and pathology of sexual health which helps the researchers and clinicians to understand and plan and develop new treatment procedures for better reproductive health for the benefit of population in general.

scholarly journals Defining Gendered Oppression in U.S. Newspapers: The Strategic Value of “Female Genital Mutilation”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Wade
Keyword(s):  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
Female Genital Cutting ◽  
The West ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Strategic Value ◽  
Traditional Societies ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
Newspaper Text ◽  
Feminist Movements ◽  
Female Genital

According to the logic of the gendered modernity/tradition binary, women in traditional societies are oppressed and women in modern societies liberated. While the binary valorizes modern women, it potentially erases gendered oppression in the West and undermines feminist movements on behalf of Western women. Using U.S. newspaper text, I ask whether female genital cutting (FGC) is used to define women in modern societies as liberated. I find that speakers use FGC to both uphold and challenge the gendered modernity/tradition binary. Speakers use FGC to denigrate non-Western cultures and trivialize the oppressions that U.S. women typically encounter, but also to make feminist arguments on behalf of women everywhere. I argue that in addition to examining how culturally imperialist logics are reproduced, theorists interested in feminist postcolonialism should turn to the distribution of such logics, emphasizing the who, where, when, and how of reinscription of and resistance to such narratives.

Perversion and Perpetration in Female Genital Mutilation Law: The Unmaking of Women as Bearers of Law

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 273-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maree Pardy ◽  
Juliet Rogers ◽  
Nan Seuffert
Keyword(s):  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
New South ◽  
Female Genital Cutting ◽  
Demonic Possession ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
South Wales ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Female Genital

Female genital cutting (FGC) or, more controversially, female genital mutilation, has motivated the implementation of legislation in many English-speaking countries, the product of emotive images and arguments that obscure the realities of the practices of FGC and the complexity of the role of the practitioner. In Australia, state and territory legislation was followed, in 2015, with a conviction in New South Wales highlighting the problem with laws that speak to fantasies of ‘mutilation’. This article analyses the positioning of Islamic women as victims of their culture, represented as performing their roles as vehicles for demonic possession, unable to authorize agency or law. Through a perverse framing of ‘mutilation’, and in the case through the interpretation of the term ‘mutilation’, practices of FGC as law performed by women are obscured, avoiding the challenge of a real multiculturalism that recognises lawful practices of migrant cultures in democratic countries.

scholarly journals The Applicability of Behaviour Change in Intervention Programmes Targeted at Ending Female Genital Mutilation in the EU: Integrating Social Cognitive and Community Level Approaches

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Brown ◽  
David Beecham ◽  
Hazel Barrett
Keyword(s):  
Behaviour Change ◽  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
Female Circumcision ◽  
Behavioural Change ◽  
Community Change ◽  
World Health ◽  
Female Genital Cutting ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Female Genital ◽  
The Eu

With increased migration, female genital mutilation (FGM) also referred to as female circumcision or female genital cutting is no longer restricted to Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. The European Parliament estimates that up to half a million women living in the EU have been subjected to FGM, with a further 180,000 at risk. Aware of the limited success of campaigns addressing FGM, the World Health Organization recommended a behavioural change approach be implemented in order to end FGM. To date, however, little progress has been made in adopting a behaviour change approach in strategies aimed at ending FGM. Based on research undertaken as part of the EU’s Daphne III programme, which researched FGM intervention programmes linked to African communities in the EU (REPLACE), this paper argues that behaviour change has not been implemented due to a lack of understanding relating to the application of the two broad categories of behaviour change approach: individualistic decision-theoretic and community-change game-theoretic approaches, and how they may be integrated to aid our understanding and the development of future intervention strategies. We therefore discuss how these can be integrated and implemented using community-based participatory action research methods with affected communities.

scholarly journals The Politics of Acculturation: Female Genital Cutting and the Challenge of Building Multicultural Democracies

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Wade
Keyword(s):  
Dynamic Model ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Cultural Adaptation ◽  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
Newspaper Coverage ◽  
Female Genital Cutting ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Primary Documents ◽  
Genital Cutting ◽  
Female Genital

Understanding how the idea of culture is mobilized in discursive contests is crucial for both theorizing and building multicultural democracies. To investigate this, I analyze a debate over whether we should relieve the “cultural need” for infibulation among immigrants by offering a “nick” in U.S. hospitals. Using interviews, newspaper coverage, and primary documents, I show that physicians and opponents of the procedure with contrasting models of culture disagreed on whether it represented cultural change. Opponents argued that the “nick” was fairly described as “female genital mutilation” and symbolically identical to more extensive cutting. Using a reified model, they imagined Somalis to be “culture-bound”; the adoption of a “nick” was simply a move from one genital cutting procedure to another. Unable to envision meaningful cultural adaptation, and presupposing the incompatibility of multiculturalism and feminism, they supported forced assimilation. Physicians, drawing on a dynamic model of culture, believed that adoption of the “nick” was meaningful cultural change, but overly idealized their ability to protect Somali girls from both Somali and U.S. patriarchy. Unduly confident, they failed to take oppression seriously, dismissing relevant constituencies and their concerns.

Health Consequences of the Female Genital Mutilation: A Systematic Review Running title: Health Consequences of Female Genital Mutilation

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 1336
Author(s):  
Khadijeh Sarayloo ◽  
Robab Latifnejad Roudsari ◽  
Amy Elhadi
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Women’S Health ◽  
Women's Health ◽  
Female Genital Mutilation ◽  
World Health ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Current Evidence ◽  
Health Consequences ◽  
Genital Mutilation ◽  
Female Genital

Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a general health concern. The World Health Organization has recognized it as a condition that endangers women’s health. This review study aimed to identify the types of health outcomes of FGM. Therefore, a systematic review was conducted to create a critical view of the current evidence on the effect of circumcision on girls and women's health. In this study, we focused on the health risks of female circumcision. Academic databases such as PubMed, Science Direct, Scopus, Google Scholar, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, SID, IranMedex, Irandoc, and Magiran were searched with regard to the health consequences of FGM from January 1990 until 2018. Eleven review studies met the criteria and contained 288 relevant studies on the risks of FGM. It was suggested that FGM had various physical, obstetric, sexual, and psychological consequences. Women with FGM experienced mental disturbances (e.g., psychiatric diagnoses, anxiety, somatization, phobia, and low self-esteem) than other women. Our study can provide evidence on improving, changing behaviors, and making decisions on the quality of services offered to women suffering from FGM. [GMJ.2019;inpress:e1336]

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