Go On! 2012 Women & Justice Conference: Sexual Violence Against Girls in Southern Africa, at Cornell Law School

(Go On! is an occasional item on symposia and other events of interest)

The Avon Global Center for Women and Justice is hosting its Third Annual Women & Justice Conference, to be held at Cornell Law School in Ithaca, N.Y. on Thursday, October 18^th.  The topic of the conference, Sexual Violence Against Girls in Southern Africa, developed from an 18-month study on sexual violence against girls in schools in Zambia conducted by the Avon Global Center for Women & Justice and the Cornell International Human Rights Clinic together with Women and Law in Southern Africa, a non-governmental organization based in southern Africa.  Cornell Law School faculty and students travelled to Zambia twice to interview government officials, school teachers and administrators, and school girls in connection with a report that will be launched at the conference.  Of the 105 girls who were interviewed as part of the study, 54% said that they had personally experienced sexual violence or harassment by a teacher, student or man they encountered while travelling to or from school, while 84% reported that they had personally experienced or knew of classmates who had experienced such abuse.

Prof. Cynthia Bowman

Hon. Gertrude Chawatama

MacDonald Moot Court Room, Room 390 Myron Taylor Hall

Cornell Law School, Ithaca, N.Y. 
12 p.m. to 2 p.m.

Report Launch and Consultation: Discussion of “‘They are Destroying Our Futures’: Sexual Violence Against Girls in Zambia’s Schools” by a panel of experts in Ithaca, N.Y. and Lusaka, Zambia.  This event is co-sponsored by the U.S. Embassy in Zambia, which will host the simultaneous event in Lusaka, Zambia and connect participants in the two countries by videoconference.  Participants from Ithaca, N.Y. will include, among others, Cynthia Bowman, Dorothea S. Clarke Professor of Law, Cornell Law School; Elizabeth Brundige, Executive Director of the Avon Global Center for Women and Justice at Cornell Law School; Honorable Gertrude Chawatama, High Court of Zambia and Commissioner of the Kenya Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission; and Honorable Virginia Kendall, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.  Participants from Lusaka, Zambia will include Zambian government officials, including from the Ministry of Education, police, and judiciary, as well as representatives of civil society organizations.  The panel consultation will be an opportunity to engage in dialogue with Zambian policy makers to discuss the concerns and recommendations raised in the new Report released by the Center.  The Report will be available for download at www.womenandjustice.org prior to the event.  Please RSVP to Jamie Weber at jaw6@cornell.edu if you plan to attend. 

Elizabeth Brundige

Hon. Virginia Kendall

4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.  Live Webcast.

Keynote Address: The Denial of the Right to a Life Free of Violence for Girl Children: Keynote Address by Rashida Manjoo, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Its Causes and Consequences and Professor, Department of Public Law, University of Cape Town.  This lecture will be streamed live via webcast over the Internet.  Those watching online can submit questions and comments by email.  The URL for the webcast will be released at www.womenandjustice.org.

Hosted by Cornell's Avon Global Center for Women & Justice and co-sponsored with the Cornell Advocates for Human Rights; the Cornell Law School International Human Rights Clinic; the Cornell Law School Women’s Law Coalition; the Dorothea S. Clarke Program in Feminist Jurisprudence at Cornell Law School; the Institute for African Development at Cornell University; the United States Embassy in Lusaka, Zambia; The Virtue Foundation; Women and Law in Southern Africa – Zambia; and the University of Zambia School of Law

Read On! U.N. Special Rapporteur Manjoo on violence against women with disabilities

As previously reported by yours truly, Hope Lewis, and by my fellow IntLawGrrls contributor Stephanie Ortoleva, here, here, and in a recent Report available here,violence against women and girls with disabilities is an important, but often overlooked aspect of gender-based violence.
Now comes word that Rashida Manjoo, UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its causes and consequences, has reported on this issue to the UN General Assembly and will discuss the matter further at meetings later in October.
To download the report, go to “Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences,”  UN General Assembly - Third Committee - Social, Humanitarian & Cultural – Documentation, UN Doc. A/67/227 (3 August 2012).

Read On! Gender-related Killing of Women

IntLawGrrls readers will be interested in reviewing and citing a recent report by Rashida Manjoo, UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its Causes and Consequences.  This report, released in May, addresses a pervasive problem—the killing of women and girls because of their gender.  The problem is to be found everywhere in the world, but it is still masked because it has become normalized as an “ordinary” aspect of crime, war, poverty, or culture.  Consider the daily news: “domestic” killings, “honor” killings, killings of women who work in maquiladoras, killings of sex workers, killings of women and children in villages and refugee camps while men are gone to war, killings of women who violate norms of dress or appearance, killings of women with disabilities, killings of lesbian, bisexual, or transgender women, gender-based killings of women as a weapon of war and armed conflict, hate crime killings of women from different racial, religion, or ethnic groups, and killings of women who are political activists or human rights advocates.
Some have come to call such violence “femicide,” “gendercide,” or “hate crimes against women,” but, no matter the name, it is responsible for a major percentage of violence internationally and domestically.
According to this thematic report by Manjoo (pictured at top):

'Rather than a new form of violence, gender-related killings are the extreme manifestation of existing forms of violence against women. Such killings are not isolated incidents that arise suddenly and unexpectedly, but represent the ultimate act of violence which is experienced in a continuum of violence. Women subjected to continuous violence and living under conditions of gender-based discrimination and threat are always on death row, always in fear of execution.'

Globally, the prevalence of different manifestations of gender-related killings is reaching alarming proportions. Culturally and socially embedded, these manifestations continue to be accepted, tolerated or justified—with impunity as the norm. States‘ responsibility to act with due diligence in the promotion and protection of women‘s rights is largely lacking as regards the killing of women.

Read On! Violence Against Women with Disabilities

(Our thanks to IntLawGrrls for the opportunity to contribute this post)

As members of  a Working Group on Violence against Women with Disabilities, the two of us, Hope Lewis and Stephanie Ortoleva, are pleased to announce the release this month of a report entitled Forgotten Sisters: a Report on Violence Against Women with Disabilities—an Overview on its Nature, Scope, Causes, and Consequences. An abstract and the report are now available for download on SSRN here, and the 228-page report is also available here via the website of WomenEnabled, the education and advocacy project that Stephanie founded. In this post, we summarize some of the points explored in our report.

A Global Issue

IntLawGrrls readers know that the problem of violence against women is global (on violence against women with disabilities, see paragraph232(p) of the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, available here, and paragraph 69(j) of the “Beijing + 5” document on "Further actions and initiatives to implement the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action," summarized here.
Violence against women is pervasive; it shows no respect for class, disability, race, ethnicity, or religion.
There are more than 1 billion persons with disabilities worldwide. Many of them are women or girls, according to recent World Bank and World Health Organization reports linked here. Gender-based violence is an international and transnational issue. In response to increasing activism, advocacy, legislation, and judicial recognition, the international community and UN mechanisms should take additional note as well.
According to our report:

'The Working Group recognizes the need to ensure that women and girls with disabilities are included as full participants in data-gathering, analysis, and proposed solutions as the mandates of Ms. Rashida Manjoo, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its Causes and Consequences, and Mr. Shuaib Chalklen, the Special Rapporteur on Disability, move forward. Additionally, the Working Group calls on international organizations, especially those focused on women’s rights such as the UN Commission on the Status of Women (which will consider as its priority thematic issue violence against women at its 57th session in March 2013) and UN Women, and the international community, governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to join us in the effort to highlight these critical issues.
'Because women with disabilities make up a significant part of the world’s population, principles of fairness and equality require that the world engage in a vigorous discussion on how to end violence against them.'

Violence against women and girls with disabilities takes many forms. Women with disabilities experience violence in armed conflict situations, violence in the home from partners, other family members or caregivers, as well as inadequate or non-existent access to justice when they report such violations. They may be denied treatment for physical harms or literally and figuratively shut out from domestic violence shelters, police stations, courthouses, or doctors’ offices. The violence and isolation they experience may be exacerbated by poverty, employment or housing discrimination and social exclusion.

An Intersectionality Approach to Women with Disabilities

Although violence against women with disabilities occurs among every class, racial, ethnic, religious, and cultural category, such social and class distinctions make a difference when analyzing specific responses to violence as well as its nature, causes, and consequences in context.
Our report argues that effective responses will require multilayered local as well as global approaches:

Inter-American ruling invites global rethink of state protection against domestic violence

(Delighted to welcome back alumna Caroline Bettinger-López, who contributes this guest post)

In a landmark decision, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has found the United States responsible for human rights violations suffered more than a decade ago by Jessica Lenahan (below right), our client here at the Human Rights Clinic at the University of Miami School of Law. (photo credit)
The August 17 decision in Jessica Lenahan (Gonzales) v. United States also recommended changes to domestic violence law and policy. It thus creates an opportunity for governments throughout the Americas – indeed, throughout the world – to conduct introspective re-evaluations of their own domestic violence laws and policies and to make necessary changes and improvements.
The Lenahan decision came as a cathartic end to a long legal battle that had begun with a tragedy.
In 1999, Jessica’s daughters – Rebecca, Katheryn, and Leslie – were abducted by her estranged husband, Simon Gonzales. Jessica repeatedly called police in Castle Rock, Colorado, for help. But they dismissed her calls, telling her to wait until the father brought the children home. At one point they even called her “ridiculous.”
In the same 10-hour period, the police responded to a fire-lane violation, looked for a lost dog, and took a 2-hour dinner break.
Then Simon Gonzales drove up to the police station and began shooting. Officers returned fire, killing him. Afterwards, they found the bodies of Jessica’s 3 girls, shot to death inside the truck. Local authorities’ failure fully to investigate the circumstances provoked questions – about the cause, time, and place of their deaths – that remain to this day.
Jessica filed a federal civil rights suit. In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court (below left) struck a blow to Jessica’s cause, ruling in Castle Rock v. Gonzales that the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution did not require police to have enforced the restraining order Jessica had secured against her estranged husband. (photo credit)
Along with the decision in DeShaney v. Winnebago County (1989) – which effectively declared that the government typically has no duty to protect individuals from private acts of violence – the Supreme Court's decision in Gonzales denied important potential mechanisms for ensuring government accountability, and thus was detrimental to efforts to combat domestic violence.
Undeterred, Jessica then applied to the Inter-American Commission for relief. Representing her along with our clinic were the Columbia Law School Human Rights Clinic and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Welcoming the Commission’s August 17 decision, Jessica stated:

‘I have waited 12 years for justice, knowing in my heart that police inaction led to the tragic and untimely deaths of my three young daughters. Today’s decision tells the world that the government violated my human rights by failing to protect me and my children from domestic violence.’

The Commission’s determination that the United States failed to discharge a duty to protect its nationals from domestic violence has far-reaching implications.
After the decision issued, Rashida Manjoo, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on violence against women, said:

‘State inaction towards cases of violence against women fosters an environment of impunity and promotes the repetition of violence.’

In a visit to the United States earlier this year, Manjoo (prior IntLawGrrls posts) had declared:

‘In my discussions with government officials, victims, survivors, and advocates, including Jessica Lenahan, I found a lack of substantive protective legislation for domestic violence victims in the United States, as well as inadequate implementation of certain laws, policies and programs.’

The Commission’s decision called into question the domestic violence laws and policies of the United States, including the Supreme Court decisions mentioned above, for it:
► Made clear that many of the current laws and policies are inadequate to protect the human rights of domestic violence victims;
► Recognized that the United States has an affirmative obligation to protect individuals from discriminatory violence; and
► Urged comprehensive reform, at the local, state, and federal levels, in U.S. law and policy respecting violence against women.
As Manjoo said in her own 2011 report,

‘Violence against women is the most pervasive human rights violation which continues to challenge every country in the world, and the US is no exception.’

Especially when read in conjunction with the 2009 decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in the Cotton Fields case (IntLawGrrls' prior posts here and here), the Commission’s ruling in Lenahan also sets forth a framework for other nations to follow.
The decision makes clear that domestic violence is a human rights violation, and brings this point into the international spotlight. It is our hope that the decision impacts the way people perceive domestic violence. What happened to Jessica was an unfathomable tragedy. Moving forward, we hope that the decision will aid advocates to push for reforms that call for law enforcement accountability. We are hopeful that it represents an important step toward creating a world where governments and their agents will know that turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to domestic violence is not an option.

(My deep thanks to Luis Ramos, my student in the Human Rights Clinic at University of Miami School of Law, who coauthored this post with me)

The Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women: National Advocacy Strategies

(Thanks to IntLawGrrls for the opportunity to contribute this guest post)

Despite a historic blizzard that shut down the mid-Atlantic region in February 2010, an intimate meeting of gender and human rights advocates from all over the country took place in Charlottesville, Virginia with the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Rashida Manjoo. Fortunately, Rashida was in town already for a three week residency at the University of Virginia School of Law. Participants (pictured below right) included: IntLawGrrls guest/alumna Prof. Carrie Bettinger-López, Director of the Human Rights Clinic at the University of Miami School of Law; Anu Bhagwati, Service Women's Action Network (SWAN); Prof. Karen Czapanskiy, University of Maryland Law School; Jan Erickson, NOW Foundation; Attorney Deborah LaBelle; Rachel Natelson, National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty; Maya Raghu, Legal Momentum; IntLawGrrls guest/alumna Cindy Soohoo, Center for Reproductive Rights; Cheryl Thomas, The Advocates for Human Rights; Heidi Williamson, SisterSong; and yours truly, host and organizer of the event.
Rashida had already submitted a formal request to the United States government for an official mission under her mandate. Her interest in focusing on the United States, she explained, was triggered by the UN Human Rights Council's (and the UN in general's) shift to a more even-handed approach, which aims to ensure that scrutiny extends beyond the global South. Rashida said that she always hears statements about violence against women (VAW) being a serious problem in Asia or in Africa. “We must look at VAW through a global, universal lens, with some specificities, of course,” she noted.
In 1998, the first U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Radhika Coomaraswamy undertook an official United States mission in which she focused particularly on women in custodial settings. Rashida wanted to include some follow-up to Radhika’s 1999 prison report.
The roundtable aimed to identify the critical issues that U.S. advocates believed should be the focus of such a mission now. We concluded that the Special Rapporteur (SRVAW) would benefit most from being briefed by domestic advocates with respect to gaps and contradictions within national law and policy. Rashida explained that reports from interest groups and on particular facilities or statistical trends generally help shape her reports. In particular, the group acknowledged the importance of intersectionality (pp. 6-21), and the due diligence standard with respect to violence against women (and which are the focus of the Special Rapporteur’s second and third thematic reports this year and in 2012, respectively).
Over the course of the subsequent ten months, a large advocacy network around the country held phone conferences and five teams drafted comprehensive briefing papers for the Special Rapporteur. The papers, authored by a broad range of academics and women's rights advocates and lawyers, focused on:

1. Domestic Violence;
   
2. Violence Against Women in Detention;
3. Violence Against Women in the U.S. Military
4. The Role of Guns in Perpetrating Violence Against Women; and
   
5. Due Diligence Obligations of the United States in the Case of Violence Against Women.

(The briefing papers, which were coordinated and edited by the University of Virginia International Human Rights Clinic, are currently being edited for publication as a resource volume which will be available later this summer.)
The SRVAW's United States mission took place from January 24 to February 7, 2011, with meetings in Washington D.C., North Carolina, Florida, California, Minnesota and New York. At the local level, Rashida met with tribal authorities in the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, North Carolina; and with state and county authorities in St. Paul and Minneapolis, Minnesota. She visited three prisons and detention facilities managed by federal and state authorities, including the Glades County Detention Center in Florida; and two of the facilities visited by Radhika Coomaraswamy in 1998: the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, California and the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla. Rashida cancelled a planned visit the Monmouth County Correctional Institution in New Jersey because she was not granted full access to speak with inmates. She also asked the U.S. government to visit a military base two weeks before the mission started, and reiterated the request upon commencement of the mission. She was informed that Department of Defense protocol was unable to accommodate the request on such short notice.
The Special Rapporteur's report on the mission to the United States was delivered June 3, 2011 at the Human Rights Council session in Geneva. It

broadly examines the situation of violence against women in the country, including such issues as violence in custodial settings, domestic violence, violence against women in the military, and violence against women who face multiple, intersecting forms of discrimination, particularly Native-American, immigrant, and African-American women.

Rashida’s focus on the combined issues of race and class is critical to addressing the structural nature of the problem of violence against women. For example, she highlights the increasing number of immigrant and African American women in prisons and detention facilities, and calls upon the government to address the root causes of this trend, paying attention to the intersectional challenges.
She acknowledges the positive legislative and policy initiatives the U.S. government has taken to reduce the occurrence of violence against women. Nevertheless, Rashida concludes that

the lack of substantive protective legislation at federal and state levels, and the inadequate implementation of current laws, policies and programs, has resulted in the continued prevalence of violence against women and the discriminatory treatment of victims, with particularly detrimental effects on poor, minority and immigrant women. [The report notes that] implementation of current policy and programmatic initiatives must address the persistent structural challenges which are often both the causes and consequences of violence against women.

This thoughtful and comprehensive report on the causes and consequences of violence against women in the United States is a call to all of us to redouble our efforts in supporting and pressing the government to act consistently and with due diligence in its policies and resources to eradicate the problems at all levels. The advocacy network is planning a series of events in conjunction with Rashida’s report to the UN General Assembly in New York in October. For more information and to get involved, contact me.

Ubuntu at Graduation--and Beyond

This year’s Northeastern University School of Law commencement speaker was United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Rashida Manjoo (Northeastern University News photo, left). We’ve posted about her mandate and missions here and here.
Manjoo, and her husband Cassim, visited our community at a time of great opportunity and great challenge for newly-minted lawyers.
Yours truly, IntLawGrrl Hope Lewis, had the honor of reading the following citation as her Honorary Doctor of Laws was conferred:

Rashida Manjoo, gifted lawyer, visionary legal scholar, tireless advocate for women’s rights--
As Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women for the United Nations Human Rights Council, you hold nations accountable for
meeting international standards that protect the human rights of women everywhere.
In your role at the International Criminal Court, as an advisor to the Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice, you have applied your legal acumen, experience, compassion, and boundless energy to bring the
force of international law to securing women’s rights.
During South Africa’s transition from apartheid to democracy, you helped codify the rights of women in the South African constitution, and founded programs to ensure the efficacy of the nation’s
domestic-violence laws.

Looking out at our talented and committed class of 2011 as this remarkable and experienced "people's lawyer" was speaking, I thought back to my law school graduation 25 years ago. The mid-1980s was also a time of great opportunity and challenges for progressive lawyers.

25 Years of Challenges and Opportunities for International Law
No one knew what the future held. In that quarter century we’ve seen the fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold War; ethnic cleansing and genocide in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda; the end of formal apartheid in South Africa; new jurisprudence on economic, social, and cultural rights from South Africa, India, Colombia, Venezuela, and Europe; the groundbreaking Beijing Fourth World Conference on Women; the rise of the internet as a human rights tool; large-scale terrorist attacks on civilians in Kenya, Tanzania, the United States, Bali, England, Russia, India, Pakistan, Iraq, and the Philippines; efforts to legitimize the arbitrary detention, torture, or abuse of suspects under the guise of counterterrorism measures; the creation of the UN Human Rights Council; UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on women and peace; the creation of UNWomen; the establishment of a permanent International Criminal Court; increasing scrutiny on violence against women in all its forms; a remarkable set of “people power” demonstrations in North Africa and the Middle East; the Responsibility to Protect; Security Council Resolution 1974; awful stories of hundreds of migrants dying in rickety boats off the coasts of the U.S., Spain, Italy, Libya, and Australia or in the deserts of North Africa and the United States; and the global collapse of “business as usual” in financial systems.
Each of these promising, or horrendous, events has involved the rule of law and the lawyers who interpret it.
Lawyering with Ubuntu
Special Rapporteur Manjoo, noting Northeastern’s commitment to social justice lawyering, reminded the audience about the great African philosophical concept of ubuntu. Roughly translated, the word means “I am what I am because of who we all are.” As Manjoo pointed out, the concept reflects the importance of a collective, as well as individual, sense of responsibility and care.
Many of our law students are going off to interpret trade agreements or the impact of multinational businesses on their workers and neighbors, to help prosecute international and domestic crimes, to work with international or regional organizations, or to battle human trafficking, public and private violence against women, poverty, or racism for community-based NGOs. Many will look for work in traditional law firms, corporate settings, or governmental departments.

All of them (and all of us) will do well to keep the concept of ubuntu in mind, no matter what the next 25 years bring.
Heartfelt congratulations to all the graduates, wherever they are in the world!

Violence Against Women: UN Fact-finding Visit to U.S.

As reported by IntLawGrrls Johanna Bond, Beth Van Schaack, and yours truly, Hope Lewis in posts here, Rashida Manjoo (pictured), a former South Africa Gender Commissioner, is the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, its Causes and Consequences.

Now, there's welcome news that Manjoo will be conducting a fact-finding visit to the United States of America beginning on Monday, 24 January and running through 7 February 2011. (See UN Press Release here.)
The visit is an important opportunity for organizations working to end gender-based and family violence as well as the individual women and girls who are at risk of such violence to be heard in an international context. At informal meetings sponsored by NGOs, women and girls will be able to talk with the rapporteur directly in order to identify failures or successes in state compliance, spread the word about best practices, and, most importantly, discuss specific effective strategies to prevent and remedy violence against women at local, national, and international levels.
Intersectionality and Interdependence
As Johanna Bond discusses in her post, Manjoo and some other special rapporteurs take an “intersectional” approach. Intersectionality recognizes the multiple aspects of identity (including dimensions like gender, race, culture, class, sexual orientation, and disability) that influence human experience. Manjoo has also reaffirmed the importance of the interdependence of civil, political, economic, social, and cultural human rights in preventing and remedying violence against women.
Plans for the Visit
An excerpt from the press release appears below:

GENEVA – The United Nations Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Rashida Manjoo, will conduct an official fact-finding mission to the United States from the 24th of January to the 7th of February 2011. “During my visit, I intend to meet with national stakeholders involved in fighting all aspects related to violence against women, with a view to appreciate the phenomenon in the United States,” said the human rights expert, who will visit the country at the invitation of the Government. The Special Rapporteur will travel to Washington D.C., North Carolina, Florida, California, Minnesota and New York City, where she will discuss the issue with government authorities at both the federal and the state levels, and with representatives of civil society. The Special Rapporteur will also visit shelters and detention centers and she will meet with individual victims of gender-based violence. A press conference on the initial findings of the visit will be held at the United Nations Information Center in Washington (1775 K ST NW, Suite 400, Washington DC) on Monday February 7 at 1 p.m. Based on the information obtained during the visit, Ms. Manjoo will present a report with her final findings and recommendations to a forthcoming session of the Human Rights Council.
Ms. Rashida Manjoo (South Africa) was appointed Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences in June 2009 by the UN Human Rights Council, for an initial period of three years. As Special Rapporteur, she is independent from any government or organization and serves in her individual capacity. Ms. Manjoo is also a Professor at the Department of Public Law at the University of Cape Town.
Additional information on the mandate of the Special Rapporteur, is available here and the OHCHR Country Page for the United States is available here.

Intersectionality and the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Rashida Manjoo, will present a thematic report to the Human Rights Council in June 2011. Manjoo’s report will focus on intersectional forms of discrimination in the context of violence against women. Manjoo, who has held the appointment of Special Rapporteur since 2009, comes to the office with impressive credentials from her years as an advocate of the High Court of South Africa, as the former South African Parliamentary Commissioner of the Commission on Gender Equality, and as an accomplished activist focusing on violence against women within South Africa.
The Special Rapporteur should be applauded for undertaking the research to produce a report on intersectionality and violence and to bring it to the attention of the Human Rights Council. Not since the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia, and Related Intolerance, has the Special Rapporteur’s office engaged with issues of intersectionality in such a meaningful way. In 2001, the then-Special Rapporteur, Radhika Coomaraswamy, issued a report in preparation for the World Conference that was important in challenging the U.N.’s historical tendency to compartmentalize human rights abuses as either the result of gender discrimination or racial discrimination -- but not both. In the past, I have critiqued the U.N. human rights treaty bodies’ tendency to neatly compartmentalize forms of discrimination rather than explore their intersections. I am encouraged to see the Special Rapporteur’s office undertake to study the myriad ways in which women are targeted for violence based not only on gender but also on their membership in ethnic, religious, sexual, and other minority communities.

How to End Violence?

So much of what we international lawyers do is aimed at preventing, ending, or responding to violence. Wouldn't it be lovely to make that aspect of our jobs obsolete?
Unfortunately, as illustrated by IntLawGrrls' numerous writings on the subject (including Naomi's post earlier today), violence—by states, by groups, by individuals—endures as a pervasive plague in almost every society. International legal organizations, states, and the lawyers who assist them try to prevent or constrain state violence through norms on aggression and the use of force, the conduct of war or armed conflict, human rights violations, or international crimes. But many civilians also experience violence perpetrated by non-state actors (insurgent groups, paramilitary units, terrorists, and family members). Often, they are targeted, at least in part, because of their gender, age, race, religion, sexual orientation, nationality, or other status.

Gender-Based Violence
This week marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (25 November; prior post). Rashida Manjoo, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women (on whom we’ve posted here), issued a statement outlining plans for her mandate. Manjoo called for “timely and focused attention” on three themes:

►reparations to women for wrongs committed in contexts of peace, conflict, post-conflict and transitional justice settings;
►prevention strategies including those which promote women’s empowerment and engagement in challenging patriarchal interpretations of norms, values and rights; and
►multiple, intersecting and aggravated forms of discrimination affecting women and leading to increased levels of violence and limitation or denial of their human rights.

Roles of Men
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued parallel statements to mark the day as well. Interestingly, one of his statements focused on the roles of men in ending violence against women. The statement recognizes that men and boys must also be engaged, committed, and involved in efforts to end gender-based violence. Secretary-General Ban announced the launching of a network of male leaders charged with taking proactive steps, in collaboration with existing women’s organizations, to address gender-based violence. The new network is part of the “UNiTE to End Violence Against Women” initiative he launched in 2008.

As I launch this Network, I call on men and boys everywhere to join us. Break the silence. When you witness violence against women and girls, do not sit back. Act. Advocate. Unite to change the practices and attitudes that incite, perpetrate and condone this violence. Violence against women and girls will not be eradicated until all of us – men and boys – refuse to tolerate it….

According to a UN Press release,

he cited positive actions that men are already taking, such as judges whose decisions have paved the way for fighting abuse in the workplace, networks of men who counsel male perpetrators of violence, and national leaders who have publicly committed to leading the movement of men to break the silence.

Such efforts must begin early and locally in homes, schools, religious and community institutions. Educators and community activists must work with young people to build cross-gender and cross-cultural understanding, respect, and non-violent approaches to problem-solving. National governments must prevent the economic, social, and cultural rights violations that intersect with the causes and consequences of violence. And, at the international level, political and military leaders, diplomats, and multinational business leaders also must show that they, too, can learn such lessons. They can do so by promoting and adhering to laws against aggression, the threat or use of weapons of mass destruction, targeting of civilian populations, and the reckless trade in small arms.

(Photo: Leymah Glowee, Liberian peacebuilding activist and a subject of the documentary film, "Pray the Devil Back to Hell," about women peace activists. Photo Credit: Robin Holland.)

Violence Against Women in the United States

The University of Virginia School of Law International Human Rights Law Clinic (directed by Deena Hurwitz (left)) is conducting a survey on "Issues of Violence against Women in the United States" within the framework of the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women’s mandate. The goal is to solicit from practitioners and engaged academics the most critical issues in this country for presentation to Rashida Manjoo (below right), the current Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women (SRVAW). The Clinic intends to formally request that Manjoo undertake a mission to the United States.
The Clinic is seeking would appreciate input from IntLawGrrls bloggers and readers. If you're interested, you can email the Clinic at js2kc@virginia.edu. They hope to receive responses no later than 23 November 2009.

The Clinic would like the following information in any submission:

• Name and title.
• Contact information.
• Your area of expertise, background, or experience with respect to your opinion, as well as region of the country you work in or have focused on.
• What you think are the most important issues of violence against women in the U.S. that the SRVAW could address?
• What you see as the contributing factors leading to these problems?
• What should the government be doing to address these issues?
• What legal, policy, and/or advocacy avenues are currently available or being pursued to redress these problems?
• What legal, policy, and/or advocacy avenues could or should be pursued?

The Special Rapporteur's mandate involves the following tasks:

1. Seek and receive information on violence against women (VAW), including its causes and its consequences, especially regarding a state’s failure to meet its obligations to prevent public and private VAW when possible, investigate and punish perpetrators of VAW, and provide adequate remedies to the victims of VAW.
2. Consider the state’s responsibility in addressing factors that contribute to VAW in the civil, cultural, economic, political, and social sphere.
3. Conduct country visits to 2-3 countries a year to investigate these issues.
4. Establish a dialogue with the country by communicating with governmental and non-governmental organizations, and to make recommendations at both the local and national level on methods to eliminate VAW and its causes, and to provide remedies for its consequences. Such dialogue is intended for clarification to ensure the effective prevention, investigation, and punishment of VAW and compensation for victims in cooperation with the government.
5. Write a mission report containing her findings and recommendations to be published in the annual thematic report and address the Human Rights Council.

Grrls - get writing!

Gender-based violence: Special rapporteur appointed

The United Nations Human Rights Council (photo below) approved Rashida Manjoo’s appointment as the new UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women its Causes and Consequences on 18 June 2009, according to a UN press release. Manjoo (above, photo credit) is a leading gender rights, anti-apartheid, and social justice advocate. The Special Rapporteur’s mandate, established in 1994, and extended in 2003, is to investigate, and to make recommendations at international, regional, and national levels on ending, gender-based violence (GBV).
Often treated as a marginal issue by governments, GBV is a global phenomenon and impacts people at all levels of society. It occurs in every country and culture and takes a range of forms, including the following:
►Family Violence: domestic violence/honor killings, female genital cutting, violently enforced appearance regulation, female infanticide, and abuses against girls, elders, and women with disabilities;
►Violence in the Community: rape, trafficking in women and girls, lack of access to reproductive health care, forced sterilization, the misuse of medical techniques to “control” women, and violence aimed at preventing the education of girls;
►State Violence and State-condoned Violence: GBV against women in detention, the use of rape, forced pregnancy, and other forms of sexual violence as weapons of war or armed conflict.
Groundbreaking international human rights instruments such as the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women and General Recommendation No. 19 (issued by the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women) elaborate on the significant roles states and private actors must play in ending GBV.
Manjoo, an Advocate of the High Court of South Africa, served on that country’s constitutionally-prescribed Commission on Gender Equality from 2001 to 2006. She held research and teaching positions in international human rights law and advocacy and family law as a Clinical Instructor and Visiting Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Human Rights Program and as the E. Desmond Lee Visiting Professor for Global Awareness at Webster University. Manjoo writes and speaks extensively on women’s rights and other social justice issues.
A member of the international board of Women Living Under Muslim Laws, she is an internationally-recognized expert on the implications of cultural and religious context for gender rights and the socio-economic status of women and girls.
Rashida Manjoo is the third Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, following the appointments of Dr. Radhika Coomaraswamy (Sri Lanka) in 1994, and Dr. Yakin Ertürk (Turkey) in 2003.
IntLawGrrls look forward to a continued international spotlight on GBV and to the realization of a safer and more peaceful world for all.