The topic I will be examining is “Gender and Human Rights” by Serena Parekh, and focusing on the impact gender has on human rights. These are two separate issues and that should be addressed separately because when addressing these issues as one of the same it diminishes the individual’s real challenges. These challenges in both public and private realms of being able to attain visibility for these individual’s human rights. We need to incorporate these experiences in being able to counteract the structural changes that are needed to bringing human rights for all. There is no denying that gender does have an impact on human rights, but Parekh’s argument is for us to examine where these challenges that we face in both gender and human rights
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The specific changes in legal norms they challenged is the struggles to attain full protection in a private sphere. These two documents of the CEDAW and the DEVAH challenged the traditional paradigm of how human rights were viewed in regards to women’s visibility. The demand was that in order for full equality we must address that violence against women is a human rights issue and therefore is a violations of those rights. CEDAW focuses on the private sphere aspect, it was the first significant legally binding convention that addressed women’s human rights. It implemented Article 5 which now enforced government agencies to be accountable to make active changes to policies and customs that are based on stereotypes and enforce the belief that women are inferior. The impact of this article allowed for government to act out against these discriminations that are repeatedly done to women and argued for more substantial legal equality in both the private and public political sphere. Although this is great efforts in the fight for equity there are still flaws in how successful this article can be for some countries where the cultural traditions or beliefs that differ in these terms for women. “In order for …show more content…
It concludes with a statement, “Human rights, in order to be effective, must challenge its structural injustices”, and I believe that until we address the disproportionate gender based injustices are culturally constructed it will never really be solved. Even though there has been much advancement since the 1970’s and its major movements, there still needs to have a higher emphasis on visibility of injustices done in both public and private spheres. Women’s rights are human rights, but women also have other needs that need to be acknowledged and categorized separately, just as men do too. The issue of civil rights and women's are one and the same because we have culturally cultivated this to be an issue when it shouldn't be. A woman’s body is not battlefield of a conference table to negotiate over and ultimately I believe that autonomy and individuality should be inherent rather than a
The specific changes in legal norms they challenged is the struggles to attain full protection in a private sphere. These two documents of the CEDAW and the DEVAH challenged the traditional paradigm of how human rights were viewed in regards to women’s visibility. The demand was that in order for full equality we must address that violence against women is a human rights issue and therefore is a violations of those rights. CEDAW focuses on the private sphere aspect, it was the first significant legally binding convention that addressed women’s human rights. It implemented Article 5 which now enforced government agencies to be accountable to make active changes to policies and customs that are based on stereotypes and enforce the belief that women are inferior. The impact of this article allowed for government to act out against these discriminations that are repeatedly done to women and argued for more substantial legal equality in both the private and public political sphere. Although this is great efforts in the fight for equity there are still flaws in how successful this article can be for some countries where the cultural traditions or beliefs that differ in these terms for women. “In order for …show more content…
It concludes with a statement, “Human rights, in order to be effective, must challenge its structural injustices”, and I believe that until we address the disproportionate gender based injustices are culturally constructed it will never really be solved. Even though there has been much advancement since the 1970’s and its major movements, there still needs to have a higher emphasis on visibility of injustices done in both public and private spheres. Women’s rights are human rights, but women also have other needs that need to be acknowledged and categorized separately, just as men do too. The issue of civil rights and women's are one and the same because we have culturally cultivated this to be an issue when it shouldn't be. A woman’s body is not battlefield of a conference table to negotiate over and ultimately I believe that autonomy and individuality should be inherent rather than a