LITERATURE REVIEW
2.3 WOMEN’S RIGHTS
Scholars have traced the development of health rights to the series of struggles on human rights that predated the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.68 Anne-Emanuelle Birn sees the relationship between health and human rights as crucial for humanity to flourish. According to her, the struggle for health and human rights is a continuous process - due to the dynamism of the subsisting society. 69 The author expounds on the various efforts made in the development of health and human rights through these themes: shared idealism, bearing witness, legislation,
64 Adedokun et al., note 60 (above).53.
65 Ibid.
66 R.H. Freymeyer & B.E. Johnson “Exploration of attitudes towards female genital cutting in Nigeria” (2007) 26 Population Research and Policy Review 69-83.
67 Ibid.
68 A. Emanuelle Birn “Health and human rights: Historical perspectives and political challenges” (2008) 29 Journal of Public Health Policy 32, 32-41; D. Tarantola “A perspective on the history of health and human rights from Cold War to Gold War” (2008) 29 Journal of Public Health Policy 42, 42-53.
69 Birn, note 68 (above).
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enforcement, accountability, and the underlying determinants. Tarantola sees human rights as the right a person has by virtue of existence – a position that has gained global recognition and convergence in health and human rights since the end of Cold War.70
Subsequent development gave rise to the division of the UDHR into two: the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Tarantola argues that this division has a negative effect on the economic, social and cultural rights – because it relegated these rights to aspirational status unlike civil and political rights which are viewed as being more justiciable. Considering the status of human and health rights during the Cold War, the author notes that international attention was given to health challenges faced by developing countries during the War. Consequently, it was affirmed at the Alma Ata conference in 1978, that health is a fundamental human right.71
However, the emergence of HIV drove the focus on health issues. Thus, the health and human rights concepts, principles and practice owe much to the response to the HIV scourge. Tarantola explains the connection between health and human rights, and goes further to examine the level of expansion of these rights – since its inception. Tarantola believes that further progress in the area of health and human rights can only be achieved through research, practice and advocacy, and a stronger role for health practitioners.72
Isobel Coleman observes that women‟s rights have gained prominence in the international system and attracted support from donors and development agencies.73 Nevertheless, “significant gender disparity continues to exist, and in some cases, to grow, in three regions: Southern Asia, the Middle East, and sub-Saharan Africa”.74 However, she acknowledges significant improvements in women empowerment – especially in the Middle East, where religious beliefs encourage gender disparities. Coleman explores the importance of women empowerment and advancement in the political arena, but does not focus on the basic reproductive health rights of women. Political empowerment is insufficient to ensure that women reach their full potential;
there is also a need to respect and guarantee their reproductive health rights.
70 Tarantola, note 68 (above).
71 Idem
72 Idem 49.
73 I. Coleman “The pay off from women‟s rights” (2004) 83 Foreign Affairs 80.
74 Idem 81.
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It is apt to ask, at this juncture, what these rights are. Charlotte Bunch contends that “many violations of women's human rights are distinctly connected to being female – that is, women are discriminated against and abused on the basis of gender”.75 Some of the violation that affects the rights of women includes sexual abuse, being held as political prisoners, persecution arising from being a member of an ethnic group, sexual assault during war, or violence. The UDHR of 1948 provides a framework for the continuous definition of the scope and for the protection of the dignity of individual citizens across the globe.76 Not only did it make human rights a global affair, but it created a “transnational activism and concern about the lives of people globally”.77 It also laid the foundation for constant review and the identification of a series of neglected rights on marginalisation and abuse.78 Article 2 of the UDHR, for instance, set the pace for the contemporary activism in the promotion of rights of women in all ramifications.79 This is in tandem with the principle and purpose of the Charter of the United Nations that sought to promote and encourage “respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction".80 The intendment of this Article is partly to address the issue of subordination of women in society – as recognised by some cultural and traditional practices.81 Thus, the Article broke all forms of cultural inhibitions placed upon the exercise and protection of the specific rights peculiar to women. Generally, “female subordination runs so deep that it is still viewed as inevitable or natural, rather than seen as a politically constructed reality maintained by patriarchal interests, ideology, and institution”.82
Bunch is one of the advocates for the adoption of a comprehensive approach to the understanding of the need to protect and promote the rights of women. According to her, it is
75 Charlotte Bunch “Women‟s rights as human rights: Toward a re-vision of human rights” (1990) 12 Human Rights Quarterly 486.
76 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted on 10 December 1948, G.A. Res.2 17A (III), U.N. Doc. A/810 (1948).
77 Bunch, note 75 (above) 487.
78 Rosalind Pollack Petchesky “From population control to reproductive rights: Feminist fault lines” (1995) 3 Reproductive Health Matters 152, 152-161.
79 Article 2 guarantees the entitlement of all individuals to “the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status”.
80 Laura Reanda “Human rights and women's rights: The United Nations approach” (1981) 3 Human Rights Quarterly 11.
81 T.I. Emerson et al. “The Equal Rights Amendment: A constitutional basis for equal rights for women” (1971) 80 The Yale Law Journal 871, 871-985.
82 Bunch, note 75 (above) 491.
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expedient for the interests of the female gender to be more visible in the transformation of the
“concept and practice of human rights in our culture so that it takes better account of women's lives”.83 She notes that though some aspects of the women's rights actually “fit into a civil liberties framework, but much of the abuse against women is part of a larger socio-economic web that entraps women, making them vulnerable to abuses which cannot be delineated as exclusively political or solely caused by states”.84 She identifies some basic life-threatening practices in the life-cycle of the female gender - such as life before birth, life during childhood, and life in adulthood.85 This adulthood life cycle brings to the fore the basic rights associated mostly with women.
Although various international instruments fought for the principle of equality between the sexes, it took years before specific rights of women were given global attention.86 Reanda notes
“the interpretation and implementation of these instruments by the competent organs has fallen far short of ensuring their full applicability to women as an oppressed and vulnerable social group”.87 She identifies discriminatory practices that keep women in subservient positions - to include discrimination in nutrition and health care, violence in the family, rape and denial of the right to abortion, exclusion from public life, or life-threatening traditional customs and practices.88
The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women89 points out some other discriminatory practices against women, such as customary laws and practices based on stereotypes of the superiority or inferiority of either sex and unequal opportunities in education and employment. Others are inequality regarding the rights of nationality of married women and their children, discrimination against rural women, access to health-care such as family planning, inequality of women and men before the law in terms of the ability to contract and administer property and marriage and family relations – including free choice and equality of
83 Bunch, note 75 (above) 487.
84 Idem 488-489.
85 Reanda, note 80 (above).
86 Ibid.
87 Idem 12.
88 Idem 13.
89 Catherine Tinker “Human rights for women: The U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1981) 3(11) Human Rights Quarterly 33.
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rights and responsibilities. Inherent in all this discrimination is the reproductive health rights of women. Although these rights are susceptible to social and political control, nevertheless,
“women have the right to reproductive freedom and control over their bodies, and … this is essential if they are to have full and equal opportunity in society”.90