Feminist critiques of human rights tend to\npresent two main arguments. First, human rights discourses\u2019 reinforcement of\nthe private vs. public sphere. Secondly, that the precarious nature of an\nemphasis on the \u201cright to culture\u201d is a tool of repression for women. Additionally, Third World Feminists emphasize\nthat the focus on the \u201cuniversality\u201d of women\u2019s rights homogenizes the\nexperiences of women who are unable to identify with mainstream feminist\nrhetoric. These women must situate their\nown experiences within the context of other rights they lack due to their race,\nethnicity, social class\/caste or identity within indigenous communities. This essay will present the feminist views of\nthe private vs. public sphere debate, critiques related to an emphasis on\ncultural rights, and criticisms presented regarding the universalizing of\nwomen\u2019s experiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Patriarchy is a gender arrangement that is\ncharacterized by men\u2019s domination of women in all or most aspects of society. It emphasizes the essentialist nature of\ngender and gender roles. It is built\nupon the idea that roles for men and women are fundamentally set and\nclear. In most societies maleness is the\nnorm and femaleness becomes the other (Fleay, 2018). Patriarchy also reinforces gender as a binary,\nestablishing rigid categories that, while evolving, are a cornerstone of most\nWestern cultures. \u201cPatriarchy is\nessential to the understanding of gender inequality\u201d (Johnson, 1997)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n This is the context in which the Universal\nDeclaration of Human Rights and the Covenants were developed. Built upon theories of \u201cnatural rights\u201d\ndeveloped during the Enlightenment when rights were extended only to propertied\nwhite men, the documents reinforced ideas which existed in 1948 during the\ndevelopment of the declaration and later in 1966 with the two covenants. Even the women involved in the development of\nthe declaration likely held ideologies that emphasized men\u2019s experiences as\ncentral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Public vs. Private Sphere Debate <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The separation of private and public spheres\nis evident throughout the development of human rights discourse. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights\nreinforced these spheres with an emphasis on the importance of \u201cfamily\u201d. While there is evidence of this throughout\nthe document (for example, \u201chuman family\u201d in the preamble), the most pronounced\ninstances appear in Article 12 and 16 (Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Article 12 states that \u201cNo one shall be\nsubjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or\ncorrespondence\u2026. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against\nsuch interference or attacks.\u201d (Universal\n Declaration of Human Rights, 1948).<\/em> For most women around the world, the private\nsphere, including home and family, is the environment where they are the most\nlikely to experience human rights abuses. \nThe U.N. notes that 1 in 3 women will experience some form of intimate\nviolence and less than 40% of the worlds women have been able to access help or\nsupport (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2015). In \u201cFeminist Analysis of Human Rights Law\u201d Shazia\nQureshi recounts Engles\u2019 references to the precarious conditions of women’s\nlives, and quotes \u201cmost feminists view the private sphere as the ‘locus of women’s\noppression’\u201d (Qureshi, 2012). (Engle, n.d.). This \u201cbifurcation\u201d of spheres, makes the\nprivate sphere virtually untouchable by the state, providing few remedies for\nwomen in their own homes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Additionally, Article 16 sets forth the\ncentral unit of society as \u201cthe family\u201d. \nIt states, \u201cThe family is the natural and fundamental group unit of\nsociety and is entitled to protection by society and the State\u201d (Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948). <\/em>In addition to the specific view of the\nfamily articulated by this Article (that of man and woman, not kinship networks\nor other alternative family structures), it centralizes the experiences of\nwomen in relationship to family. While\nother Articles attempt to be \u201cgender neutral\u201d this Article specifically places women\u2019s\nrole within the family and centralizes it. \nWhile it is the only Article that creates a distinct set of rights for\nwomen, those rights are within the context of family and marriage. Binion identifies the fundamental problem\nwith this approach. She states \u201cA\nseparate spheres approach has relegated women to the home, away from\u2026”public\ninstitutions that determine the nature and quality of life in a community…and\n\u2026subject to the control of patriarchal familial authorities\u2026therefore, beyond\nthe scope of governmental authority and intervention\u201d (Binion, 1995)<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Emphasizing \u201cCultural Rights\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Arguments in the development of human rights\nhave frequently emphasized the \u201cwesternization\u201d of rights. Efforts to draw distinctions between\nindividual rights and collective rights have resulted in continued debate on\nhow to implement rights most effectively. \nFor women, this is not grounded in their lived experiences. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The emphasizing of \u201ccultural rights\u201d is\nevident in the bifurcation of civil and political rights from economic, social\nand cultural rights. In 1966 the UN\nNational Assembly adopted the dual Covenants of \u201cCivil and Political Rights\u201d\nand \u201cEconomic, Social and Cultural Rights\u201d (The Minnesota Human Rights\n Resource Center). While this was an attempt to implement rights\nschemes and meet the demands of states adverse to the imposition of \u201cWestern\nLiberal Values\u201d, this bifurcation of covenants had its greatest impact on women\u2019s\naccess to rights. By reinforcing the separation\nof rights as \u201ccultural\u201d or \u201cpolitical\u201d it served as a legal reframing of the\n\u201cprivate\u201d vs. \u201cpublic\u201d spheres debate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While, feminists disagree as to whether this\nbifurcation of rights advantages or disadvantages women, advocates of \u201ccultural\nrights\u201d frequently argue limiting state intervention when cultural practices limit\nwomen\u2019s power and bodily autonomy. Binion\nobserves that \u201cfeminist scholars have asked why culture appears to be a defense\nonly in regard to gender roles and to the governmental and nongovernmental\ndenials of fundamental rights to women.\u201d (Binion, 1995).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Universalizing Women\u2019s Experiences<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWomen\u2019s Rights are Human Rights\u201d has served\nas a catalyst for a mainstreaming of the experiences of women in relationship\nto human rights. Charlotte Bunch notes\nthat it became a \u201cguiding framework\u201d for integrating women\u2019s experiences into\nhuman rights discussions, \u201cdevelopment and other aspects of the UN operations\u201d (Bunch, 2013). <\/p>\n\n\n\n In \u201cFeminist praxis and women\u2019s human rights\u201d\nLaura Parisi lays out the balancing act of feminist contributions to human\nrights discourse. She documents the\nefforts of early western feminists to ensure that the private and public sphere\ngap was intentionally filled. They\nemphasized the political and civil rights of women. However, she notes that these rights did not\naddress the experiences of women in most parts of the world which included\nissues of poverty, malnutrition and population, frequently grounded in cultural\nand economic, not political realms. (Parisi, 2002)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collins et al express concern about this\n\u201cmainstreaming approach\u201d to human rights through the articulation of the\nstories of women who are human rights workers. \nThey write about the diversity of women\u2019s experiences in\nrelationship to the \u201cframing\u201d of women\u2019s rights. By providing examples of women whose social\nlocation is intersectional, they challenge the notion of a universal women\u2019s\nexperience (Dana Collins, 2010). Similarly, in \u201cWe are Not Victims, We are the\nProtagonists of this History\u201d Viviana Beatriz Macmanus points out that women\u2019s experiences related to\nhuman rights discourse are frequently captioned as \u201cvictims\u201d, particularly\nvictims of sexualized violence and familial abuse. Without denying that these are experiences\nthat impact women around the world, she is concerned that a simple narrative of\n\u201csexual assault victim\u201d for women may not contextualize their full experience\nand ensure their protection in the vast range of human rights abuses they\nexperience, including as political activists. \nShe identifies a gender normative approach to feminist and human rights\nscholarship that \u201creduces women\u2019s histories of resistance to their experiences\nas passive victims of sexual violence and\/or as grieving mothers and partners.\u201d\nand by doing so reinforces hierarchal structures of women as subordinate and\npassive (Macmanus, 2015).<\/p>\n\n\n\n A primary feature of feminist critique is its\nability to look inward. While it is a\npertinent practice to analyze the existing norms and ideology that disadvantage\nwomen outside of feminist circles, it is just as critical to look within for\nareas of continued growth. Therefore, feminist\ncritique is not reserved for documents, ideas and cultural traditions developed\nby men in a patriarchal society but is also used as a tool to view internal biases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the conceptualization of human rights\nprovides a mechanism by which we can measure and account for human needs and\nstate responsibility, it is also constructed within social norms. Those norms advantage certain individuals\nover others, providing a shaky foundation on which to build the rights of the\ndisadvantaged. Charlotte Bunch describes\nthe events leading up to Vienna as a method of incorporating women\u2019s\nexperiences that did not attempt an \u201cadd and stir\u201d approach (Bunch, 2013). The question remains, without a new approach that\ninvolves women\u2019s diverse experiences, can the documents developed to protect\nall humans really claim universality? <\/p>\n\n\n\n Feminist critique has challenged the idea of\nprivate and public spheres and emphasized the falsely developed dichotomy. It has called attention to the problems of\nviewing \u201cculture\u201d through a monolithic lens and even challenged other feminists\nnotions of the \u201cuniversality\u201d of women\u2019s experiences. Through the process of critique, feminists\nhave engaged in a robust discussion that can result in human rights schemes\nthat are not absent the needs of more than half of the human population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Binion, G. (1995). ‘Human Rights: A Feminist\n Perspective,’. Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 17, No.3.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bunch, C. (2013). \u2018Legacy of Vienna: Feminism and\n Human Rights\u2019. International Expert Conference on Vienna + 20.<\/em> Vienna.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dana Collins, S. F. (2010). \u2018New Directions in\n Feminism and Human Rights\u2019. nternational Feminist Journal of Politics,\n Vol. 12, No. 3-4<\/em>, 298- 318.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Engle, K. (n.d.). In D. Buss(ed), International\n Human Rights and Feminisms’ .<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Fleay, C. (2018, October). Human Righs and Feminist\n Critique. Human Rights Theory and Philosophy<\/em>. Perth, WA, Australia:\n Curtin University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Johnson, A. (1997). The Gender Knot: Unraveling\n our Patriarchal Legacy.<\/em> Philadelphia: Temple University Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Macmanus, V. B. (2015). \u2018We are not Victims, we are\n Protagonists of this History’; Latin American Gender Violence and the Limits\n of Women’s Rights as Human Rights. International Feminist Journal of\n Politics Vol. 17, No. 1,<\/em>, 40\u201357.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Parisi, L. (2002). Feminist praxis and women\u2019s human\n rights. Journal of Human Rights, Vol. 1, No. 4<\/em>, 571\u2013585.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Qureshi, S. (2012). Feminist Analysis of Human\n Rights Law. Journal of Political Studies<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Minnesota Human Rights Resource Center. (n.d.). The\n International Bill of Rights, Fact Sheet #2.<\/em> Minnesota, United States:\n The Minnesota Human Rights Resource Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n United Nations Department of Economic and Social\n Affairs. (2015). The World’s Women 2015; Trends and Statistics.<\/em> New\n York: United Nations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Universal Declaration of Human Rights. (1948,\n December 10). Paris.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Feminist critiques of human rights tend to present two main arguments. First, human rights discourses\u2019 reinforcement of the private vs. public sphere. Secondly, that the precarious nature of an emphasis on the \u201cright to culture\u201d is a tool of repression for women. Additionally, Third World Feminists emphasize that the focus on the \u201cuniversality\u201d of women\u2019s … <\/p>\nReferences<\/h1>\n\n\n\n