WUNRN
WOMEN'S
RIGHTS IN AN ECONOMIC CRISIS - AWID INTERVIEW WITH UN SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR ON
VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
Jane Gabriel
caught up with Dr. Yakin Erturk, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on
Violence against Women, on her first officially mandated visit to the UN
Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).
JG: Your
latest report to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) concentrates on political
economy - Why so?
YE: You may
recall in 2006 I did a report on due diligence as a tool to eliminate violence
against women. There, I identified three areas which stand as a constraint to
advancing women's rights. One was the public /private dichotomy, which I didn't
deal with, because I think feminist scholars have dealt with it extensively,
and to a large extent we have demystified that kind of dichotomy. But the other
two constraints are still very problematic.
One is
identity politics. The whole issue of defining identity on the basis of culture
and religion has become subject to intense political contestation since the
cold war and has had an extremely serious impact on women's human rights, because
at root it pits relativist against essentialised notions of culture. My 2007
report was on this very issue. The second area I had identified was the whole
issue of global restructuring and the political and economic order, which is
often sidelined when we talk about human rights.
We refer to
human rights as if they were confined to civil and political rights; this is
also reflected in the twin covenants which have divided rights into civil and
political on the one hand, and economic and social on the other. The latter is
generally seen as inspirational and the first one as the real thing. But we
know from women's lives that unless we have a holistic approach to women's
rights, whereby women can achieve economic independence or are at least
empowered socially and politically, the rights they may read about in books do
not reach them. So my final report to the council this year is taking up this
challenge: I have argued that underneath the surface of many of the things that
we talk about as being cultural, there is a solid, material basis which feeds
certain concrete interests and relationships; and that unless we dig down into
that base we are talking at a very abstract level. Culture can take on a life
of its own, so that we assume that that is the reality, when half the time
nobody really understands its true impact.
We are all
cultural beings: it is very hard to attack cultures. What I wanted to do in my
culture report was to connect this to a more profound analysis of concrete
interests, real power - hence political economy. Particularly in the
neo-liberal era, it is political economy which is creating new challenges for
women's rights, while at the same time, of course, creating some new
opportunities. The report will be presented to the council in June, and I'm
hoping that once this element is in place - I can present a unified vision of
women's rights.
JG: Tell
me some of the highpoints of your argument.
YE: I begin
by trying to explain what I mean by a political economy perspective - one which
looks at political decisions and economic processes as they feed into one
another. In particular, I'm trying to see how the neo-liberal economic
environment impacts both on changing conditions for the labour force as well as
on migration and subsidiary economic outcomes such as land occupation for
economic development purposes, and the military response. This allows me to
understand the social conflicts that can lead to open wars, and how all this
must affect the lives of women. Then we are in a better position to tackle each
particular area of economic rights in turn: such as the right to food, right to
land - you know these very much more conventional areas.
These are
economic rights we are very familiar with. But now we can try to identify how
they are directly linked to the increased risk of violence against women. Of
course, we want to conclude by arguing that economic independence for woman is
essential if they are to have a fighting chance in this world. By which I do
not mean a total escape from violence, because we know that even educated,
employed women still find themselves experiencing violence. But research does
show that economic security increases the woman's options in terms of being
able to leave an abusive environment. This is where the whole issue of the
current economic crisis becomes very relevant indeed: yet, we make the same
mistake over and over again and treat the economic crisis as if it were a
gender neutral process. Nobody talks about how women are going to be affected
by this economic crisis. We do not yet know what the full scale impact of the
crisis will look like, but at least I will have raised these questions and the
implications that follow from such issues.
I argue that
we need to be vigilant from now on - and, furthermore, that there is one
significant opportunity that the crisis has generated: the state is being
pulled back into taking charge. States are being invited to take responsibility
for financial security.
JG: The
state is taking more control and this affords new opportunities?
YE:
Absolutely, totally. In the neo-liberal era that is exactly what we lost, that
sense of responsibility. We lost our welfare state, which no longer took any
interest in providing livelihoods or social security services and so forth. The
same thing happened before - decades ago - in the initial stages of development
of competitive capitalism. The laissez faire understanding of the economy came
to predominate, and it created absolute havoc and misery on a frightening
scale. What happened then? The state came in with a welfare framework to
correct the wrongs of the market. Now, perhaps we are experiencing the same
sort of thing. So, my hope is that we can use our lessons learned from the
past. So that this time, by calling the state back in, we can reintroduce
social policy into the new macro-economic that will benefit women .
JG: Can I
refer back to last year's conversation with you about violence against women, when you said that we
don't really know what we are talking about when we refer to ‘violence' and you
called for definitions and a system of reporting and monitoring. What progress,
if any, have you seen in the last year?
YE: Last
year I presented a report to the UNHRC on indicators of violence against women
and indicators on state response or accountability and asked, what does it
actually mean for a state to be accountable? I was able to spell out the
indicators, and I presented the report to the HRC. It was well received on the
whole. (You know states are not too eager to quantify these things.) But we had
put the indicator issue on the agenda, that was the important thing. Because
without indicators we won't know what we are doing, whether we are really
combating violence or not.
JG: So will
this result in a common definition of violence and if so, where will we see the
impact of that?
YE: I think
so: the General Assembly has already mandated the Statistical Commission to
build on my work to continue the spotlight on violence against women.
Unfortunately, they didn't say anything about state accountability, but I think
that will come too in time. So the Statistical Commission is working away on
this and I do hope that they will have a stronger gender awareness as a result.
Normally they deal with highly technical issues. But I have been making friends
with the chair of that commission and they have started inviting me to make my
own submissions too. So I think, soon, we will indeed have a common wording on
international indicators at least. There will be all sorts of variations at the
national level due to specific national conditions. But at least we will have
some common comparative indicators to enable us to talk across borders and be
talking about the same thing!
JG: The meeting at Doha received a lot of publicity. In
your view, what happened there, and did it in any way relate to why you have
come to the CSW this year?
YE: Let me
answer the last part of your question first. I came to the CSW this year
because this is the first time - and I underline first time - since the
creation of the Special Rapporteur's mandate 15 years ago, that I have been
mandated officially to do annual reporting to the Commission. So this time,
nobody can stop my ten minute presentation! Before this I was invited on an ad
hoc basis. But this year - this is my victory in a way, because I have been
advocating for this since I became Rapporteur - here I am. I never understood
why, since its creation, the Rapporteur was not required to report to the CSW.
It seems the most logical thing to me.
JG: Did
you ever find out why it was like that?
YE: I don't
think there is an official reason out there, but it's the way we perceive
women's rights issues - very fragmented. Violence is about victims, whereas CSW
deals with the more policy-oriented advancement of women. But what I have been
arguing since I became Rapporteur is that the violence against women mandate is
not about victims. It is precisely about women's empowerment. Unlike torture
and some other more conventional types of human rights derogations, you can
heal the wound, but it will not be an effective way of dealing with the problem
of violence against women, unless you perceive it within the framework of
women's empowerment. So I consider the HRC resolution of last year which
mandated me to report annually to CSW as an acknowledgement of this holistic
approach to women's rights issues and this is a most welcome resolution. I
personally will be ending my mandate this year, but through this resolution the
next Rapporteur will have a foot in the door and a voice at the CSW which I
think is essential.
JG: What
are you going to use your ten minutes to say?
YE: Well I
will basically report on my work of the last year and try to insinuate a few
messages here and there ...
JG:
Messages?
YE: Well one
of the last things perhaps I would like to say as I'm leaving this mandate, is
that I found that this is one of the most incredible tools that we have
available, as difficult as it is, as under-resourced as it is. One of the
things that is at stake in my effort to introduce this system of reporting to
the CSW is my conviction that the mandate of the HRC should not be confined to
being a monitoring tool. It should have some tangible follow up mechanisms. So,
I've spoken with the Unifem
Trust Fund to see if we can use the existing trust fund to link with my
mandate, so that when the Rapporteur leaves a country and makes
recommendations, the fund can immediately be channelled towards implementation.
Currently, we rapporteurs go and visit, produce great reports and
recommendations, but there is no guarantee our recommendations will be
implemented. So that is not so much a message, as a final call that I very much
hope will receive some attention, so that in the coming years this mandate will
have a resource base from which implementation can also follow.
But to
return to your question about Doha - this was such an interesting meeting. Held
in conjunction with the Secretary General's campaign to end violence against
women, it was used skillfully to open up a debate on an issue in a part of the
world where these debates are in their infancy. People from all the middle
eastern countries were invited and the debates were dynamic. I was there with
the chair of CEDAW
and we made a strong joint appeal to Qatar to ratify CEDAW. We followed up our
request with a letter and I'm told something will happen. The meeting itself, I
think, opened new spaces in Qatar as well as in neighbouring countries to move
more intensely in the area of combating violence against women and women's
rights. This is important as it will open up a new space for women in other
areas as well.
JG: Is
this part of the process you describe as a growing convergence around the core
values of the universal human rights discourse?
YE:
Absolutely. This is a key development. It seems almost ironic, because one of
the major problems of the world today is the immense violation of rights
everywhere, especially since 9/11. Human rights have been belittled to say the
least. But at the very same time, I think we have found refuge in the whole
discourse of human rights. This allows us to keep moving despite all the
negatives. And when you look around the world even the most skeptical people
are in the human rights system. They forge their own struggles using universal
human rights standards. This is very interesting and every UN member state
today is a party to at least one convention. I don't think states can remain
indefinitely disengaged from the human rights system.
JG: Do
you think that there is less of a sense that it's a western instrument or a
western concept?
YE: That is
certainly what I have been arguing for wholeheartedly, because the whole notion
of a ‘clash of civilizations' has created such a dichotomy between existing
civilizations. I have always argued that there is only one human civilization
and that this civilization emerged through interaction - trade, wars. In short
- people never were isolated in their own corners. They have always engaged
with each other. It is the common suffering throughout history that brought us
to the point of designing human rights instruments. It may have been initiated
in the west, but it certainly is not the property of the west, and unless we
recognise this, we will surrender ourselves to becoming something less than
human beings. I don't think that's acceptable.
JG: If
there is a growing convergence around the universal human rights discourse, how
does that impact on the division between the public and the private in terms of
women's rights? We know as women that where you draw this line between public
and private is pretty crucial ...
YE: The
public/private divide has in the past been one of the major obstacles
preventing women from pursuing their own empowerment in their private lives
(which we do want to protect as ‘private' because our privacy is important).
But given the patriarchal nature of all societies, this privacy has meant the privacy
of the man, the privilege of the man to do as he pleases because the home is
the man's castle. What about the woman? What is in it for her?
This
challenge is the reason why this is one of the first barriers feminists
attacked in the 1980's and since then we have managed to broaden the
understanding of the human rights discourse which, until 1992, pretty much
dealt with violation of rights in the hands of the states, or in the public
sphere. Today, we are talking about domestic violence, marital rape - issues
that were inconceivable to mention just fifteen years ago.
My mandate
represents the first mandate that is designed specifically to monitor the
private sphere. So I think we have pretty well penetrated that area, though
implementation is still a problem. But today's state responsibility has gone
beyond just negative responsibility, ‘not to do harm'. States are required to
assume a positive responsibility to make sure that harm is not done by others,
such as private actors in the private sphere.
We have to
push still more for progress in this area, because although the standards are
there, courts are still reluctant to punish the perpetrators when they are
private individuals. There are a lot of cultural misconceptions, still.
I recall a
German female judge who was presiding over a divorce case. The woman, who was
from the middle east, was filing for divorce on the grounds of domestic
violence, and the judge asked her "Why are you here? In your culture
domestic violence is acceptable: I'm not accepting this case". So this is
the kind of world we are still living in. On the one hand there is this racist
connotation here that this woman need not expect any better. On the other hand,
a judge is using someone else's culture as something that presides over the
laws of her own country, and of her court. So there are a lot of double
standards involved, and some perverse justifications invoking alien cultures or
religions or whatever, simply in order to sidestep the appropriate prevention
and punishment of violations in the private sphere. So it's still going on, but
I think it has been demystified and today at least at the level of standards,
we have made quite an advance.
JG: There
is a new global initiative to reform Muslim Family law called Musawah. You were
there at the launch. Where do you think it may go?
YE: I was
very pleased when they invited me. I think their motivation is very similar to
my motivation in demystifying these cultural arguments that say "well this
is our culture, and this is our religion". Of course, I argue from the
perspective of universal human rights norms as a human rights expert. Musawah
is claiming to do the same thing from within Islam itself and their primary argument
is that the Sharia cannot be against women because the Sharia is based on
justice and equality. Viewed from a historical perspective that is
incontrovertible. Only recall the conditions on the Arabian peninsular when
Islam emerged. It brought a great deal of justice and equality to a situation
where there were incredible injustices.
What has
happened in the course of history is that, as with anything else, as religion
became politicized, it also became an area of contestation. Wars were fought on
the basis of Sharia and still are being fought, so that it became a political
tool, defined in accordance with the political environment itself, so that
today, yes, there are many, many misogynous prescriptions issued in the name of
Islam, which we cannot accept. I criticize them from the point of view of
universal human rights, but Musawah is taking Islamic teaching and
reinterpreting it, and I think this is very, very important.
It's a
different level of engagement. They will be engaging the clergy in different
Islamic countries in a dialogue about the Islamic teaching itself (because when
we are talking from outside the faith, there is always going to be a gap in the
communication). But this is creating a platform for involving them in their own
terrain.
Muslim women's
groups have been doing this for a number of years, and in a number of countries
- Iran included. There have been reinterpretations and reform of this kind in
Morocco too. So much work has been done on the basis of such reforms, and yet
none of these countries has ceased to be Muslim. So I think it is for us to
recognize that what these reforms do is really to protect the dynamism of the
religion itself, not relinquishing it to the will of a few archaic minds. And I
think we need to do this. We all need to challenge such interpretations of
religion and culture, whether we are talking about Christianity, Judaism, Islam
or any other religion or belief. So that there are plural voices, and that the
teachings that are attributed to holy books cannot be interpreted in just one
way.
Unless we
listen to these plural voices, we condemn these teachings to death. So, it's
self defeating. It is in that sense that I wish Musawah all the best. It is not
easy to do what they are doing: they will be attacked, for sure. And Musawah
also has diverse voices internally, which is good because we don't want an
equally dogmatic alternative voice coming out in protest. They have women of
belief as well as secular women in their numbers and they are dialoguing
amongst themselves. They are also relying on scholarly work in both the Muslim
and the Christian world. Religion is important: people need to have
spirituality. It's part of our identities. But when you lock it up in dogma and
conservativism, it becomes a tool of oppression. So I think Musawah may in time
make a contribution to giving Islam back its due credit in the eyes of the
world.
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