WUNRN
RESOURCES ON INCLUSION OF WOMEN
& GIRLS WITH DISABILITIES
IN DISCUSSIONS OF CONFLICT &
POST-CONFLICT SITUATIONS
By Stephanie Ortoleva, Esq.
The inclusion of women with disabilities in discussions of women and conflict and post-conflict situations is essential at the forthcoming session of the Committee on the elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW Committee.) Women and girls with disabilities are a part of all societies and need to be part of the solution in advancing the human rights of all and shaping how societies affect their lives. The justifications for inclusion are numerous. Fairness is the most obvious: women account for more than half of the world population, persons with disabilities are at least 15% of the world’s population, equaling approximately One Billion, and women with disabilities comprise at least half of this population, although some reports indicate that women are a greater proportion of the disabled population. These numbers are increasing due to various factors, including the raveges of war and conflict – bombs, landmines, abandonment, rape and gender-based violence, loss of social safety nets and family and community supports, inaccessable programs and facilities, etc. The World Health Organization and the World Bank’s just release (9 June 2011) ground-breaking report entitled “World report on disability,” notes this dramatic increase in estimates of the number of persons with disabilities worldwide.
With such a dramatic increase in the percentage of persons with disabilities, especially women with disabilities, the urgent need to include women and girls with disabilities is even more obvious., of whom 2-4% experience significant difficulties in functioning. The global disability prevalence is higher than previous WHO estimates, which date from the 1970s and suggested a figure of around 10%. This global estimate for disability is on the rise due to population ageing and the rapid spread of chronic diseases, as well as improvements in the methodologies used to measure disability.”
Persons with disabilities tend to be more economically disadvantaged than their counterparts without disabilities and are disproportionately represented among the world’s poorest people, meaning those who live on less than one dollar a day and who lack access to basic necessities such as food, clean water, clothing and shelter, one-fifth of whom is a person with disabilities and three-fourths of whom are women with disabilities in low and middle-income countries. Between 65% and 70% of these women live in rural areas.
According to one of the women who led the effort to ensure that the rights of women with disabilities were incorporated into the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) “[g]ender is one of the most important categories of social organization, and patterns of disadvantage are often associated with the differences in social position of women and men. These gendered differences are reflected in the different life experiences of women with disabilities and men with disabilities. While women with disabilities have much in common with men with disabilities, women with disabilities have to face multiple discrimination in many cases, so that they are often more disadvantaged than men with disabilities in similar circumstances.”
Women and girls with disabilities are recognized to be doubly disadvantaged, experiencing exclusion on account of both their gender and their disability.” Therefore, it is only just that they have meaningful roles as decision makers and achieve gender equality. Given how greatly women and girls with disabilities are affected by the double discrimination and gender and disability stereotyping they face because of both gender and disability, before, during and after conflict, they deserve to be heard and be part of the peace building process, as societies are re-established post-conflict.
Drawing on provisions of the CEDAW as well as the CRPD, international law and field research, Stephanie Ortoleva explores the situation of women and girls with disabilities in conflict and post-conflict situations and makes recommendations for a gender-mainstreaming, disability-inclusive approachto frame the forthcoming CEDAW General Discussion.
CEDAW COMMITTEE CONSIDERATION OF GENERAL RECOMMENDATION ON WOMEN IN CONFLICT & POST-CONFLICT SITUATIONS
The CEDAW Committee will hold a general discussion on 18 July 2011 at the UN Headquarters in New York, to commence the Committee’s process of elaborating a "General Recommendation on Women in Conflict and Post-conflict Situations", the purpose of which is to provide appropriate and authoritative guidance to States Parties on the measures to be adopted to ensure full compliance with their obligations to protect, respect and fulfil women’s human rights during times of armed conflict and in all peace-building processes, which includes the immediate aftermath of conflict and long-term post-conflict reconstruction.
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