Overview

According to Susan Deller Ross, many human rights advocates still do not see women's rights as human rights. Yet women in many countries suffer from laws, practices, customs, and cultural and religious norms that consign them to a deeply inferior status. Advocates might conceive of human rights as involving torture, extrajudicial killings, or cruel and degrading treatment-all clearly in violation of international human rights-and think those issues irrelevant to women. Yet is female genital mutilation, practiced on millions of young girls and even infants, not a gross violation of human rights? When a family decides to murder a daughter in the name of ""honor,"" is that not an extrajudicial killing? When a husband rapes or savagely beats his wife, knowing the legal authorities will take no action on her behalf, is that not cruel and degrading treatment? Women's Human Rights is the first human rights casebook to focus specifically on women's human rights. Rich with interdisciplinary material, the book advances the study of the deprivation and violence women suffer due to discriminatory laws, religions, and customs that deny them their most fundamental freedoms. It also provides present and future lawyers the legal tools for change, demonstrating how human rights treaties can be used to obtain new laws and court decisions that protect women against discrimination with respect to employment, land ownership, inheritance, subordination in marriage, domestic violence, female genital mutilation, polygamy, child marriage, and the denial of reproductive rights. Ross examines international and regional human rights treaties in depth, including treaty language and the jurisprudence and general interpretive guidelines developed by human rights bodies. By studying how international human rights law has been and can be implemented at the domestic level through local courts and legislatures, readers will understand how to call upon these newly articulated human rights to help bring about legislation, court decisions, and executive action that protect women from human rights violations.

Full Product Details

Author:   Susan Deller Ross
Publisher:   University of Pennsylvania Press
Imprint:   University of Pennsylvania Press
Dimensions:   Width: 17.80cm , Height: 3.50cm , Length: 25.40cm
Weight:   1.198kg
ISBN:  

9780812220919

ISBN 10:   0812220919
Pages:   277
Publication Date:   31 August 2009
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Adult education ,  College/higher education ,  Professional & Vocational ,  Further / Higher Education
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Preface Using This Book Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Women's Status and CEDAW I. Women's Human Rights: An Introduction II. Women's Status Around the World III. The Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women IV. Case Study: Afghanistan Chapter 2. Equality Doctrines and Gender Discrimination: The Evolving Jurisprudence of the UN Human Rights Committee and the U.S. Supreme Court I. Early International Sources of Women's Human Rights II. The UN Human Rights Committee: Its Role and Function III. Equality Doctrines, Gender, and the United States Supreme Court: A Comparative Standard Chapter 3. The Interrelationship of the ICCPR and the ICESCR; and the Human Rights Committee's Evolving Equal Protection Doctrine I. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) II. Applying Equal Protection to Different Sex-Based Statutes III. Case Study: Philippine Family Law Chapter 4. Conflicting Human Rights Under International Law: Freedom of Religion Versus Women's Equality Rights I. Comparison of Religious Fundamentalist Norms in Five Religions II. The UN Charter and Universal Declaration of Human Rights III. Religious Freedom and Women's Rights Under the ICCPR and CEDAW IV. A Comparative View of How the Conflict Between Religious Freedom and Women's Rights Is Resolved Under the U.S. Constitution Chapter 5. Enforcing Women's International Human Rights Under Regional Treaties: The American Convention on Human Rights and the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights I. Introduction to the American Convention on Human Rights II. A Challenge to Costa Rica's Gender-Based Nationality Law III. Case Study: Costa Rican Nationality Law Revisited in a Costa Rican Court IV. Other Women's Issues in the American System V. Introduction to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights VI. The Relevance to Women of the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights Chapter 6. Enforcing Women's International Human Rights Under Regional Treaties: The [European] Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms I. Introduction to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms II. Using the European Convention Chapter 7. Economic Empowerment and Employment Discrimination: Europe and the United States Compared I. Women's Economic Empowerment II. The European System III. The United States System Chapter 8. The Special Treatment Versus Equal Treatment Debate I. The International Labour Organization II. Special Treatment Versus Equal Treatment in the Context of Childbirth and Childcare Chapter 9. CEDAW in Practice I. Egypt as Case Study: CEDAW's Effectiveness in Addressing the Subordination of Women in Marriage II. Strategies for Using CEDAW to Effect Change at Home Chapter 10. Enforcing Women's International Rights at Home: International Law in Domestic Courts I. The Relationship Between National and International Law: Theory II. Applying the International Right to Equal Treatment Without Regard to Gender in Domestic Courts III. Applying the International Right Against Slavery and Slave-like Practices in a Domestic Court Chapter 11. Strategies to Combat Domestic Violence I. Domestic Violence and ""Honor Crimes"" II. Holding the State Responsible for Private Violence III. International and Regional Law Concerning Domestic Violence IV. Examples of Different State Mechanisms in Action Chapter 12. Strategies for Ending Female Genital Mutilation and Footbinding: Western Imperialism or Women's Human Rights? I. Cultural Relativism II. FGM: The Practice, Its Consequences, and Its Prevalence III. Footbinding—Comparing Two Movements IV. Breast Implants: Female Breast Mutilation? V. National Legal Approaches: What Works? Chapter 13. Gender and Polygyny—Religion, Culture, and Equality in Marriage I. An Introduction to the Practice of Polygyny II. Women's Voices III. Equal Protection Versus Religious Freedom IV. Perspectives on Polygyny V. A Case Study: Uganda VI. Resolving the Polygyny Question Chapter 14. Women's Reproductive Rights I. Introduction II. Abortion: Women's Autonomy Versus Fetal Life III. Sex-Selective Abortion: A Conflict of Interests IV. Child Marriage and Reproductive Rights Table of Cases Glossary Acronyms and Short Forms Credits and Permissions Index

Reviews

Susan Deller Ross has provided us with an important addition to existing human rights law teaching materials with her casebook on women's human rights. The book brings the complex array of legal, political, social, and cultural issues involved in protecting women's human rights front and center for students and teachers of international law. The case book demonstrates that, because of their reach and their complexity, women's human rights deserve to be studied in and of themselves not just as one segment of an international human rights course. Providing a holistic picture of the status of women in international law, the casebook offers equal doses of the legal gains we are making and how far there still is to go. -Human Rights Quarterly A definitive text on a topic both timely and timeless, Women's Human Rights is an indispensable resource for all who care about gender and justice in any part of the world. -Madeleine K. Albright, former Secretary of State

A definitive text on a topic both timely and timeless, Women's Human Rights is an indispensable resource for all who care about gender and justice in any part of the world. -Madeleine K. Albright, former Secretary of State Susan Deller Ross has provided us with an important addition to existing human rights law teaching materials with her casebook on women's human rights. The book brings the complex array of legal, political, social, and cultural issues involved in protecting women's human rights front and center for students and teachers of international law. The case book demonstrates that, because of their reach and their complexity, women's human rights deserve to be studied in and of themselves not just as one segment of an international human rights course. Providing a holistic picture of the status of women in international law, the casebook offers equal doses of the legal gains we are making and how far there still is to go. -Human Rights Quarterly

"""Susan Deller Ross has provided us with an important addition to existing human rights law teaching materials with her casebook on women's human rights. The book brings the complex array of legal, political, social, and cultural issues involved in protecting women's human rights front and center for students and teachers of international law. The case book demonstrates that, because of their reach and their complexity, women's human rights deserve to be studied in and of themselves not just as one segment of an international human rights course. Providing a holistic picture of the status of women in international law, the casebook offers equal doses of the legal gains we are making and how far there still is to go."" * <i>Human Rights Quarterly</i> *"

Author Information

Susan Deller Ross is Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and Founder and Director of the International Women's Human Rights Clinic at Georgetown. RossRights.com is an an online documentary supplement to Women's Human Rights: The International and Comparative Law Casebook.

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