5. Saturday, December 9, 2000
Session 4
Part 1
Women’s Conditions of Social and Economic Inequality
The purpose of this session was to ground discussion of women’s social and economic rights in the context of current societal issues and concerns.
Globalization and Women’s Social and Economic Rights in India
- Subhashini Ali (India)
The distinguishing feature of our age is that for the first time in human history, enough wealth has been produced globally to fulfill the needs of people. There is enough food grown to ensure that none go hungry and there are adequate resources to meet the health, educational and cultural needs of humanity. The paradox is that in spite of this, inequalities are growing apace, between countries, between the rich and the poor, and between men and women. This central paradox has to be addressed by activists mobilising for women’s access to basic human, economic, and social rights.
Two contradictory processes seem to be at work in the fast globalizing world. On the one hand, concerned citizens and organizations all over the world are interacting with various international agencies, many of them affiliated with the United Nations, to advocate for the elimination of rights violations nationally and internationally and are calling upon these agencies and national governments to intervene strongly in order to make this elimination a reality. On the other, financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF and trade regulatory bodies like the WTO are advocating and insisting that national governments follow policies that institutionalize the violation of these rights by increasing exploitation and inequality.
Financial conditionalities imposed by international financial institutions and policies of the WTO are limiting not only governments’ role but also their sovereign status by pressuring them to adopt policies designed for the primary purpose of opening markets for penetration by Transnational Corporations (TNCs) and unpredictable movements of financial capital. In effect, States are becoming more and more the guarantors of TNCs’ penetration and exploitation of their markets and people. Yet, national governments are still being expected to assume the responsibility to ensure economic, social and cultural justice to women and girl children at a time when their policies are informed more and more by the buzzwords of “privatization” and “budgetary cutbacks”.
It is important to realize that when we speak of women’s economic, social and cultural rights we are doing so at a time when policies of structural adjustment are responsible, not only for the feminization of poverty but also for increasing violence against women and girl children and inequalities in general. To even think of gender justice without radically altering the existing parameters of globalization is misplaced. The expansion of human and gender rights concepts and treaties and resolutions dealing with them will prove not only futile but also dangerous if we fail, at the same time, to challenge the new world order that is attacking them.
The impact of globalization in India can be understood through examination of a few marked trends in the agricultural sector.
There are currently 27 million women who are agricultural workers. Their percentage of total workers has increased from 31.18% to 36.15%. The rapid feminization of this sector is mainly due to the very low wages and the insecure nature of the work. Legislation providing for the payment of minimum wages for agricultural workers and their rights to pensions, maternity benefits, and provident fund, was introduced in the Indian Parliament in 1989 but, due to lack of political will, has been allowed to lapse. As a result low wages of 15 to 20 rupees per day (less than 50 cents US) continue to be paid to many workers in the sector. Even this small amount is difficult to claim in many areas where feudal forces are still deeply entrenched.
Globalization has brought about radical changes in the agricultural sector. First, the introduction of cash crops, which, given the instability of international markets, has caused distress for many of the farmers who have switched over from their traditional farming practices. The majority of these farmers are caught in debt-traps, whilst the sudden drop in crop prices has devastated the lives of workers. Women workers in general have been badly impacted. For example, shrimp cultivation in traditional rice-growing areas has adversely affected the number of workdays available to women agricultural workers in areas where their organizing efforts over the years had ensured better wages than in many other parts of the country.
Second, replacement of traditional seeds by seeds supplied by transnationals has led not only to increased costs but has increased crop vulnerability to pests and diseases and the use of ever more expensive fertilizers. In addition, rising rates of electricity because of privatization, unchecked increase in storage rates charged by cold storages, increased water rates, repeated cuts in the fertilizer subsidies have all added to farmers’ costs. It is notable that there has been a steady increase in the number of farmers’ suicides (including women and children of such families) in the parts of the country affected by these trends.
Third, increased mechanization and changing cropping patterns have reduced the work available to agricultural workers and resulted in increased migration of male workers in search of work. This has contributed to the very large percentage - at least 35 percent - of rural households becoming female-headed. It is these women, who often belong to socially oppressed groups, like the scheduled castes and tribes, who make up the bulk of the cheap labour.
The desperation of these poorest women is exploited to maximize profit. For example, in Andra Pradesh a survey conducted in five districts found that farmers preferred to employ women because they were perceived to be more industrious. Women worked without breaks and could be hired at 30 percent less wages than men. For planting one acre of land in one day, eight men were paid 300 rupees but were replaced by 10 women who were paid 200 rupees. This is a saving of 100 Rupees for the farmer, and an increase in productivity.
The impact of a global consumerist culture has also been harmful for Indian society, and Indian women, in particular.
The attempt at universal cultural unification combined with the fact that economic globalisation and unfettered market functioning has resulted in deep and pervasive inequalities. For example, the majoritarian coalition in political power is using various institutions under its control to distort history and to demonize the religious minorities by portraying them as invaders, marauders, rapists, destroyers of temples of Hindi religion and culture and as having extra-territorial loyalties. Socially and economically disadvantaged minorities in India serve as easy scapegoats, as Indians try to deal with the growing discontent generated by the policies of globalization.
Political parties use patriarchal rationales to undermine women’s demand for economic and social equality, and to foster regressive attitudes. For example, Hindu women, organized by the BJ Party, are encouraged to enact their role of defender of the faith and to find their emancipation by instigating attacks against women members of minority communities. Unfortunately, increased mobilization has not resulted in women being able to challenge the patriarchal beliefs underlying the BJ Party. Research by women activists shows that the refusal by young, modern women to conform to these emerging traditional roles has been used to justify the rise in dowry-deaths. Also women’s revealing clothes, and their claim for equal rights, have been used to justify rape and domestic violence.
The growth of fundamentalism within the majority and minority religious communities, that is accompanying the processes of globalization in India, is fraught with danger since it poses a great threat for women and their quest for autonomy, liberation, and equality.
Rural Women in Urban Areas
- Pumla Mncayi (South Africa)
“Put women in their place.” This statement begs the question: who determines someone’s rightful place? And what criteria are used to make this determination? In the context of South Africa, the debate over whether there is respect for women’s right to equality is complicated by the urban/rural dichotomy, which has qualitative and quantitative implications.
The rural environment is different from the urban environment. The lives of rural women are strongly defined by culture. A Xhosa woman, for example, is expected to conform to traditional cultural norms. Because rural women are amongst the poorest women in the country, poverty forces them to move to urban areas hoping to find work that will assist them in keeping their families alive. Often their lack of education and skills and the absence of supportive infrastructure makes adjustment to the new environment difficult and also renders them vulnerable to exploitation.
A rural woman settling in an urban area is a stranger to the social mores of her new urban home. For example, how one acquires a house, work or food is different in this context, and women’s rights are often violated. Yet, rural women in urban environments are expected to adhere to their rural cultural roots.
Enforcing the South African Domestic Violence Act is more difficult because rigid patriarchal beliefs prevalent in rural areas tolerate wife beating. Intra-regional and inter-regional inequalities in South Africa have also meant that women in these communities act as “shock absorbers” as governmental social assistance decreases.
The fact that worsening poverty levels are now transcending the rural/urban dichotomy raises challenges, which must be addressed if we are to ensure that all women have access to, and benefit of, their social and economic rights. These new challenges include:
The existing regional divide, and the misconception prevalent in rural communities that urban life is sophisticated, advanced, and superior, and which underlies rural-urban migration, must be challenged by ensuring that rural communities are given priority when resources are allocated for education, health, and other services;
Community partnership is necessary to ensure that there is a supportive infrastructure for rural women resettling in urban areas; and
Poverty, illiteracy, and the process of globalization are directly responsible for sustaining the pervasive levels of disadvantage. The cumulative effect of these factors means that black women in rural communities continue to be denied the benefits of the new democratic dispensation.
Documenting Violations of Human Rights: Violence Against Women
- Dr. Jessie Mbwambo(Tanzania)
Violence against women remains the most pervasive of crimes perpetrated against women and in the literature has been linked to gender-based discrimination including limited access to education, resources and decision-making power in both the public and private domain. Violence is considered a private matter and therefore remains enclosed in a “culture of silence,” which further perpetuates the epidemic of violence and carries with it a host of physical and mental health consequences.
In Tanzania, colonial rules and customs co-existed with indigenous customary laws. Since independence, Tanzania has ratified some UN treaties, which, unfortunately, are not being properly implemented. However, Tanzania’s policies of equity in access to basic needs (health, education and water) and emphasis on equity and respect, including the importance of gender, have resulted in the outlawing of violence in public spaces. Generally, there is a consensus that violence against women in public spaces cannot be justified. But the same consensus is lacking when similar violence takes place in the private sphere.
The issue of how cultural customs are used to control women’s sexuality is proving more difficult to regulate, especially given the fact that it takes place in private (unregulated) space. The failure (and reluctance) of the State to sanction this type of violence implicates the State in the increasing violence that is often justified by cultural imperatives. In addition to traditional patriarchal systems, the worsening economic situation has also contributed to an increase in violence against women. The shift of government policies to more free market orientation and the elimination of subsidies has resulted in rural women losing their access to land and in urban women losing jobs in the formal sector. Women now seek employment in the informal sector working for menial pay. Moreover, the worsening economic situation has led to an increase in depressed and frustrated households and an increase in crime and drug use among men. All of these factors contribute to domestic violence against women.
Most recently the linkages between violence and HIV calls for urgent attention and action. A study of voluntary counseling facilities in Tanzania showed that there is an increase in reported cases of violence against young women who are HIV positive. Indeed, the study demonstrates the lived connection between women’s social and economic subordination, drastic health consequences, and violence.
Violence against women is sanctioned, justified, and maintained by:
economic policies that fail to improve women’s poor and worsening educational and financial position in society. Such policies constrain women’s decision-making and often force them to stay in abusive relationships;
community criticism of women who do not follow their expected gender roles and responsibilities;
cultural practices that further subordinate women and often place them in partnerships that put women at risk of HIV infection; and
the State’s failure to enforce international conventions and legal mechanisms to protect women.
Discussion
In addition to the traditional, patriarchal view of women, the processes of economic globalization such as privatization, free trade, lack of protection, and depression of wages are adversely affecting women’s substantive equality and human rights. Globalization, while
allowing for better communication has also resulted in the rise of ultra-conservative cultural custom and revanchist policies by groups, which have further subjugated women.
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Neo-liberal policies have rolled back women’s social gains by steadily taking away the social safety net, support services and increased opportunities for employment in the State system
which had, in certain jurisdictions, not only succeeded in making women’s lives more secure, but also managed to decrease their economic dependency on individual men. All these struggles are happening at a time when governments are forced to commercialize land and promote monetary policies that further disempower women.
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The two questions before us are: first, how do we close the gender gap in the context of neo-
liberal policies, given that 25 percent of poorest households are women? Second, how do we
address women’s rights within a pluralistic system where women’s visibility, agency and subjectivity does not exist in customary law and is often not enforced in common law? Is it possible to focus on developing customary laws in a way that advantages women, in the
same manner that the common law is being developed within the constitutional imperatives of equality, freedom, and dignity in South Africa?
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Values are socially constructed. Conformity has, in some instances, offered women protection, while non-conformity has resulted in individuals being excluded from the community. We must also acknowledge and recognise that women do take active roles in maintaining these oppressive cultural customs. Women accept their roles as the protectors of cultural purity. Finally, women do police other women. There needs to be a process of education that empowers women as women and not women as protectors of patriarchy or social, racial, economic or cultural groupings.
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Several crucial points have to be acknowledged in addressing the issue of culture when it is implicated in the subjugation of black women: First, the legal subjectivity (personhood) of black women, especially in South Africa, is not at all well developed in ‘western law” or in African customary law. This has important implications for any strategy taken to raise the profile of black women. Secondly, the change to a constitutional democracy, founded on women’s right to the full benefit and enjoyment of equality, challenges and threatens certain powerful vested interests. The politics and reality of cultural imperialism in South Africa has seen the courts erring on the side of cautious cultural relativist positions rather than taking an active role in transforming all South African ‘cultures’. This equivocation has, and will continue to be, to the disproportionate disadvantage of black women.
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The rapid growth of the informal sector means that a large part of protective labour legislation and labour standards (at both the national and international levels) is out of date; it was designed for a world that is vanishing. What are the State’s obligations in the face of the rapid growth of the informal sector?
Part 2
Transforming Social and Economic Rights
Specific rights in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights were the focus of this session: the right to food, the right to social security and the right to adequate housing. Presenters were concerned with demonstrating the ways in which the rights pertain to women’s equality or how these rights can be re-conceived so that they reflect and resonate with women’s experiences. Two presentations touched on the impact of globalization and of the privatization of public services on women’s enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights.
The Right to Adequate Food
- Simone Pingel (FIAN International)
The right to food, a constituent element of the right to an adequate standard of living, is found in the Universal Declaration for Human Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The right to food must be understood as the “right to feed oneself” in order to reflect the understanding that the right to food concerns more than just caloric and protein intake and includes access issues, such as access to economic and productive resources including land, fishing rights, employment and social security. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has undertaken a detailed discussion of the right to adequate food in its General Comment 12.
To understand what the right to feed oneself means for women, women’s social and economic position must be considered. In other words, women’s disadvantaged economic status must be highlighted. For example, it must be recalled that women are occupied by child rearing and domestic work, which is unremunerated; when employed, women are not afforded equal pay for work of equal value; and women experience multiple barriers in acquiring land and property. Without economic and productive resources, women cannot access food and are excluded from food production. Given women’s disadvantaged social and economic position within and outside the household, it is not surprising that, in situations of famine, most victims are women and girl children and that women suffer more than men in terms of malnutrition.
What is surprising, however, is the lack of gender specific data and information pertaining to women’s relationship to food, especially in light of women’s primary role in food production. While the role of women in access to and production of food is recognized in international political declarations, it is not taken seriously.
Because the right to food (or to feed oneself) is an internationally recognized human right, States are legally obliged to respect, protect and fulfill the right to food for all people. What does this mean for women? To respect the right to food, States must not take any measures to destroy existing access to food. Thus, the State is obliged to refrain from doing anything that impedes women’s access to water, land, credit, agricultural advisory services and other resources related to the realization of the right to food. To protect the right to food, States are obliged to intervene to prevent a third party - for example, private individuals, trans-national corporations - from depriving individuals of their right to adequate food. The State must therefore ensure that women are protected against all forms of discrimination, regardless of who commits the discrimination (State or non-State actors), and must be ensured equal access and rights to the resources necessary for the realization of the right to adequate food. To fulfill the right to food, States have a positive obligation, to the maximum of available resources, to ensure the long-term ability of all persons to enjoy the right to adequate food. Depending on the country situation, this might oblige States to engage in land re-distribution policies and programmes, which guarantee women access to and control over land and resources.
While women are affected by all violations of the obligations to respect, protect and fulfill the right to adequate food, it is violations of the obligations to protect and fulfill that are most felt by women. This is because women’s right to food is often hampered as a result of the enforcement of custom and traditions by non-State actors and in many cases in order for women to have access to adequate food, States are required to take positive steps.
The right to adequate food for women, must, of course, be understood and viewed in light of globalization which reduces States’ ability to govern its national policies in a manner conducive to the implementation of economic, social and cultural rights. The process of globalization can contribute to a concentration of productive resources in the hands of a few powerful actors leading to economic growth at one end of the spectrum and the increasing impoverishment of women at the other. Land and water, formerly natural resources that make agriculture possible, increasingly become profitable commodities for large-scale export-oriented agribusiness, which severely affects the right of everyone, particularly women, to feed themselves.
States are increasingly declaring that “globalization” is impeding the implementation of national laws, policies and programmes necessary for the realization of economic, social and cultural rights. While in some cases this may be a legitimate explanation for the lack of implementation of these rights, women should be vigilant to ensure that “globalization” is not used to obscure an abdication of legal obligations and responsibilities not actually attributable to “globalization”.
The Right to Social Security
- Lucie Lamarche (Canada)
It is important to focus on the definition of social security and to determine ways in which the right to social security can benefit women.
According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), social security, from a legal perspective, is almost always linked to formal sector, waged employment and as such, traditionally it has not engaged with issues of poverty. Historically, within the formal sector, women have been disadvantaged with respect to pensions, maternity and sickness benefits, and, more generally, with regard to the level of benefits. Working women often have interrupted or part-time patterns of employment, due in large part to their social and economic roles within families and households. As such, they experience lower wages and thus fewer and lower benefits. Social security has been critiqued for at least two reasons:
(1) it is said to be a male paradigm; and (2) it is commonly provided by States in an inefficient manner.
While these critiques can be said to be correct, we should be cautious not to “throw the baby out with the bath water”. In other words, although social security systems may not be working well for women, we should not ignore social security systems when promoting women’s economic, social, and cultural rights, for a number of reasons. First, according to the 1999 ILO World Labour Report, many women do work in the formal sector and are thus eligible and entitled to social security. Second, in some systems, industrial protection is separated from non-industrial protection in a two-tiered system. Third, while social security may not work particularly well in general, and thus may not work for women, if it were to become more efficient it would also become more efficient for women beneficiaries. Lastly, there are some interesting extensions of social security that can benefit women.
It is also important to note the impact of privatization on social security. Privatization in the field of social security means many things and includes a wide scope of possible models. In many countries, social security regimes, such as pensions and health benefits, are being privatized, turned over to the market. As a result, workers are forced to contribute to individualized accounts on which their benefits are eventually solely based. This type of privatization clearly disadvantages women who, as a result of gendered roles within and outside the household, cannot contribute equally to such accounts and are thus deprived of equal social security. Privatized social security that deprives women of their entitlements is untenable under human rights law, but there may be some ways in which privatized social security is acceptable.
In conclusion:
1. There still is a need to work inside social security schemes for those who are eligible Social security can be improved and it can benefit women in the formal sector if discrimination within these schemes is addressed. Recommendations for improvement should focus on both State delivery AND State regulation.
2. There is a growing informal market. The informal sector cannot be formalized. It either will not work or is too costly, especially for women. The question we need to answer is: What are State obligations in this process? Perhaps we should move away from social security and towards a social welfare system. One way to start re-engaging social security is by resisting the distinction between work-related and non-work related entitlements.
3. We can examine more carefully ideas about who should and can deliver social security. The State should always have to deliver basic in-kind health care, as well as in-cash basic income. The national context will determine what other issues should be delivered in this way.
4. We must deal with trade-related social security. Social security is being given into the market, where it can be delivered by for-profit or not-for-profit organizations. The positive aspect of this is that it can provide opportunities for community-based, not-for-profit organizations to control delivery.
The Right to Adequate Housing
- Leilani Farha (Canada)
The right to adequate housing, like the right to adequate food, is a constituent element of the right to an adequate standard of living as found in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. The right to adequate housing is also understood as an independent, free-standing right in international law. Despite the relevance of the right to adequate housing to women, women’s housing needs and experiences have not been included or reflected in international articulations of the content of this right. Most United Nations documents profess “gender neutrality” but a closer examination reveals a decontextualized and male-specific conception of housing rights. This decontextualization obscures what women’s equality rights mean in the context of the right to housing.
The gender neutrality of the right to housing is readily apparent in General Comment 4 on the right to adequate housing adopted by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 1994. General Comment 4 is the leading legal interpretation of the right to adequate housing and yet it fails to adequately consider and reflect women’s housing needs and experiences in anything more than a cursory and superficial manner. Though General Comment 4 suggests that the male-specific language used in the articulation of the right in the ICESCR must be understood in its historical context and cannot mean that the right to housing does not extend to women (or at least female-headed households), the Committee fails to reflect and incorporate this into its articulation of other aspects of the content of the right.
This is best reflected when examining the seven elements required in order for housing to be deemed “adequate” under international human rights law. Three examples were provided:
Security of tenure: The definition provided by the CESCR fails to acknowledge that security of tenure is of particular importance to women as a group and that women’s security of tenure is threatened in gendered ways. For example, domestic violence against women and women’s lack of inheritance rights in many countries are two phenomena - particular to women - that jeopardize women’s security of tenure.
Affordability: General Comment 4 recognizes that housing costs should be commensurate with income levels. It does not, however, recognize or indicate that women are the poorest group in society and that, therefore, States parties should develop strategies that take into account women's poverty when ensuring housing affordability. And while the CESCR recognizes that tenants should be protected from unreasonable rent levels or increases, they fail to consider the fact that male landlords can exploit women by demanding sexual favours if women want to avoid rent increases and evictions.
Accessibility: General Comment 4 highlights that particularly disadvantaged groups should be ensured some degree of priority in the housing sphere. The list of disadvantaged groups includes: elderly, children, physically disabled, and HIV positive individuals, among others. The list, however, does not include women. It also fails to acknowledge that access is a particularly important issue for women who suffer domestic violence and all women who are landless and/or unable to own land and property, for whatever reason.
The gender-neutrality of General Comment 4 obscures what it is States must address and undertake to ensure equality between women and men within the context of women’s rights to housing.
Too little attention has been paid to the issue of women and forced evictions. Forced eviction is the involuntary removal of a person from their homes or lands. There is a danger in particularizing women in a fashion that treats women as a subset and moves them away from the centre of our analysis and understanding. For example, when women are positioned as a subset of a larger group in the forced eviction context, we might ask: what is the particular impact on women of forced eviction? However, when women are at the centre of our analysis, it is apparent that forced evictions target women. In armed conflict, for example, the targeting of the home for forced evictions is not arbitrary. The home is recognized as a vulnerable site because that is where aggressors will find women.
Discussion
On the issue of the definition of social security, South African participants noted that in their country an extended definition of social security exists. In turn, they queried whether it is possible to use such extended definitions in the international context. For example, could social security include social insurance or social protection? It was noted that social security, social assistance and social insurance are different legal concepts, while social protection is not a legal concept, though perhaps it should be. As it stands, social protection has been used in World Bank literature pertaining to its anti-poverty programmes. Social protection has also been understood as one of a number of techniques that can be used to implement the right to social security but it is not currently understood as a component of the right to social security itself. Regardless, male standards or conceptions of basic income or basic security tend to be the starting point.
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Participants were concerned by the notion that the privatization of social security is not necessarily detrimental to women. They suggested that privatization makes it easier for governments to abdicate their human rights obligations and responsibilities. A participant from Mexico explained that in her country there is a mixed private-public social security system. As it stands, a large portion of the federal budget is allocated to social security, but of these monies, most are spent to support private social security programmes. Another large portion of the social security budget item goes to State social security including pensions, and the smallest portion of the budget is allocated to provide social security to the portion of the population not covered by the first two schemes, approximately 50% of the population. And so, while the budget line for social security has increased, the State has not
increased its own delivery of social security, rather it has merely increased its support of private social security. It appears that as a result, women continue to be disadvantaged with respect to social security provisions in Mexico.
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It was noted that while privatization absolves Governments of direct responsibility for delivering social security, Governments must continue to regulate and sustain the social security system. Also, privatization can come in many forms, such as community initiatives and micro networks, where people come together and take social security into their own hands, which is not necessarily as negative as private corporations taking over social security.
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A participant from Argentina explained that in her country privatization of social security is a result of conditions imposed by the IMF. The result of this has not been positive. Private companies running the social security system speculate using these public funds, which leaves people at risk, with no State protection of social security.
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Regarding the right to food, a participant reported the dismantling of an important food programme. India used to have a system of subsidizing food grains targeted to the poorest groups. The scheme was dismantled because of corruption, and as a result there is no public food distribution system currently in place.
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Participants commented that the practice of forced evictions exposes the interrelationship between the right to housing and the right to food. For example, in Ghana, transnational mining companies are part of the economic landscape. The Government of Ghana provides enormous concessions to the companies, giving these companies lands that were used formerly by Ghanaians for subsistence farming and living. As a result, tens of thousands of people have been forcibly evicted from their homes and lands. If communities are resettled at all they are put in barren settlements that do not offer culturally specific, or indeed any basic, living standards. Most often, no land for agriculture or subsistence gardening is available. Money is given to the men, who then leave, while women remain in these resettled areas with no way of growing food and no access to services. This phenomenon takes place in other countries as well and is usually the result of legislation adopted to offer incentives to companies to bring their business in to the country.
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A number of participants commented on the relevance of housing and forced evictions in women’s lives. In Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa, a participant noted that women are
evicted from their homes upon the death of a spouse if they do not have children, particularly male children, who can inherit the home? It is also very difficult for single women to access rental housing as landlords discriminate against single women or women not “attached” to men.
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Several participants agreed that women must be kept at the centre of an analysis or understanding of the right to housing and that this is necessary if we are going to understand the right in a way that is useful for women.
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In order for women to have the equal benefit of economic, social and cultural rights, a deeper analysis of each right is required from women’s perspective. To establish such a meaning will entail an ownership of and a claiming of these rights as women’s rights. Ultimately, each of these rights must be made capable of responding to women’s experiences of inequality.
