Human Rights Of Women - A Collection Of International And Regional Normative Instruments - Brief Article

WIN News, Spring, 2000

PREPARED BY JANUSZ SYMONIDES AND VLADIMIR VOLODIN

UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANIZATION (UNESCO)

7 place de Fontenoy, F-75352 Paris 07 SP, FRANCE

CONTENTS:

"Introduction // Part I: Universal Normative Instruments // A. United Nations Organization // B. International Labour Organisation // C. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) // Part II: Regional Normative Instruments // A. Council of Europe: (a) Texts of the Committee of Ministers // (b) Texts of the Parliamentary Assembly // B. Organization of American States // Part III: Selection of Documents Concerning The World Conferences on Women // Part IV: State of Ratifications of Universal and Regional Normative Instruments in this Publication.

In the autumn of 1998, UNESCO published Droits des femmes: Recueil de textes normatifs internationaux which was dedicated to the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This book met with great interest and the Organization received many requests for an English edition. The present volume, containing updated information, has been prepared in response to these demands. It is dedicated to the twentieth anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

UNESCO

FROM THE INTRODUCTION

Women began struggling for their rights centuries ago; they have been trying for a very long time to gain the same rights and opportunities as men, in what has always been a fundamentally male-dominated society. Though ideals of emancipation can be traced back to the Renaissance, women's fight for their rights gained considerable momentum from the eighteenth century onwards[ldots] The most decisive and irreversible transformation in the status of women came with the Industrial Revolution. [ldots] The creation of secondary schools for girls, equal in quality to boys' schools, was a turning-point, and the admission of young women into the world of higher education lent increasingly irresistible and irreversible force to the advancement of the human rights of women[ldots]

The International Council of Women was set up towards the end of the nineteenth century: 66 American and 8 European women attended its first and founding convention, held in Washington in 1888. Some 5,000 women participated in the second meeting, which took place in London in 1899. Women workers were beginning to organize movements demanding better working conditions. The first women's strike broke out on 1 May 1893 in Vienna.

Political rights for women, especially the right to vote, were a particularly important issue. Women carried out an intense voting rights campaign in the United Kingdom and the United States where, in 1869, two organizations were founded to win that right[ldots]it was New Zealand that first granted women the right to vote, in 1893, followed by Australia in 1902, Finland in 1906 and Norway in 1913.

The first international convention relating to the protection of women was adopted at the beginning of the twentieth century: the International Convention for the Suppression of the White Slave Trade of 4 May 1910[ldots] Although the Covenant of the League of Nations did not make express reference to individual rights, among its objectives - inadequately developed - are a number of rights of the human person, such as that relating to humane and equal working conditions for men, women and children. The League of Nations also adopted some instruments dealing with the protection of women.

I. THE UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM AND THE HUMAN RIGHTS OF WOMEN

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948, enshrines the principle of equality between women and men and prohibits discrimination against women[ldots]

1. United Nations standard-setting instruments relating to the human rights of women:

- Convention on the Political Rights of Women

- Declaration on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women

- Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women

2. United Nations Plans of Action and Strategies to promote equality and combat discrimination

3. United Nations specialized agencies and bodies and the protection of women

II. CONTRIBUTION OF REGIONAL ORGANIZATIONS TO THE PROTECTION OF WOMEN

III. CONCLUSION

This publication contains conventions, declaration and recommendations adopted by the United Nations and its Specialized Agencies and by two regional organizations: the Council of Europe and the Organization of American States[ldots]"