PHM-Exch> Women as full human beings (2)

[Claudio Schuftan]

from Dr Sam Lanfranco (Prof Emeritus), York U.
 Lanfran at Yorku.ca

>  As we celebrate the 30th anniversary of CEDAW, the United Nations
> Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
> Women, we may want to temper our notions around the idea that CEDAW
> is an extraordinary revolutionary document, unique in its
> perception of women as full human beings.
>
> The reason for the caution here is not to devalue the achievement of
> CEDWA but to recognize two things. First that it is but on stepping
> stone in a long path toward full rights for women, and a just gender
> equality. There is much left to be done. Second, it is but one
> stepping stone in a long path that, in Western thought at least,
> stretches well back into the Enlightenment.
>
> It was almost 200 years ago, after she had taken Edmond Burke to task
> for not opposing American slavery, that Mary Wollstonecraft wrote "A
> Vindication of the Rights of Women: with Strictures on Political and
> Moral Subjects"(1792), re-published in Sylvana Tomaselli (ed) "A
> Vindication of the Rights of Men and A Vindication of the Rights of
> Women", Cambridge Univ. Press, 1995.
>
> While we mark history by events, by writings, and by declarations, the
> history of the struggles around human rights have gone on for ever,
> and will go on for ever. The test of our efforts will always be "are
> we making progress" and not "are we there yet".
>
> If the CEDWA stepping stone deserves a distinct marker it is give
> tribute to the fact that a global body (the UN) has endorsed the
> notion that the rights are universal, and that the next phases in the
> quest for more pervasive human rights now spansglobal initiatives, as
> well as civil and local initiatives.
>
>
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