Violence against Women under International Human Rights Law

by Alice Edwards

Overview

Since the mid-1990s, increasing international attention has been paid to the issue of violence against women; however, there is still no explicit international human rights treaty prohibition on violence against women and the issue remains poorly defined and understood under international human rights law. Drawing on feminist theories of international law and human rights, this critical examination of the United Nations' legal approaches to violence against women analyses the merits of strategies which incorporate women's concerns of violence within existing human rights norms such as equality norms, the right to life, and the prohibition against torture. Although feminist strategies of inclusion have been necessary as well as symbolically powerful for women, the book argues that they also carry their own problems and limitations, prevent a more radical transformation of the human rights system and ultimately reinforce the unequal position of women under international law.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781107617445
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	11/07/2013
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	410
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Dr Alice Edwards is Lecturer in International Refugee and Human Rights Law at the Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford. She has previously worked for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in various locations and for the International Secretariat of Amnesty International.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction; 2. Feminist theories on international law and human rights; 3. The international human rights treaty system: practice and procedure; 4. Equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex; 5. Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; 6. The right to life; 7. Conundrums, paradoxes, and continuing inequality: revisiting feminist narratives; 8. Strategising next steps: treaty body reform and humanising women.

Editorial Reviews

"This treatment of the status of violence against women under international human rights law by Dr Alice Edwards is a tour de force of erudition and rigour. The book succeeds on three levels: first, it offers an exceptional synthesis of the current state of international law in this area; second, it provides an excellent entry-point into feminist theoretical scholarship to explain clearly why this terrain is so difficult to traverse; and third, it offers a way forward which is strategic and underpinned by the author’s lived experience as a practitioner and advocate for women."
Susan Harris Rimmer, Human Rights Law Review

"… a thorough and detailed assessment of three areas of international human rights jurisprudence as applied to violence against women - a collection that will make this book a go-to resource for anyone writing in the field … Edwards’s call to reassess continually the efforts to include women and their perspectives in the human rights system is one that we must all take seriously. Her book is a powerful step in that direction."
Jaya Ramji-Nogales, American Society of International Law

From the Publisher