Christine Chinkin

Feminist Approaches to International Law

The development of feminist jurisprudence in recent years has made a rich and fruitful contribution to legal theory. Few areas of domestic law have avoided the scrutiny of feminist writers, who have exposed the gender bias of apparently neutral systems of rules. A central feature of many western theories about law is that the law is an autonomous entity, distinct from the society it regulates. A legal system is regarded as different from a political or economic system, for example, because it operates on the basis of abstract rationality, and is thus universally applicable and capable of achieving neutrality and objectivity. These attributes are held to give the law its special authority. More radical theories have challenged this abstract rationalism, arguing that legal analysis cannot be separated from the political, economic, historical and cultural context in which people live. Some theorists argue that the law functions as a system of beliefs that make social, political and economic inequalities appear natural. Feminist jurisprudence builds on certain aspects of this critical strain in legal thought. It is much more focused and concrete, however, and derives its theoretical force from immediate experience of the role of the legal system in creating and perpetuating the unequal position of women.

The boundaries of international law : a feminist analysis

1. Women and the international legal system 2. Feminist theories and international law 3. Modes of international law-making 4. The law of treaties 5. The idea of the state 6. International institutions 7. Human rights 8. The use of force in international law 9. Peaceful settlement of disputes 10. Redrawing the boundaries of international law

Building Women into Peace: the international legal framework

Abstract Peace-building is now a major aspect of the work of international institutions. While once the international community aimed simply to maintain a ceasefire and restore some form of stability in conflict zones, since the early 1990s there has been increasing attention given to creating peaceful and democratic societies through international intervention. A common problem in international peace-building projects over the past decade has been the position of women, particularly their limited involvement in the institutional design of peace-building strategies and the possibility that peace-building may actually reduce local womens agency in society. This article discusses the modern enterprise of peace-building and identifies international legal principles that can serve as a framework for peace-building projects in which womens lives are taken seriously.

A Mirage in the Sand? Distinguishing Binding and Non-Binding Relations Between States

The article discusses the two decisions (thus far) of the International Court of Justice in the case concerning Maritime Delimitation and Territorial Questions between Qatar and Bahrain , especially its consideration of when an internationally binding agreement has come into existence. The Courts willingness to infer a legally binding agreement, regardless of the intentions of at least one of the parties, appears to displace the primacy of consent it has emphasized in its earlier jurisprudence. The decision seems to hold states bound by informal commitments, an approach that might inhibit open negotiations between states and undermine genuine attempts to pre-empt disputes or to comply with the obligation of peaceful settlement of disputes.

Cultural Relativism and International Law

Public international law makes a particular claim to universality in application, if not in origin, and central to this claim is the univer- sality of the human rights standards articulated under the auspices of the United Nations (UN). While international human rights instruments, from the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights1 onward, derive substantially from Western intellectual, philosophical, and spiritual tradi- tions, they have nonetheless today acquired widespread international com- mitment. There are, for example, over 160 state parties, representing every geographic region and espousing all religions, to the 1979 UN Conven- tion on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEAFDAW)2 and 191 state parties to the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.3 UN member states’ adoption by consensus of Gen- eral Assembly resolutions, such as the 1993 Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women,4 has meant that formally there are no dis- sentient voices to the view that gender-specific violence constitutes a di- rect denial of human rights and prevents women’s enjoyment of all rights.

Addressing violence against women in the commonwealth within states' obligations under international law

This article examines international human rights standards with respect to redressing violence against women. It first sets out the international and regional instruments and jurisprudence relevant to determining international standards. It notes that, while there is no single convention explicitly on violence against women, the consistent language is such that these instruments in conjunction with the work of expert bodies (notably the Committee on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW Committee) and the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women) provide a blueprint of recommended actions and strategies for governments, inter-governmental organisations and NGOs to ensure the human rights of women free from violence. The article then discusses the widely accepted understanding of gender-based violence against women as ‘violence that is directed against a woman because she is a woman or that affects women disproportionately’. The article adopts the framework of understanding states’ obligations through the typology of the obligations to respect, protect and fulfil women’s right to be free from violence. In particular, the obligation to exercise due diligence to prevent such violence, to protect women against such violence, to prosecute and punish the perpetrators of such violence and to provide reparation to the victims of such violence. It recognises the importance of legislation that defines violence against women and criminalises its various manifestations. However, it also recognises that legal reform is not of itself an adequate approach and that legislation must operate in an effective system. It thus highlights the importance of a holistic, multisectoral and comprehensive national strategy that includes addressing the ways that law enforcement personnel, judges and prosecutors are influenced adversely by gender stereotypes and prejudices.

The New United Nations “Gender Architecture”: A Room with a View?

UN Reform in the 21st century has been motivated by the perceived need for institutional coherence. This was at the heart of UN Secretary- General Kofi Annan’s ambitious program for reform that he pursued throughout his term of office, seeking to ensure greater UN effectiveness through streamlining institutional functions. A significant development in the reform process was the creation in 2010 of the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, known as UN Women. UN Women incorporates the four existing parts of the UN system dealing with women and has been styled as the new UN “gender architecture”. This article considers the implications of this new institutional structure for the situation of women worldwide from the perspective of international law, asking in particular whether institutional reform is matched by normative progress.

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

This record is subject to correction. Corrections should be submitted in one of the working languages. They should be set forth in a memorandum and also incorporated in a copy of the record. They should be sent within one week of the date of this document to the Editing Unit, room E.4108, Palais des Nations, Geneva. Any corrections to the records of this session will be consolidated in a single corrigendum, to be issued shortly after the end of the session.

A Bottom-Up Approach to Redressing Past Violations of Human Rights

This contribution examines how civil society actors pursue justice in various ways different from, or in addition to, those of the formal justice system and in so doing seek to enhance human security. Human security has been the subject of multiple conceptual analyses since the publication of the 1994 Human Development Report (United Nations Development Programme, 1994). Different approaches have emphasized particular dimensions: direct physical violence (Canada), political violence (Human Security Report) and freedom from want (UNDP; Japan). The work of the Human Security Study Group convened at the behest of Javier Solana by Mary Kaldor articulated an operational framework that called attention in particular to the need for a ‘bottom-up’ approach (Barcelona Report, 2003; Madrid Report, 2007).1

A Century of Achievement and Unfinished Work

The Hague Conferences that produced the Conventions of 1899 and 1907 closed the nineteenth century and opened the twentieth. They established an agenda for negotiation, in the parliamentary-diplomatic mode, for the next hundred years; elevated the development of mechanisms of dispute resolution to new prominence; tried to order many areas of armed conflict with new international law; and, perhaps unintentionally, set parameters for the future diplomacy of international conferences. Subsequent international lawmaking efforts grappled with many of the themes debated at The Hague, even as the political landscape of international law was completely transformed by the breakup of empires and the advent of almost two hundred new states; the founding of international organizations and regional organizations that could scarcely have been imagined in 1899, and the establishment of a truly permanent international judicial institution, followed by the creation of many other judicial institutions with more focused jurisdictions. Despite these changes, much of the style of the Hague Conferences left a deep imprint on international law. The mixture of lofty rhetoric, prophetic international legal vision, and narrow political interest of the Hague Conferences became a characteristic, even an expected feature, of collective international lawmaking efforts in this century.