Rabu, 01 Agustus 2012

“Human Rights and Gender Relations in Postcolonial Africa: Options and Limits for the Subjects of Legal Pluralism”


                                                                         By Anne Hellum

            This article is very interesting for me, because it provides information about human rights and gender relations are an important component of social relations was still a lot of experience as an example of the relationship issues of gender relations and human rights in Africa.  The contentious relationship between gender equality, custom, and culture is reflected in varying legislative and judicial strategies that have been pursued by the different postcolonial African states as a means of reconciling greater equality with the protection of custom and culture  quite caught my attention.
            The article explain about contentious relationship between gender equality, custom, and culture is reflected in varying legislative and judicial strategies that have been pursued by the different postcolonial African states as a means of reconciling greater equality with the protection of custom and culture.   The social, cultural, economic, and legal differences between and within the countries that have ratified the Women’s Convention have made its implementation problematic.  Part of the problem is that customary norms sometimes operate to women’s disadvantage but other times do not.  for example, The Kenyan constitution embodies the principle of gender equality but at the same time protects the customary laws of the different ethnic groups and Hindu and Islamic law.  
By the article Anne Hellum suggested how women are contesting and transforming asymmetric power relations in terms of gendered prescriptions about speech, behavior, and distribution of resources, all these studies show that internationally initiated law reform gradually is taking root in local African communities. What all these studies demonstrate is the shortcoming of simplistic and one-dimensional dichotomies, such as Western versus African, traditional versus modern, folk law versus state law and universalism versus cultural relativism. Insight into women’s different and complex needs implies rejecting both the universalist and the relativist theories that assume harmonious and balanced societies based on complementary gender roles.
I things to do to understand the problem that law should be analyzed as a process of producing fixed gender identities rather than as the application of gender-neutral law to Previously gendered subjects. This is done to create a unified system applicable to all groups or to continue with a plural system of laws and customary That accommodate the religious laws of the different ethnic Populations. so that the convention requires states to undertake constitutional, legislative, and socioeconomic reform Aiming at the elimination of discrimination against women in the private as well as in the public sphere.

Tidak ada komentar:

Posting Komentar