Women's Rights and International Human Rights: A Bibliographical Note

Abstract

rights for women is an integral part of the struggle for the actualization of human rights through both domestic and international procedures and processes. Yet, in political and strategic terms, there seems to be very little intersection between the work of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) perceived as international human rights NGOs and that of women's rights movements. In like manner, the literature on international human rights tends to treat the problem of women's rights in a rather peripheral manner, discussing it only in the context of nondiscrimination against race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.1 To point out that discrimination against women is different from discrimination against other groups in that women comprise more than 50 percent of humankind does not, however, resolve the problem. What seems more significant is that NGOs focused on women's rights should begin to conceive of themselves as part of a larger struggle for human dignity while international human rights NGOs should begin to recognize that women's rights must become one of their fundamental concerns. From the vantage point of the Human Rights Internet-a communications network of scholars, activists, and policymakers actively engaged in the promotion and protection of internationally recognized human rights-the linkages between the work of human rights NGOs and women's rights NGOs seem very weak. Among the nearly fifteen hundred individuals and organizations from seventy-five countries which are contributors to this network, only a handful are scholars or organizations primarily concerned with women's rights, and only a fraction of the 1. Persons wishing more detailed information on how to obtain any of the above publications may write the Human Rights Internet, 1502 Ogden St., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20010.