¹ Faustina Ward-Osbome, speaking at the International Women’s Rights Action Watch seminar on Women, Human Rights and Development, Vienna, February 1989.

² Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, Dec. 18, 1979, G.A. Res. 180, U.N. GAOR, 34th Sess., Supp. No. 46, at 193, U.N. Doc. A/34/46 (1980), reprinted in 19 I.L.M. 33.

³ See in particular id. arts. 2 (general requirements), S (custom and stereotyping) and 14 (rural women).

⁴ Guidelines Regarding the Form and Content of Initial Reports of States Parties, Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, 14th Sess., UN Doc. CEDAW/C/7/Rev.l (1995).

⁵ International Women’s Rights Action Watch (in collaboration with the Commonwealth Secretariat), Assessing the Status of Women: A Guide to Retorting Under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1996).

⁶ This cautionary note applies to industrialized countries and to the richer countries in the developing world as well as to very poor countries. In South Africa just before the 1994 elections, for example, I was told that there were no health statistics that could be trusted, even as to white women, and that nobody knew with any degree of certainty what the census population was.

⁷ Under customary law, applicable to over 90 percent of the marriages in Zimbabwe, women have no rights to marital property upon divorce. The 1985 Marriage Act, which overrides customary law, includes provision for marital property division upon dissolution of the marriage.

⁸ Zimbabwe Matrimonial Causes Act 1985, sec. 7(2)(b).

⁹ The rationale for (and the history of) not dividing such land is that it provides sustenance for an extended family and must remain intact, in parcels that are not endlessly subdivided, in the hands of the family it is supposed to feed.

¹⁰ Status of Submission of Reports of States Parties under Article 18, U.N. Doc. CEDAW/C/2 (1997).

¹¹ “Trying to get your government to ratify CEDAW is a political process that makes you see the ramifications of this quite extensive and encompassing document. Once your government has signed, it’s a social contract that they’re making with the women in the country.” Roberta Clarke, a founder of the Caribbean Association for Feminist Research and Action (CAFRA), quoted in Friedman, Elisabeth, Women ‘s Human Rights: The Emergence of a Movement, in Women’s Rights, Human Rights: International Feminist Perspectives 23 (Peters, Julie & Wolper, Andrea eds., 1995)Google Scholar.

¹² When Mauritius was reviewed in 1995, the concluding observations included material critical of the government, which was not acknowledged until NGO observer Pramila Patten obtained the concluding observations and challenged the government’s account. Ultimately the government acknowledged the negative points and proceeded to amend the Constitution. See the Women’s Convention and CEDAW: Opportunities and Challenges in Light of Beijing, report of a Colloquium of the International Women’s Rights Action Watch and CEDAW (Jan. 1996).

¹³ Twenty-one plaintiffs have sued Sumitomo Metals, Sumitomo Electric, Sumitomo Chemical and Sumitomo Life Insurance, claiming discrimination in placement, promotion and pay. The Sumitomo Electric case also names the government, for refusing to pursue required mediation processes under the Equal Employment Opportunity Law. In a hearing held on April 7, 1997 in Osaka, the court ordered Sumitomo to submit its justification of these employment practices. According to the lawyers representing the plaintiffs, this is a major positive development.

¹⁴ Immediately after the January 1997 CEDAW session, the Union of Moroccan Women and other NGOs held a press conference to counter the Moroccan Government’s assertion to the CEDAW Committee that the government’s policies represented a consensus among Moroccan women. The Union’s representative had attended the CEDAW session and observed this misrepresentation first-hand. Japanese women also used the results of the reporting process to challenge government policy; since the 1994 review they have pressed for improved employment discrimination laws and have brought suit against a major corporation. See The Women’s Convention and Cedaw, supra note 12, and private communication from Katumi Hishimura and Eiko Shirafuji, Working Women’s Network, to IWRAW director Marsha Freeman.