Creating spaces – for women
with disabilities (WWD) to communicate and advocate for their rights in South
Asia
The rights-based focus in our approach
The rights-based approach adopted in this project involves promoting and supporting WWD to gain control over their social, economic, political and material resources.
This includes communicating the benefits as well as the responsibilities and the consequences that these rights bring with them, and helping the women to find opportunities and confidence to participate in, and eventually contribute to a 'dialogue', or even move to establish the parameters of the 'dialogue'.The aim is to create opportunity and confidence for WWD to take their 'private dialogue' into the 'public domain'.
Country context is important in this rights-based approach, which takes into account the political system, legislation in place, cultural context, social stratification, economic system and civil society participation. Crucially, this project combines lobbying through official channels in addition to advocating for change in the private sphere, attempting to transform aspirations into policy change and on the ground implementation. It will aim to achieve this by transposing the frameworks and international commitments (as outlined below) into context specific depictions of entitlements and responsibilities, as defined by the WWD themselves.
Specific rights addressed in this project
a) Right to equality, and to be free from all forms of discrimination to ensure full development and advancement of women for the purpose of guaranteeing them the exercise and enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms. (from the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women - CEDAW 1979)
b) Right to social-economic security, particularly in relation to the dignity of persons and entitlement to an adequate standard of living for physical, social, and mental development Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)
c) Right not to be subject to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, such as gender-based violence(CEDAW)
d) The obligation of the state to modify the social and cultural patterns of a society with the view to achieve the elimination of discriminatory traditional practices. (CEDAW)
e) The obligation of the state to recognize that a mentally or physically disabled child should enjoy a full and decent life, in conditions which ensure dignity, promote self-reliance and facilitate the child's active participation in the community. UN Convention on the rights of the child (1990)
f) The UN General Assembly of the United Nations Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for People with Disabilities The UN General Assembly of the United Nations Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for People with Disabilities in resolution 48/96 of (20 December 1993)
g) Right to health, particularly in relation to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) including HIV and AIDS
In particular, they will draw on the UN Standard Rules on the equalisation of opportunities for persons with disabilities (as referenced in DFID in Disability, Poverty and Development). Within these directives focus will be made on influencing Government Organisations (GOs), as well as non-state actors such as DPOs, NGOs, WOs, community leaders and the media.
Below is a list of the priority advocacy areas as depicted by standard rule core areas, but defined by the project partners during the design of the project:
1. Preconditions for equal participation
- Raising awareness about the rights of disabled women/girls
- Lobbying for access to health care
2. Target areas for equal participation
- Lobbying for governments to make buildings accessible
- Lobbying for equal access to education and employment opportunities
- Lobbying for inclusion in social security policies
- Lobbying for personal integrity and safety, including protection against violence and sexual abuse
- Lobbying for inclusion in all development programmes, including income generation
- Advocating for positive representation in the media
3. Implementation measure
- Lobbying for increased allocation of budgets and more resources to WWD
- Lobbying for mainstreaming and accountability of the rights of WWDs through the international human rights instruments, especially CEDAW (linking with the NGOs shadow country reports)
- Lobbying for inclusion of WWD issues in the mainstream development policies and voluntary codes held by non-state actors
- Lobbying for the inclusion of WWD and gender in country disability laws and acts
- Lobbying for the correct application of existing position papers and enforcement of laws against rights violations
- Increasing provision of country-level information and research about WWD
- Increasing the organisation and international co-operation by WWD
Operating within other frameworks – maximising the opportunities
In addition, the WWD project will also contribute towards the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific’s (UNESCAP) 2002 Biwako Millennium Declaration which aims at “Promoting an inclusive, barrier-free and rights-based society for people with disabilities in the Asian and Pacific region in the twenty-first century” as well as UNESCAP’s follow-on Beijing Declaration of 2003.
Both declarations assert the need to create a legally binding convention on disability for the Asia and Pacific region which is founded on human rights, which recognises the position of women and girls and both call for increased sub-regional, regional and inter-regional cooperation in support of action.
These declarations became forerunners of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities which, together with its Optional Protocol, was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2006.