Women's rights, international norms, and domestic violence: Asian perspectives

Human Rights Quarterly

Volumn 27, Issue 2, 2005, Pages 683-708

  Amirthalingam, Kumaralingam ^a  

^a NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE   (Singapore)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

VIOLENCE; WOMENS STATUS;

ASIA; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; EURASIA; WORLD;

EID: 20044367528     PISSN: 02750392     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/hrq.2005.0013     Document Type: Review

References (147)

1. Domestic Violence Act, No. 521 (1994) (Malay.);
2. Women's Charter Act, No. 353, § 64 (1961) (Sing.), amended 1996 to insert Part VII dealing with the protection of the family.
3. "Partners" includes a relationship between two people that has some degree of continuity, but is not exclusive to the husband-wife relationship.
4. World Health Organization, World Report on Violence and Health 93 (2002), available at www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/ violence/world_report/en/.
5. Report of the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Its Causes and Consequences, Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy, Submitted in Accordance with Commission on Human Rights Resolution 1995/85, a Framework for Model Legislation on Domestic Violence, U.N. ESCOR, Comm'n on Hum. Rts., 52d Sess., Agenda Item 9(a), addendum, 28, U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/1996/53/Add. 2 (1996).
6. Societal Change and Change in Family Violence from 1975 to 1985: As Revealed by Two National Surveys, in Woman Battering in the United States: Till Death Do Us Part 131 (Helen M. Eigenberg ed., 2001).
7. An important caveat must be introduced here. It is acknowledged that a multidimensional approach is crucial and while this paper focuses on criminal justice and women's rights, it is not suggested that there are no other dimensions to domestic violence. All that is contended is that this particular aspect needs serious attention.
8. Sally E. Merry, Rights Talk and the Experience of Law: Implementing Women's Human Rights to Protection from Violence, 25 Hum. Rts. Q. 343, 350 (2003).
9. The criminal laws of Singapore and Malaysia are virtually identical. Both have their origins in the Penal Code of the Straits Settlements of 1871. When Singapore became a crown colony in 1935 and the Federation of Malaysia was formed in 1948, each jurisdiction simply adopted the Straits Settlement Penal Code, which incidentally was copied from the Indian Penal Code of 1860. The current version of the Penal Codes are Penal Code, Cap. 224, Revised Edition 1985 (Singapore) and Penal Code Revised 1997 (Malaysia). The general discussion of Penal Code offenses applies equally to both jurisdictions unless otherwise specified.
10. The term domestic violence is used in Malaysia and family violence in Singapore and they are treated interchangeably in this article.
11. For a history of activities and milestones in Singapore, see Constance Singam, Working for Gender Equality: An AWARE Experience, in Building Social Space in Singapore: The Working Committee's Initiative in Civil Society Activism 45-52 (Constance Singam et al. eds., 2002). For information on Malaysia, see the Women's Aid Organisation, Domestic Violence, available at www.wao.org.my/research.htm#domestic.
12. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, adopted 18 Dec. 1979, G.A. Res. 34/180, U.N. GOAR, 34th Sess., Supp. No. 46, U.N. Doc. A/34/46 (1980) (entered into force 3 Sept. 1981), 1249 U.N.T.S. 13, reprinted in 19 I.L.M. 33 (1980).
13. The establishment of a family court to provide a holistic approach to family matters is highly commendable. Malaysia does not have a specialist family court, despite the value of having one. See Abu Bakar Munir & Nor Aini Abdullah, Domestic Violence and the Need for a Family Court, 4 Current L.J. Ixxv, lxxx-lxxxiii (1995).
14. See Ministry of Community Development and Sports, National Family Violence Networking System, in Families in Conflict: Theories and Approaches in Mediation and Counselling 271 (Richard Magnus et al. eds., 2000).
15. In 1995, there were 3,639 reported cases of family violence, of which 90 percent or 3,245 involved women as the victims. See Singapore Parliamentary Debates, Official Reports, Vol. 66, col. 121 (2 May 1996), Dr. Kanwaljit Soin, Nominated Member of Parliament.
16. The legislation has had an impact on the number of reported cases of domestic violence, which showed a dramatic increase after the enactments. See Consideration of Reports Submitted by States Parties Under Article 18 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women: Second Periodic Reports of States Parties, Singapore, U.N. ESCOR, Comm. for Elim. of Discrim. Against Women, U.N. Doc. CEDAW/C/SPG/2 (2001).
17. See text accompanying notes 67-69 for disadvantages of this type of approach.
18. A 1995 survey by the Women's Aid Organisation showed that 15 percent of adults did not view physical abuse of women as wrong. Rashidah Abdullah et al., Women's Aid Organisation, Battered Women in Malaysia: Prevalence, Problems and Public Attitudes (1995) (report available from WAO office, Kuala Lumpur), available at www.wao.org.my/ research.htm#domestic).
19. See generally, Second Reading of the Family Violence Bill, Singapore Parliamentary Debates, Official Reports, Vol. 65, at cols. 94-110 (1 Nov. 1995), Dr. Kanwaljit Soin, Nominated Member of Parliament (hereinafter Statement of Dr. Kanwaljit Soin);
20. Website of the Women's Aid Organisation, especially the research and advocacy page, available at www.wao.org.my/research.htm.
21. Statement of Dr. Kanwaljit Soin, supra note 18, col. 114.
22. See, e.g., id. Col. 169.
23. I b i d. col. 170.
24. I b i d. cols. 98, 105.
25. Alfred Choi, Formal Protection of Women from Wife Assaults in Singapore, 3 Malayan L.J. xli (1994).
26. The Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment, Police Foundation Reports (Apr. 1984), available at www.policefoundation.org/pdf/ minneapolisdve.pdf.
27. See Lisa G. Lerman, The Decontextualisation of Domestic Violence, in Woman Battering in the United States, supra note 5, at 226.
28. See Joel H. Garner & Christopher D. Maxwell, What are the Lessons of the Police Arrest Studies?, 4 J. Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma 83 (2000)
29. cited in Robyn Holder, Domestic and Family Violence: Criminal Justice Interventions, 3 Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearing House: Issues Paper 11 (2001).
30. Dr. Soin made this point explicitly during the second reading of the Domestic Violence Bill 1994: By empowering the Police to carry out investigations of a case, we are not suggesting that in each and every case of family violence the Police have to take a pro-active approach and intrude into every home ... the Police can use their discretion not to proceed further. Like any other offence reported to the Police, it is up to Police judgment to assess the situation. Statement of Dr. Kanwaljit Soin, supra note 18, col. 102. Compare the view expressed by Kenneth Chen Koon Lap, a member of Parliament, during debate of the Domestic Violence Bill 1994: "I, therefore, consider the proposed Family Violence Bill redundant and, if passed, would serve no additional purpose but may even have a negative effect on creating more broken families and bring more pain and suffering to the family members." Singapore Parliamentary Debates, Official Reports, Vol. 65, col. 172 (2 Nov. 1995), Kenneth Chen Koon Lap.
31. Ministry of Community Development and Sports, Family Matters: Report of the Public Education Committee on Family 2 (2002), available at app.mcys.gov.sg/web/serv_reports_faml.asp? szMod=toppublication&szSubMod=rfaml.
32. Report of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (25th Sess. 2001), U.N. GAOR, 56th Sess., Supp. No. 38, at 53, U.N. Doc A/56/38 (2001).
33. I b i d. at 54.
34. Faridah Hamid, Domestic Violence Act Passed But for Whom?, Malaysian Law News, June 1994, at 27.
35. Some of the provisions in both Penal Codes include sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt); 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means); 325 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt); 326 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means); 341 (wrongful restraint); 342 (wrongful confinement); 352 (using criminal force otherwise than on grave provocation); 354 assault or use of criminal force to a person with intent to outrage modesty); 355 (assault or criminal force with intent to dishonor a person; otherwise than on grave provocation) 357 assault or criminal force in attempt to wrongfully confine a person; 376 (rape); 426 (committing mischief); and 506 (criminal intimidation). This list was compiled by Fawziah Begum, Implementing the Domestic Violence Act 1994 (7 Oct. 1996) (unpublished paper presented at HAWA Workshop on Gender Perspectives in Family Violence).
36. Women's Crisis Centre, Review and Proposals for Amendments to the Domestic Violence Act 1994, at 3 (Mar. 1999) (report available from the WAO office, Kuala Lumpur).
37. See supra note 32.
38. Domestic Violence Act, supra note 1, § 2 contains four paragraphs describing different acts that constitute domestic violence.
39. Women's Charter, supra note 1, § 64.
40. Some guidance may be found in the Protection from Harassment Act, 1997, c. 40 (UK), which applies a reasonable person test.
41. Malcomson Nicholas Hugh Bertram & Anor v. Naresh Kumar Mehta, 4 Singapore L. Rep. 454 (2001).
42. A seizable offense requires a police officer to conduct immediate investigation and includes a power of arrest. Non-seizable offenses cannot be investigated without an order from the Public Prosecutor and a warrant is required for any arrest.
43. See Nor Aini bte Abdullah, Domestic Violence Act 1994: An End to a Nightmare?, 1 Malayan L.J. xli, xliii n.8 (1995).
44. See Women's Charter, supra note 1, at § 65(1).
45. Domestic Violence Act, supra note 1, § 6.
46. I b i d. § 6(1)(a).
47. I b i d. § 6(4)(a). Note that this problem does not exist under the Singapore provisions, as the Women's Charter does not have this requirement.
48. Conversation with Naina Kapur, Director of Sakshi, at the Salzburg Seminar Session 405 on Law as a Catalyst of Change in Asia (Dec. 2002).
49. See Hamid, supra note 31, at 28.
50. While conclusive evidence on cohabition trends in Asia is not yet available, recent research suggests that there is evidence of increased levels of premarital sex as well as long-term sexually intimate relationships and a greater acceptance of cohabitation amongst unmarried adults. The official policy of not encouraging a permissive society may not reflect the reality. See Gavin Jones, Not "When to Marry" but "Whether to Marry": The Changing Context of Marriage Decisions in East and Southeast Asia, in (Un)tying the Knot: Ideal and Reality in Asian Marriage 3-36 (Gavin Jones & Kamalini Ramdas eds., 2004).
51. Domestic Violence Act, supra note 1, § 2.
52. Penal Code § 375 (Cap 224, Rev. Ed. 1985) (Sing.);
53. Penal Code § 375 (Revised 1997) (Malay.).
54. These and other examples are considered in Women's Crisis Centre, supra note 33, at 8.
55. Women's Charter (Amendment) Bill, No. 5/96 (1996)(Sing.).
56. Select Committee on the Women's Charter (Amendment) Bill, Report of the Select Committee (1996).
57. For example, the various Australian states: Crimes Act 1900 (ACT) § 3; Domestic And Family Violence Protection Act 1989 (Qld) § 11A(1); Domestic Violence Act 1994 (SA) § 4(2); Crimes (Family Violence) Act 1987 (Vic) § 4; Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) § 4. See also New Zealand: Domestic Violence Act 1995 (NZ) § 3.
58. "[W]hen fellatio is a substitute for natural sexual intercourse between a man and a woman capable in law of giving consent, the woman's consent to perform the act of fellatio cannot save it from being an offence under § 377 of the Penal Code. See Public Prosecutor v. Kwan Kwong Weng, 1 Singapore L. Rep. 697, 706 (1997).
59. See Chan Wing Cheong, Latest Improvement to the Women's Charter , Sing. J. Legal Stud. 553, 563-64 (1996) for some insightful criticisms.
60. Select Committee on the Women's Charter (Amendment) Bill, Report of the Select Committee, iv (1996) suggests that this may be possible. See Wai Kum Leong, Family Law in Singapore 167-68 (1990) (arguing that the marital rape immunity should not apply to married couples who are estranged).
61. See also Cheng Han Tan, Marital Rape - Removing the Husband's Legal Immunity, 31 Malayan L. Rev. 112 (1989).
62. See Family Court of Singapore, Frequently Asked Questions, available at www. familycourtofsingapore.gov.sg/principles/ FAQ_Family_Violence.htm (emphasis added).
63. Rape and sexual assault have historically been the principal method of subjugating women, and during war it is a common form of attack against women as well as a means of torture, resulting in its being declared a war crime. See Platform for Action adopted at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing (1995).
64. Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women: Action for Equality, Development, and Peace, Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, U.N. GAOR, U.N. Doc. A/CONF.177/20 (1995), reprinted in Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women (1995) (recommended to the UN General Assembly by the Committee on the Status of Women on 7 Oct. 1995).
65. See also Rhonda Copelon, Women and War Crimes, 69 St. John's L. Rev. 61 (1995);
66. Kelly D. Askin, Women and International Humanitarian Law, in Women and International Human Rights Law 41 (Kelly Dawn Askin & Dorean M. Koenig eds., 1999);
67. Ximena Bunster-Burotto, Surviving Beyond Fear: Women and Torture in Latin America, in Women and Violence 156 (Miranda Davies ed., 1994). The Malaysian Women's Aid Organisation has recently highlighted this issue again in the context of the Iraq War.
68. Jaclyn Kee, Violence of War on Women, Sunday Mail, 6 April 2003.
69. Asian Human Rights Commission, The Asian Human Rights Charter: A People's Charter, art. 9.2 (1998), available at www.ahrchk.net/ charter/mainfile.php/eng_charter/.
70. Women's Crisis Centre, supra note 33, at 19-20.
71. See Del Martin, Domestic Violence: A Sociological Perspectives, in The Male Batterer: A Treatment Approach 8-11 (Daniel Jay Sonkin et al. eds., 1985).
72. See Terry Davidson, Wifebeating: A Recurring Phenomenon Throughout History, in Battered Women: A Psychosociological Study of Domestic Violence 2 (Maria Roy ed., 1977).
73. See Gordon Rattray Taylor, Sex in History (1954).
74. R. Emerson Dobash & Russell P. Dobash, Violence Against Wives: A Case Against The Patriarchy 24 (The Free Press, 1979).
75. See Bunster-Burotto, supra note 58, at 6-7;
76. The United Nations, Violence Against Women in the Family: What Causes Violence Against Women in the Home, in Woman Battering in the United States, supra note 5, at 147-56.
77. See also David Levinson, Family Violence in Cross-Cultural Perspective 14 (1989) for a much wider variety of theories.
78. See Katharine D. Kelly, The Family Violence and Woman Abuse Debate: Reviewing the Literature, Posing Alternatives, in A Cross-Cultural Exploration of Wife Abuse 28 (Aysan Sev'er ed., 1997).
79. See generally The Abusive Partner: An Analysis of Domestic Battering (Maria Roy ed., 1982);
80. Woman Battering in the United States, supra note 5, ch. 3;
81. Domestic Violence: The Criminal Justice Response 15-26 (Eve S. Buzawa & Carl G. Buzawa eds., 1990);
82. Levinson, supra note 65.
83. See Keith M. Farrington, Stress and Family Violence, in Social Causes of Husband-Wife Violence 94-114 (Murray A. Strauss & Gerald T. Hotaling eds., 1980).
84. Kerry Healey et al., The Causes of Domestic Violence: From Theory to Intervention, in Woman Battering in the United States, supra note 5, at 167.
85. See, e.g., United States Commission on Civil Rights, Under the Rule of Thumb: Battered Women and the Administration of Justice: A Report of the United States Commission on Civil Rights (1982).
86. See generally, Levinson, supra note 65.
87. The person and work now almost synonymous with this theory is Lenore E. Walker, The Battered Woman 55 (1979).
88. Kit Kinports, Defending Battered Women's Self-Defense Claims, 67 Or. L. Rev. 393, 398 (1998).
89. Some feminists are critical of this approach as it perpetuates a victim mentality, which is not necessarily true in many cases. See Woman Battering in the United States, supra note 5, at 131-32 and references therein.
90. The Abusive Partner, supra note 67, at 3.
91. I b i d. at 3-5, referring to Rollo.May, Power and Innocence: A Search for the Sources of Violence (1972).
92. Clearly evident from much of the rhetoric emanating from the American and British political and military establishments prior to the recent Gulf War.
93. For an interesting study on the relationship between hawkish attitudes toward war and family values, see Robert A. Lewis, Socialization into National Violence: Familial Correlates of Hawkish Attitudes towards War , 33 J. Marriage & Family 699 (1971).
94. Dobash & Dobash, supra note 64, at 15.
95. See Radhika Coomaraswamy, To Bellow Like a Cow: Women, Ethnicity and the Discourse of Rights, in Human Rights of Women: National and International Perspectives 39 (Rebecca J. Cook ed., 1994).
96. New South Wales Attorney General's Department, Strategy to Reduce Violence Against Women, 2001, cited in Rochelle Braaf & Gargi Ganguly, Cultural Challenges for Violence Prevention: Working Towards an Ethical Practice of Sustainable Intervention 3 (2002) (Paper presented at Expanding Our Horizons Conference).
97. Donald G. Dutton & Cynthia E. van Ginkel, The Interaction of Cultural and Personality Factors in the Etiology of Wife Assault, in A Cross-Cultural Exploration of Wife Abuse, supra note 66, at 102.
98. See Sonia Harris-Short, International Human Rights Law: Imperialist Inept and Ineffective? Cultural Relativism and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 25 Hum. Rts. Q. 130 (2003) and references therein for useful literature on the subject.
99. Levison, supra note 65, at 31, found that wife beating occurred in about 85 percent of societies.
100. Braaf & Ganguly, supra note 81, at 9.
101. See Roger J.R. Levesque, Culture and Family Violence: Fostering Change Through Human Rights Law 7 (2001).
102. Levison, supra note 65, at 88.
103. I b i d. at 33-36.
104. See, e.g., the results of a study of the Wape community in New Guinea. William E. Mitchell, Why Wape Men Don't Beat Their Wives: Constraints towards Domestic Tranquility in a New Guinea Society, in To Have and To Hit: Cultural Perspectives on Wife Beating 100-09 (Dorothy Ayers Counts et al. eds., 2d ed. 1999).
105. Barbara Diane Miller, Wife Beating in India: Variations on a Theme, in To Have and to Hit: Cultural Perspectives on Wife Beating, supra note 89, at 203-15.
106. Levinson, supra note 65, at 46.
107. Lifting the Veil of Inequality, 17 Asia Week, 9 Aug. 1991, at 27. Hasnah is not the woman's real name.
108. Verse Al Nisa' 4:34.
109. I b i d.
110. To Have and to Hit: Cultural Perspectives on Wife Beating, supra note 89, at ix.
111. Asian values are generally identified with three schools of thought; the Lee Kwan Yew-Singapore model, the Mahathir-Malaysia model and the Post-Tiananmen-Confucianism-Nationalism model: see Errol P. Mendes, Asian Values and Human Rights: Letting the Tigers Free (Human Rights Research and Education Centre, University of Ottawa, 1996), available at www.cdp-hrc.uottawa.ca/publicat/asian_values.html.
112. To Have and to Hit: Cultural Perspectives on Wife Beating, supra note 89, at ix.
113. See Kevin Y. L. Tan, What Asians Think about the West's Response to the Human Rights Debate, Human Rights Dialogue, Series 1, No. 4 (1996), available at www.carnegiecouncil.org.
114. Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Address at the Senate House, Cambridge University (15 Mar. 1995) (transcript on file with author). Having offended the universalists, the most militant of whom are congregated in the West, let me now be permitted to offend the authoritarians, so many of whom are said to congregate in "the East". The first thing that might usefully be said is that atrocity anywhere must not be tolerated. It should be punished. No one should be allowed to hide behind the cloak of cultural relativism. I b i d.
115. See Asian Freedoms: The Idea of Freedom in East and Southeast Asia (David Kelly & Anthony Reid eds., 1998). The major Asian religions and cultural traditions including Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and Confucianism all have such notions at their core although expressed in different ways.
116. See generally Maria Serena Diokno, Cultural Sources of Human Rights in East Asia: Consensus Building Toward a Rights Regime, Human Rights Dialogue, Series 1, No. 5 (June 1996), available at www.carnegiecouncil.org.
117. Prior to the Vienna Declaration of 1993, China led a regional preparatory conference in Bangkok, which resulted in a declaration emphasizing Asian values over universalism. This resulted in the Vienna Declaration including an affirmation that the right to development was as universal and inalienable as other fundamental rights. See infra notes 105-07.
118. Anwar Ibrahim, Media and Society in Asia, Keynote Address at the Asian Press Forum (2 Dec. 1994), cited in Hoong-Phun Lee, Constitutional Values in Turbulent Asia, Papers of the 14th Lawasia Biennial Conference (16-20 Aug. 1995).
119. Women's Rights are Human Rights: International Law and the Culture of Domestic Violence, in To Have and to Hit: Cultural Perspectives on Wife Beating, supra note 89, at 292-93.
120. P.N. Bhagwati, Former Chief Justice of India and Member of the UN Human Rights Committee, Keynote Address at the Asia/South Pacific Regional Judicial Colloquium for Senior Judges on the Domestic Application of International Human Rights Norms Relevant to Women's Human Rights (20-22 May 1996)
121. Gender Equality and the Judiciary 35 (Kirstine Adams & Andrew Byrne eds., 1999).
122. The sixteen days linked 25 November (International Day Against Violence Against Women) to 10 December (International Human Rights Day).
123. Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, U.N. GAOR, World Conf. on Hum. Rts., 48th Sess., 22d plen. mtg., part I, 38, U.N. Doc. A/CONF.157/ 24 (1993), reprinted in 32 I.L.M. 1661 (1993).
124. Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women, G.A. Res. 48/ 104, adopted 20 Dec. 1993, U.N. GAOR, 48th Sess., 85th plen. mtg., U.N. Doc. A/RES/48/104 (1993).
125. Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women: Action for Equality, Development, and Peace, Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, U.N. GAOR, U.N. Doc. A/CONF.177/20 (1995), reprinted in Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women (1995) (recommended to the UN General Assembly by the Committee on the Status of Women on 7 Oct. 1995);
126. Copenhagen Declaration on Social Development and Programme of Action of the World Summit for Social Development, adopted 12 Mar. 1995, U.N. Doc. A/CONF.166/9 (1995), available at www.un.org/esa/socdev/ wssd/agreements/HREF="http//www.un.org/esa/socdev/wssd/agreements/; "
127. Integrating the Rights of Women into the Human Rights Mechanisms of the United Nations, C.H.R. Res. 1993/46, U.N. ESCOR, Comm'n on Hum. Rts., 49th Sess., Supp. No. 3, U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/1993/122 (1993).
128. Dorothy Q. Thomas & Robin S. Levi, Common Abuses Against Women, in Women and International Human Rights Law, supra note 58, at 139, 143.
129. Sharon Pickering, Australia, in Domestic Violence: A Global View 9 (Randal W. Summers & Allan M. Hoffman eds., 2002).
130. See the interesting introductory chapter to Warwick McKean, Equality and Discrimination Under International Law 1-13 (1983).
131. Hilary Charlesworth, Concepts of Equality in International Law, in Litigating Rights: Perspectives From Domestic and International Law 145 (Grant Huscroft & Paul Rishworth eds., 2002).
132. What are "Women's International Human Rights"? in Human Rights of Women: National and International Perspectives, supra note 86, at 63-65.
133. Nicola Lacey, Legislating Against Sex Discrimination: Questions from a Feminist Perspective, 14 J. L. & Society 411, 420 (1987).
134. See Charlesworth, supra note 113, at 143.
135. Hilary Charlesworth & Christine Chinkin, The Boundaries of International Law: A Feminist Analysis 102-09 (2000).
136. See generally, The Public Nature of Private Violence: The Discovery of Domestic Abuse (Martha Albertson Fineman & Roxanne Mykitiuk eds., 1994), especially the penultimate chapter dealing with human rights,
137. Michele E. Beasley & Dorothy Q. Thomas, Domestic Violence as a Human Rights Issue, in id. at 323.
138. See Challenging the Public/Private Divide: Feminism, Law and Public Policy 8 (Susan B. Boyd ed., 1997) for references to literature on the feminist analysis of the public/private divide:
139. Nicola Lacey, Theory into Practice? Pornography and the Public/ Private Dichotomy, 20 J. L. & Society 93, 97 (1993) (emphasis in original).
140. See also, Radhika Coomaraswamy & Lisa M. Kois, Violence Against Women, in Women and International Human Rights Law, supra note 58, at 185.
141. Conclusion of Asia/South Pacific Regional Judicial Colloquium for Senior Judges on the Domestic Application of International Human Rights Norms Relevant to Women's Human Rights (20-22 May 1996), in Gender Equality and the Judiciary, supra note 104, at 4.
142. A.I.R. 1997 SC 3011.
143. UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, 11th Sess., U.N. Doc. CEDAW/C/1992/L.1/Add.15 (1992), General Recommendation No 19.
144. A.I.R. 1997 SC 3011, 3014.
145. See Theodor Meron, Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms as Customary Law (1989).
146. See, e.g., Leslie Bender, A Lawyer's Primer on Feminist Theory and Tort, 38 J. Legal Ed. 3 (1988).
147. It should be of note that Asia has the highest concentration of women leaders in the world, with Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Philippines all having had, or are currently under, women as heads of government. Myanmar, presently under military rule, would also have had a woman as head of Government had the election results of 1998 been honoured. Anthony Reid, Charismatic & Constitutional Queens: Women Rulers in Southern Asia (4 Feb. 2003) (paper presented at a seminar at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore) (forthcoming, abstract available at www.ari.nus.edu.sg/ sem2003/030204.htm).