"I believe in human rights, not women's rights" Women and the human rights state, 1969-1984

Radical History Review

Volumn , Issue 101, 2008, Pages 107-129

  Clément, Dominique ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF VICTORIA   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 48949117557     PISSN: 01636545     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1215/01636545-2007-040     Document Type: Article

References (139)

1. Globe and Mail, December 1, 2006.
2. The average income is slightly higher for families living in the largest cities. Statistics Canada, "Average Earnings by Sex and Work Pattern'" 2007, www.statcan.ca (accessed September 15, 2007).
3. See also "Women in Canada" Daily, March 7, 2006, www.statcan.ca/english/dai-quo.
4. Globe and Mail, April 1, 2006; April 8, 2006; April 15, 2006; April 22, 2006.
5. Angus McLaren and Arlene Tigar McLaren, The Bedroom and the State: The Changing Practices and Politics of Contraception and Abortion in Canada, 1880-1997 (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1997), 58-59.
6. Jack Donnelly, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice, 2nd ed. (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 9003), 1.
7. Micheline R. Ishay provides a brief over-view of women's rights in the context of the French and English revolutions in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: Ishay, The History of Human Rights: From Ancient Times to the Globalization Era (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004), 109-12.
8. See Joe Foweraker and Todd Landman, Citizenship Rights and Social Movements: A Comparative and Statistical Analysis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997);
9. Maxine Molyneux and Sian Lazar, Doing the Rights Thing: Rights-Based Development and Latin American NGOs (London: ITDG, 2003).
10. James Walker, "Race," Rights, and the Law in the Supreme Court of Canada: Historical Case Studies (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1997), 320-21.
11. Molyneux and Lazar, Doing the Rights Thing.
12. Judy Fudge, "The Effect of Entrenching a Bill of Rights upon Political Discourse: Feminist Demands and Sexual Violence in Canada," Journal of the Sociology of Law 17 (1989): 449-50.
13. Also see Catherine MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified: Discourses on Life and Law (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), 35.
14. Judy Fudge and Harry Glasbeek, "The Politics of Rights: A Politics with Little Class," Social and Legal Studies 1 (1992): 61.
15. Fudge, "The Effect of Entrenching a Bill of Rights upon Political Discourse," 445-63;
16. Neil Stammers, "A Critique of Social Approaches to Human Rights," Human Rights Quarterly 3 (1995): 488-508;
17. Neil Stammers, "Social Movements and the Social Construction of Human Rights," Human Rights Quarterly 4 (1999): 980-1108;
18. Molyneux and Lazar, Doing the Rights Thing.
19. For a sample of such debates, see Frances Olsen, "Statutory Rape: A Feminist Critique of Rights Analysis," Texas Law Review 3 (1984): 387-432;
20. Elizabeth M. Schneider, "The Dialectic of Rights and Politics: Perspectives from the Women's Movement," NYU Law Review 589 (1986): 589-652;
21. Fudge, "The Effect of Entrenching a Bill of Rights upon Political Discourse";
22. Alan Hunt, "Rights and Social Movements: Counter-hegemonic Strategies," Journal of Law and Society 3 (1990): 309-28;
23. Michael W. McCann, "Legal Mobilization and Social Reform Movements: Notes on Theory and Its Application," Studies in Law, Politics, and Society (1991): 225-54;
24. Miriam Smith, Lesbian and Gay Rights in Canada: Social Movements and Equality-Seeking, 1971-1995 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999).
25. Martha Minow, Making All the Difference: Inclusion, Exclusion, and American Law (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990), 307.
26. McCann, "Legal Mobilization and Social Reform Movements."
27. Christopher MacLennan, Toward the Charter: Canadians and the Demand for a National Bill of Rights, 1929-1960 (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2003).
28. Walker, "Race," Rights, and the Law in the Supreme Court of Canada;
29. James Walker, "The 'Jewish Phase' in the Movement for Racial Equality in Canada," Canadian Ethnic Studies 1 (2002): 1-23;
30. Stephanie D. Bangarth, "'We Are Not Asking You to Open Wide the Gates for Chinese Immigration: The Committee for the Repeal of the Chinese Immigration Act and Early Human Rights Activism in Canada," Canadian Historical Review 3 (2003): 394-442;
31. Ross Lambertson, Repression and Resistance: Canadian Human Rights Activists, 1930-1960 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005).
32. The Saskatchewan Bill of Rights (1947) was a provincial statute that did not provide for an enforcement mechanism, and it was unclear which level of government had jurisdiction over civil liberties. The bill was more a symbol than an effective instrument for defending human rights.
33. Walker, "The 'Jewish Phase' in the Movement for Racial Equality in Canada."
34. Walter Surma Tarnopolsky, Discrimination and the Law in Canada (Toronto: De Boo, 1982), 27-28;
35. Dominique Clément, Canada's Rights Revolution: Social Movements and Social Change, 1937-1982 (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2008).
36. Walker, "The 'Jewish Phase' in the Movement for Racial Equality in Canada," 1.
37. Ross Lambertson, "The Dresden Story: Racism, Human Rights, and the Jewish Labour Committee of Canada," Labour/Le Travail 47 (2001): 43-82.
38. See also Ruth Frager and Carmela Patrias, "'This Is Our Country, These Are Our Rights': Minorities and the Origins of Ontario's Human Rights Campaigns'" Canadian Historical Review 1 (2001): 1-35.
39. Philip Girard, Bora Laskin: Bringing Law to Life (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 260.
40. Vancouver Sun, March 13, 1952;
41. Vancouver Sun, October 3, 1953.
42. Ruth A. Frager and Carmela Patrias, Discounted Labour: Women Workers in Canada, 1870-1939 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 154.
43. Australia's 1984 Sex Discrimination Act was preceded by similar legislation in South Australia (1975), New South Wales (1977), Victoria (1977), and Western Australia (1984).
44. Doris Anderson, Rebel Daughter: An Autobiography (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 1996), 173.
45. Human Rights Code of British Columbia Act (1974);
46. Human Rights Commission of British Columbia, I'm Okay, We're Not So Sure about You: A Report of the BC Human Rights Commission on Extensions to the Code (Victoria, BC: Human Rights Commission of British Columbia, 1983), 44-45.
47. Maxine Molyneux and Shabra Razavi, Gender, Justice, Development, and Rights (New York: United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, 2003), 5-6.
48. Cynthia Williams, "The Changing Nature of Citizen Rights," in Constitutionalism, Citizenship, and Society in Canada, ed. Alan Cairns and Williams (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985), 109.
49. Molyneux and Razavi, Gender, Justice, Development, and Rights, 6.
50. Ibid.
51. Nancy Adamson, Feminist Organizing for Change: The Contemporary Women's Movement in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988), 5-6.
52. British Columbia, "Report of the Women's Bureau," in Annual Report - Department of Labour (Victoria, BC: Department of Labour, 1966-75).
53. Adamson, Feminist Organizing for Change, chap. 2.
54. Rosemary Brown, Being Brown: A Very Public Life (Toronto: Random House, 1989), 98.
55. Ibid., 85-100.
56. Rare Books and Special Collections, University of British Columbia (RBSC UBC), Vancouver Status of Women (VSW) Papers, Grant Application to the Provincial Secretary of BC, April 1, 1977, to March 31, 1978.
57. Several briefs prepared by the VSW dealing with the status of women in British Columbia are available in RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, v.8, f.29; v.13, f9-11.
58. See also: British Columbia, Debates of the Legislative Assembly (1984), 3292; RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, v.6, f.15, day of mourning for the human rights code, December 1976.
59. Province, February 29, 1980;
60. Vancouver Sun, March 5, 1982;
61. Red Rag, February 1982.
62. RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, correspondence between Kathleen Ruff and the VSW, 1971-1972.
63. RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, v.6, f.15, day of mourning for the human rights code, December 1976.
64. Smith, Lesbian and Gay Rights in Canada, 75.
65. VSW Correspondence and minutes are available at: RBSC UBC, VSW Papers.
66. One of VSW's key strategies was to train and support full-time ombudswomen to "act as paral-legal counsellors [and] as agents between women and the system." RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, v.5, f.1, VSW Grant Application to the Provincial Secretary of BC, April 1., 1977, to March 31, 1978;
67. Canadian Women's Movement Archives, VSW, BOX 124, Annual Report, 1975-1976.
68. RBSC UBC, Rosemary Brown Papers, v.8, f.9, briefs and correspondence by the Vancouver Young Women's Christian Association, British Columbia Federation of Labour Women's Rights Committee, and the University of British Columbia Women's Action Group; Canadian Women's Movement Archives, British Columbia Federation of Women, volumes 5-6, materials on the British Columbia human rights code and commission, 1979;
69. Donald Anderson, "The Development of Human Rights Protections in British Columbia" (MA thesis, University of Victoria, 1986), 69-70.
70. Janet Beebe, Update on the Status of Women in British Columbia (Vancouver: Vancouver Status of Women, 1978), 12.
71. RBSC UBC Solidarity Coalition Papers, v.2, Briefs to the People's Commission on Social and Economic Policy Alternatives.
72. RBSC UBC, VSW Papers, v.6, f.15, memorandum by Carol Pfeiffer, December 3, 1976.
73. Nancy Adamson, "Feminists, Libbers, Lefties, and Radicals: The Emergence of the Women's Liberation Movement," in A Diversity of Women: Ontario, 1945-1980, ed. Joy Parr (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995), 249.
74. Women Unite! An Anthology of the Canadian Women's Movement (Toronto: Canadian Women's Educational Press, 1972), 9.
75. Peak, July 3, 1968.
76. See Vancouver Rape Relief, www.rapereliefshelter.bc.ca (accessed November 20, 2007).
77. Simon Fraser University Archives, Frances Wasserlein Papers, f.162-3-3-0-4, Vancouver Women's Caucus Brief to the Human Rights Commission, December 3, 1969.
78. Pedestal, November 1970.
79. Rape Relief encouraged feminists to support groups that protested violence against women through confrontation, leafleting, civil disobedience, and other direct-action strategies. Canadian Woman's Movement Archives, Box 373, file Women Against Violence Against Women, policy proposal by Vancouver Rape Relief, n.d.
80. University of Victoria Archives (UVA), Women against Pornography Papers, v. 1., f.9, Women against Pornography Manifesto.
81. Pam Blackstone to Megan Ellis, September 5, 1983, UVA, Women Against Pornography Papers, v.1, f.6.
82. Maurice Cranston, What Is a Human Right? (New York: Basic Books, 1973).
83. Gary Teeple, The Riddle of Human Rights (New York: Humanity Books, 2005), 103-16.
84. Monique Begin, "The Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada: Twenty Years Later," in Challenging Times: The Women's Movement in Canada and the united states, ed. Constance Backhouse and David H. Flaherty (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1992), 29.
85. Brown, Being Brown, 131.
86. One of his own caucus members, and a leading feminist in Canada and British Columbia, Rosemary Brown, suggested that the "depth of his ignorance about women's condition was profound and equaled only by his belief that the women's movement was a temporary aberration, a blip in history supported only by a few discontented women." Ibid., 131.
87. Jean Barman, The West beyond the West: A History of British Columbia (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991), 279.
88. The number of boards appointed between 1970 and 1982 were as follows: three (1970), one (1971), five (1972), fourteen (1973), ten (1974), twenty-five (1975), four (1976), eight (1977), thirteen (1978), thirty-two (1979), three (1980), twelve (1981), eight (1982). The anomaly, 1979, was a result of intense pressure by women's groups and other advocacy organizations.
89. British Columbia, Annual Reports - Department of Labour (Victoria, BC: Department of Labour, 1970-84);
90. Human Rights Commission of British Columbia, Human Rights Are for Everyone (Annual Report of the Human Rights Commission) (Victoria, BC: Human Rights Commission of British Columbia, 1980-82).
91. Anderson, "The Development of Human Rights Protections in British Columbia," 82.
92. Pedestal, Fall 1969.
93. Province, December 4, 1969.
94. Province, March 25, 1969.
95. Victoria Times Colonist, April 4, 1979; April 21, 1979; May 2, 1979; Canadian Women's Movement Archives, University of Ottawa, f.377, presentation by the rights of lesbians sub-committee, 1979.
96. British Columbia, Debates of the Legislative Assembly (1979), 1787.
97. See Dominique Clément, "An Exercise in Futility? Regionalism, State Funding, and Ideology as Obstacles to the Formation of a National Social Movement Organization in Canada," BC Studies 146 (2005): 63-91.
98. British Columbia, Debates of the Legislative Assembly, 4463.
99. Bill Black, "Human Rights in British Columbia: Equality Postponed," in Canadian Human Rights Yearbook, 1984-85, ed. William Pentney and Daniel Proulx (Toronto: Carswell, 1985), 232.
100. British Columbia, Annual Reports - Department of Labour;
101. British Columbia Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Arejor Everyone.
102. UVA, British Columbia Human Rights Board of Inquiry Collection, AR017, Box 97-159, 1976.
103. UVA, British Columbia Human Rights Board of Inquiry Collection, AR017, Box 97-159, Jean Tharpe v Lornex Mining Corporation, 1976; British Columbia, "Jean Tharpe v. Lornex Mining Corporation," Labour Relations Bulletin (July 1976): 85-86.
104. British Columbia Human Rights Act (1984).
105. Black, "Human Rights in British Columbia," 220-21.
106. The Human Rights Commission was reintroduced by the NDP in 1997, but eliminated - again - in 2002 by the Liberal government.
107. The British Columbia Federation of Labour's Women's Committee, the VSW, Nanaimo Women's Resource Centre, and the Status of Women Action Group were among those organizations that lobbied against the amendments. See Sisterhood 7 (August 1983);
108. RBSC UBC Solidarity Coalition Papers, v.2, briefs to the People's Commission on Social and Economic Policy Alternatives; British Columbia, Debates of the Legislative Assembly (1984), 4471- 72;
109. Vancouver Sun, November 24, 1984; November 27, 1984; November 29, 1984; December 12, 1984.
110. Shelagh Day, "Recent Developments in Human Rights," Labour Relations Bulletin (June 1977): 17.
111. B. Gene Errington, Sexual Harassment in the Workplace: A Discussion Paper (Burnaby: British Columbia Federation of Labour, Women's Rights Committee, 1980).
112. British Columbia, I'm Okay.
113. British Columbia, Annual Reports - Department of Labour (1970-84);
114. British Columbia Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Are for Everyone.
115. Dominique Clément, "Searching for Rights in the Age of Activism: The Newfoundland-Labrador Human Rights Association, 1968-1982," Newfoundland Studies 2 (2003): 347-72.
116. With the exception of the province of Quebec, which amended its human rights code in 1977, most provinces were slow to acknowledge discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Tom Warner, A History of Queer Activism in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002).
117. Sheila McIntyre, "Studied Ignorance and Privileged Innocence: Keeping Equity Academic," Canadian Journal of Women and the Law 1 (2000): 160-62.
118. Day, "Recent Developments in Human Rights," 17-18.
119. In Nova Scotia, for instance, nineteen cases went to a full board hearing between 1969 and 1992. Only two resulted in monetary damages for pain and suffering, and the highest award was a meager CDN$100. Tarnopolsky, Discrimination and the Law in Canada, 488-90.
120. Daiva Kristina Stasiulis, "Race, Ethnicity, and the State: The Political Structuring of South Asian and West Indian Communal Action in Combating Racism," (PhD, University of Toronto, 1982), 245.
121. Quebec, Commission des droits de la personne, Rapport annuel (Annual Report) (1976-84).
122. Ontario Human Rights Commission, Life Together: A Report of Human Rights in Ontario (Toronto: Ontario Human Rights Commission, 1977);
123. Stasiulis, "Race, Ethnicity, and the State," 271.
124. Jack Donnelly, "Post-Cold War Reflections on the Study of International Human Rights," in Ethics and International Affairs: A Reader, ed. Joel H. Rosenthal (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 1995), 236.
125. United Nations Centre for Human Rights, National Human Rights Institutions: A Handbook on the Establishment and Strengthening of National Human Rights Institutions for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights (New York: United Nations, 1995).
126. Cass R. Sunstein, "Why Does the American Constitution Lack Social and Economic Guarantees?" in American Exceptionalism and Human Rights, ed. Michael Ignatieff (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005), 102.
127. Also see Todd Landman, "Measuring Human Rights: Principle, Practice, and Policy," Human Rights Quarterly 4 (2004): 912.
128. Michael W. McCann, Rights at Work: Pay Equity Reform and the Politics of Legal Mobilization (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1994), 4.
129. Teeple, The Riddle of Human Rights, 224n39.
130. Patricia Grimshaw, Nell Musgrove, and Shurlee Swain, "The Australian Labour Movement and Working Mothers in the United Nations' Decade for Women, 1975-1985," in The Time of Their Lives: The Eight Hour Day and Working Life, ed. Julie Kimber and Peter Love (Melbourne: Australia Society for the Study of Labour History, 2007), 145.
131. Verity Burgmann, Power and Protest: Movements for Change in Australian Society (St. Leonards, NSW: Allen and Unwin, 1993), 99.
132. Beth Gaze and Melinda Jones, Law, Liberty, and Australian Democracy (Sydney: Law Book Company, 1990), 399.
133. McCann, "Legal Mobilization and Social Reform Movements," 233.
134. Richard Townshend-Smith, "The Impact of European Law on Equal Pay for Women," in The Effect on English Domestic Law of Membership of the European Communities and of Ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights, ed. M. P. Furmston, Roger Kerridge, and B. E. Suffin (London: Nijhoff, 1983), 101.
135. Fudge, "The Effect of Entrenching a Bill of Rights upon Political Discourse," 448.
136. MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified, 41.
137. RBSC UBC, Rosemary Brown Papers, v.1, f.5, NDP Women's Committee: Herstory and Policy, 1977.
138. Didi Herman, Rights of Passage: Struggles for Lesbian and Gay Legal Equality (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994), 4.
139. British Columbia, "H.W. v. Jack R. Kroff and Riviera Reservations of Canada Ltd," Labour Relations Bulletin (July 1976).