Framing FGC: Health and Human Rights

Approaches

Bettina Shell-Duncan, Ph.D.Department of Anthropology

University of Washington

• What are the ramifications of framing FGC as a human rights violation?

• What perils and pitfalls potentially arise from a rights-based framework?

Previous Frameworks for Justifying Intervention

• Health Framework

“Genital mutilation should be treated as a public health problem and recognized as an impediment to development that can be prevented and eradicated much like any disease.”

-Fran Hosken (1978: 151)

“Problems” Emanating from the Health Framework

• Failed to motivate behavior change

• Credibility gap

• Difficulty in establishing the “medical facts”

• Encouragement of medicalization

Human Rights Framework

1993 Vienna World Conference on Human Rights

1) FGC classified as a form of violence against women (VAW)

2) VAW recognized a a human rights violation

Doctrinist Claims to Define FGC as a Human Rights Violation

• 1) Rights of the child

• 2) Rights of women

• 3) Freedom from torture

• 4) The right to health and bodily integrity

Perils and Pitfalls of the Human Rights Framework

• 1) Can view the problems and solutions too narrowly

• 2) Imposition of a Western human rights culture

• 3) Undermine women’s agency

• 4) Unresolved questions concerning consent

Recommendations

• Assess, anticipate and attempt to avert pitfalls

• Conduct research on how legislative measures contribute to changes in FGC

• Seek to understand how legal measures interact with other change efforts