Bringing disabled women together, mobilising
and sharing through lived experiences

The sixtieth session of the Commission on the Status of Women took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 14 to 24 March 2016.

Representatives of Member States, UN entities, and ECOSOC-accredited non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from all regions of the world attended the session.

The priority theme this year was the ‘Women’s empowerment and its link to sustainable development’ with the review theme ‘the elimination and prevention of all forms of violence against women and girls’.

Why go this year?

I have been involved in the National Association of Women’s Organisations (NAWO) for the past two years and am a core member of the UK CSW Alliance for Sisters of Frida. As an activist for gender and disability equality, I realise the impact and importance of the UN instruments in telling the state parties, and in particular, our own government of the treaties they have signed and to remind them of the legal and moral obligations. This might seem to be a quixotic task but it is evident that if we are not visible at those international spaces, our voices and concerns will definitely not be heard. Our government can also continue its façade of fulfilling its duties and pontificate about its role in global leadership where gender equality is concerned. As a disabled woman activist, the two themes of empowerment and domestic violence are of particular importance. I was asked to be in a side event on disabled women and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by Enabled Women International to speak on the first goal – poverty, and in particular the role of the UK government and the impact on disabled women of government program cuts. And since we will be there, we organized our own side event, ‘Survivors in a disabling environment, what does empowerment of disabled women mean globally’?

While we might question the expense (self-funding) and putting ourselves through the grueling schedule of the UN event, my colleague and SOF Steering Group member, Lucia Bellini (who came with me) clinched the decision by remarking that if we, from the global north could not get there (funding, access reasons) how much more difficult it would be for the disabled women in the global south? Having that in mind, we asked other disabled women whom we know from other parts of the world, Jamie Bolling (ENIL), Dr Huhanna Hickey (NZ) and Khairani Barokka (Indonesia) to record short clips (2 mins) so that they could join our voices.

What did we do there?

Here is a report with videos of the side events we spoke at on the Sisters of Frida’s, a disabled women’s collective, website.

It seems needless to note but nevertheless, my main impression of being at the UN, apart from the security, is the networking and diversity of people you meet. There was also the back to back schedule of events and discussions to attend – at the main UN building and at the Church Centre (CCUN) across the street. Even a conference junkie like myself found it difficult to negotiate and pin down the relevant ones to get to.

One of the sessions I attended which I thought would be of particular interest was a session on media and technology and the intersections with violence against women – the Safety Net Project at NNEDV (National Network to End Domestic Violence)  with sister programmes in Canada, Australia (WESNET) and Ireland. (but not in the UK, why not?) They had resources with safety tips on how to be safe online and WESNET developed Webinars for practitioners working with women experiencing technology abuse. I am also most impressed by the toolkit “Toolkit on Eliminating Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Fiji”  from the Pacific region.

As part of the UK CSW Alliance, we had our own briefings every morning and evening and also worked with the Government Equalities office head of EU and international policy, Charles Ramsden. The principal output of the Commission on the Status of Women is the agreed conclusions on priority themes set for each year. This year it was on the empowerment of women. Agreed conclusions contain an analysis of the priority theme and a set of concrete recommendations for governments, intergovernmental bodies and other institutions, civil society actors and other relevant stakeholders, to be implemented at the international, national, regional and local level. The importance of this is where we can monitor and hold our government. I suggested adding ‘women with disabilities’ on an item about planning for natural disasters and emergencies – well, we always get left behind in times like those.

I met several interesting disabled women leaders, not least a commissioner for Gender Equality in South Africa, Ms Nomasonto Grace Mazibuko, with whom I had a very interesting conversation on albino-ism and the Namibian Deputy Minister of Disability Affairs, the Hon. Alexia Manombe-Ncube who wants to discuss about independent living in the UK. And of course fellow panelists Asha Hans (India), Adaobi Egboka (Nigeria)  and Andrea Parra (Columbia) with the Enabled Women International, Stephanie Ortoleva. Daniela Bas, the Director of the Division for Social Policy and Development at the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.is a wheelchair user, was most approachable and friendly as were the disabled women from Fiji (on a session on domestic violence in the Pacific), Bangladesh, and Spain. It is clear that for an assembly as big as the CSW, there were not that many of us disabled women and our voices are very muted. It seems to me that we have to concentrate on the SDGs to make sure we are definitely not left behind in the ‘leaving no one behind’ aspiration.

Photos from the event are here (they are not in any order).

with Eleanor, Suzanna, Asha, Stephanie, Andrea and others before the panel session

The UK CSW Alliance with Charles Ramsden

–written by Eleanor Lisney

Eleanor is a founder member and coordinator of Sisters of Frida. She is an access advisor, an NUJ member on the New Media Industrial Council and the Equality Council. She is also on the British Council Disability Advisory Panel and the web team of the International Network of Women with Disabilities. She enjoys being on the EVA (Electronic Visualisation & the Arts) London organising committee.

This article is by Stephanie Ortoleva, President, Women Enabled, Inc.

The United Nations has designated October 11 as International Day of the Girl, with a focus on Education.  But as I read many well-written and strong feminist posts on this issue, the concerns of millions of girls with disabilities are missing from the dialog.  Who are the missing girls?  The deaf girl in India who attends a school for deaf children and who was raped by her teachers.  The blind girl in the United States who wants to be a scientist, but is not permitted to take the classes and who is told a blind person can’t be a scientist, especially not a blind girl.  The girl with a disability in Pakistan whose parents keep her at home and will not even let her attend school because they are ashamed.  These are only a few of the untold stories.  But The statistics about education of girls with disabilities tells us even more starkly.

Estimates of the percentage of children with disabilities not attending school are extremely variable.  However, in general, children with disabilities are less likely to start school and have lower rates of staying and being promoted in school than their peers without disabilities.  The correlation between low educational outcomes and having a disability is often stronger than the correlations between low educational outcomes and other characteristics such as gender, rural residence or poverty.  The limited statistics that are available indicate that although the literacy rate for adults with disabilities is 3%, only 1% of women with disabilities are literate, based on comprehensive research completed by Harilyn Rousso for UNESCO.  These percentages are significantly lower than those for women in general.  The UNESCO Institute for Statistics reports:  “In 2008, 796 million adults worldwide (15 years and older) reported not being able to read and write and two-thirds of them (64%) were women.  The global adult literacy rate was 83%, with a male literacy rate of 88% and a female literacy rate of 79%.

In 2010, According to a journal article by Francis  Huebler, this statistic improved marginally to a male literacy rate of 89% and a female literacy rate of 80%, with the percent differential between the genders remaining the same.

The World Bank and World Health Organization Report states that out of the 51 countries included in the analysis, “50.6% of males with disability have completed primary school, compared with 61.3% of males without disability. Females with disability report 41.7% primary school completion compared with 52.9% of females without disability, a  difference of 8.9% between  males and females with disabilities.”

There is a direct correlation between poverty, being a child with disabilities and low education participation, with the girls with disabilities from lower socio-

economic backgrounds rarely attending school.

Girls with disabilities have the lowest education participation rates of all groups and they have few opportunities for vocational training, all of which further contributes to their low employment rates.

Under international law our participation is our human right.  The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in its Article 7 onChildren with Disabilities and its Article 24 on Education focus on the girl child with a disability and her right to education.

The United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in its Articles 10, guarantee to all women and girls the right to education.  Furthermore, in several of its General Recommendations, the CEDAW Committee has specifically addressed the rights of women and girls with disabilities and the Final Conclusions from the 55th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women, which focused on women and education and employment in the STEM fields, specifically incorporated these rights for women and girls with disabilities.  Thus, the synergy between the CRPD and the CEDAW is a vital tool for advancing our rights in this area.

Barriers to the participation of women and girls with disabilities in education are based on culture, family structures, societal attitudes and stereotypes, institutional systems, law and legal processes, economic realities, patriarchy and paternalism.  Specific barriers include:

• Cultural bias – Often, women are denied education because it is believed that they will become wives and mothers and such resources are provided to male children.  But for women with disabilities, are often seen as unlikely to assume such roles, and thus are the last to receive family resources.
• Double discrimination – Women and girls with disabilities face double or intersectional discrimination based on both gender and disability (as well as other identities) and stereotypical attitudes based thereon further limit our opportunities.
• Invisibility – Girls with disabilities are often kept in the home and their births may not be registered, making them invisible to the education system, either because of assumptions about our abilities or embarrassment on the part of our families.  Additionally, misconceptions about our abilities may make us invisible to teachers even if we attend school.
• Violence against women and girls with disabilities – Women and girls with disabilities are more likely to experience gender-based violence than their non-disabled sisters, sometimes because we are erroneously perceived as sick, helpless, asexual, and powerless, or on the other hand, we are seen as hypersexual or just lucky to have sexual experiences at all wherever we can because we are undesirable.  Additionally, women and girls with disabilities living in residential facilities or schools are even more likely to experience such abuse.
• Pregnancy, HIV-infection and other results of sexual assault and rape – As a result of sexual violence and rape, women and girls with disabilities may become pregnant or contract sexually transmitted diseases from the abuser.
• Bullying and teasing – Disabled girls are sometimes subjected to bullying and teasing by their peers based on both our gender and our disability, negatively impacting our emotional and cognitive development, as well as causing low self esteem
• Economic resources for Education – Male education is prioritized as it is believed that a male child can contribute financially to the family, and women and girls with disabilities are not viewed as worthy of an education since many assume their disabilities will preclude success.
• Schools in inaccessible locations and/or lack of transportation – Schools that provide special education and/or education for children with disabilities in integrated settings are often located in cities and families are reluctant to send daughters to the city or there is no accessible transport to such schools.  Boys are often seen as more independent and permitted to travel to urban locations.
• Access to assistive technology and rehabilitation – Men and boys have greater access to such services.
• Accessibility of school facilities – Often the school buildings and facilities themselves are inaccessible, posing yet another barrier.
•  Accessible toileting facilities and assistance in toileting – Provision of toileting assistance places a particular burden on women and girls with disabilities, especially with respect to menstruation which is often a taboo topic and access to appropriate hygiene products is non-existent or in very short supply resulting in increased isolation for women and girls with disabilities and further impairs their ability to attend school or work.
• Availability of special education – Girls with disabilities are less likely to receive special education, in some instances because teachers expect more from boys than girls and sometimes because girls, who may be less likely to act out due to cultural control pressures, are not referred for services based on a learning or other disability.  And even if a girl receives special education services she may be tracked toward pursuing traditional gender-identified career paths.
• Competitive classroom climate and teaching strategies – Competitive educational approaches are challenging to some girls with disabilities.  Mainly for the same reasons discussed earlier, like bullying, being outnumbered by males in the classroom, and low self-esteem.  In addition, many teachers are trained to teach more life skills to students with disabilities rather than focus on competitive subjects.
• Digital divide – Women and girls with disabilities are at the bottom of the digital divide and the least likely to have access to technology.
• Belief that girls do not do math and science – We are presumed not to have aptitude in these subjects and are steered into gender stereotypical subjects, as well as the “talent myth” which is based on the erroneous assumption that skills in STEM fields are an innate aptitude and cannot be learned.
• Counselling based on stereotypical roles for women and girls – Counsellors often steer girls with disabilities toward gender-stereotyped jobs and generally they are less likely to afford girls with disabilities vocational education and many counsellors hold the incorrect societal perception that girls with disabilities have limited aptitude or interest in STEM and other challenging subjects.
• Girls with and without disabilities have limited interaction – Both groups would benefit from such interactions, as they contribute to networking and peer support, and reduction of fear and stigma.
• Absence of women with disabilities as role models – The invisibility of women with disabilities in educational materials, as educators, in the workplace and in the media creates a dearth of positive role models for women and girls with disabilities.
• Shortage of women with disabilities as mentors – Having a responsive and supportive mentor makes the world of difference for academic and professional success and increased self-esteem.

Let’s spread the facts and then, let’s change them!

Available also as PDF

For more information, see Stephanie Ortoleva’s chapter on this subject in the forthcoming book: Asha Hans, Editor, “Women and Girls with Disabilities – Global Perspectives,” Sage Publications, 2014 (ordering information will be on the Women enabled, Inc.  website in the Reading and Listening room.), Also see the Women Enabled, Inc. website in the “Education and Employment in Science, Technology, engineering and Math” section and the Publications Section for several other articles on women and girls with disabilities.

Poster at the Palais des Nations

A main consensus among all the UK NGOs who went to the 55th CEDAW session in Geneva was how access to justice was being eroded by the austerity measures put into effect by the present UK coalition government.

As Sisters of Frida members, we self funded ourselves when we went to Geneva to join the other NGOs. We saw it  important that disabled women were represented with other women organisations (and as a precursor experience to the CRPD coming up later).  There was a rush to get creditation to go (many thanks to NAWO for helping us with that) and research about accessible accomodation, travel, maps, travel documents etc). CEDAW was part of the whole ‘justice’ dimension – our rights were not granted us as a result of the benign good nature of our government but because of the international campaigns for human rights set about into conventions by the United Nations and the European Union (with rulings such as by the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg). These are some of the human rights instruments that we can use – even if we have to exhaust the domestic legal systems first. This is where we can hold our own government to account.

I felt hugely inadequate to the task in comparison – there was so much to take in. Even when we had contributed to the shadow report (credit to Sister of Frida member, Dr Armineh Soorenian) there were so many welfare reform changes to remember and so many cuts to disabled people services (without the disaggregated data) that we needed to prioritise and formulate as questions and recommendations to the CEDAW committee  .  We could have made a better case for disabled women if we had more experience in the procedures but then the essential fact was that we were there as disabled women and our presence were felt and many of the sister NGOs included disabled women in their presentations. A word of caution for disabled women taking part in these CEDAW sessions is the pace and pressure – as someone with a chronic fatigue syndrome (post polio) I had to withdraw from certain things.  It might have affected my temper too – I apologise unreservedly for the moments when it got a bit frayed.

–Eleanor Lisney

Stephanie Ortholeva‘s article – Women with Disabilities and the Justice System: Rights without Remedies    at the World Justice Project website is great in giving the whole access to justice issue a framework. She’s kindly allowed us to repost it here.

——–

One example of how society has come to view gender and disability is demonstrated by the iconographic historical symbol of justice, the blindfolded Lady Justice. In a creative book, “Representing Justice: Invention, Controversy, and Rights in City-States and Democratic Courtrooms”, Yale law professors Resnik and Curtis trace the philosophical uses of the symbol, “Blindness as a deficit presumes that sight is requisite to understanding, whereas blindness as an asset presumes that sight can corrupt judgment.”  This iconic image highlights the ongoing debates about the role of women with disabilities in the justice system.  Historically and to today, many legal systems restrict the legal capacity of women who are blind, as well as women with other disabilities, solely because of their disability.  This contrasts with that blind (or blinded) icon of justice, Lady Justice, seen as a symbol of rationality and even handedness.

International Normative Framework. 

The intersection between the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), both address legal capacity, access to justice, equal recognition before the law, gender and disability stereotyping, state due diligence obligations, among other issues. CRPD Article 6 adopts a gendered lens-recognizing the multiple and intersecting dimensions of women’s lives  and Article 12 requires equal recognition before the law, or legal capacity. Article 13 includes the right to access to justice, requiring States to provide procedural and age-appropriate accommodations, to facilitate effective participation.”  CEDAW Article 15 requires states to ensure that men and women have equal access to the legal system, ensuring legal autonomy.  Because women with disabilities have rights under both CEDAW and CRPD, State Parties have a due diligence obligation to afford them full and fair legal capacity, and access to the justice system.

Addressing Violence Through the Legal System. 

As noted in “Forgotten Sisters – A Report on Violence against Women with Disabilities:  & Overview of Its Nature, Scope, Causes & Consequences” authored by me and Professor Hope Lewis, violence against women with disabilities occurs in the home, community, perpetrated and/or condoned by the state and private institutions, and in the transnational sphere. Forms include physical, psychological, sexual, financial, entrapment, degradation, neglect, trafficking, detention, denial of health care, forced sterilization and psychiatric treatment, among others.  Women with disabilities are more likely to experience violence than non-disabled women, over a longer period, resulting in more severe injuries.  Their abuser may also be their caregiver; someone relied on for care or mobility.  In various ways the justice system itself (and therefore the state) perpetrates and/or condones the violence through various barriers.

Women with Disabilities as Witnesses. 

The justice system often fails to see women with disabilities as competent witnesses, a result of damaging stereotypes, or difficulties in communication without accommodations, as highlighted by the work of the Disability Discrimination Legal Service. The general failure of society to see women with disabilities as sexual beings and the tendency to “infantilize” them, while on the other hand, seeing women with mental disabilities as hypersexual and lacking self-control, results in their complaints or testimony being disregarded.

As noted by Benedet and Grant in “Hearing the Sexual Assault Complaints of Women with Mental Disabilities”, the mere fact that a woman has a disability, especially psycho-social or intellectual disabilities, or that she require assistive communication or accommodations, may result in the justice system viewing her as lacking credibility.  Judges may require more corroborating evidence when the witness is a woman with disabilities than in other cases, and prior mental health treatment may be used to discredit testimony. The complainant frequently does not serve as sole witness against the accused. Women with cognitive disabilities may have more difficulty with long term memory or remembering the sequence of events, which may make them appear less credible. Paternalistic attitudes may cause the legal system to view them as too fragile to withstand rigors of examination.

Exclusions of testimony are particularly problematic in gender-based violence and sexual assault cases, where the testimony of the parties and the credibility of the witnesses are exceptionally important, placing women with disabilities at even greater risk, since perpetrators may be more likely to attack them because they know that their complaints may be taken less seriously.  If prior complaints were dismissed, they are less likely to report abuse in the future, perpetuating the violence.

Forced Sterilization. 

Under the CRPD, forced, coerced or non-consensual sterilization is a violation of human rights, and women with disabilities have the right to retain fertility on an equal basis with others.  International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics Guidelines state that only women themselves can give ethically valid consent to their sterilization, and sterilization cannot be made a condition of access to medical care or other benefit.  Despite legal prohibitions, involuntary sterilization has long been used to restrict the fertility of some persons with disabilities, especially those with intellectual disabilities.

The failure of some countries to prohibit involuntary sterilization has been challenged before international tribunals.  In Gauer v France, at the European Court of Human Rights, a case was filed on behalf of five women who were sterilized without their consent as a form of contraception.  Sterilization also has been used as a technique for menstrual management, but it is rarely the only option and should not be done without informed consent.  Women with disabilities should have access to voluntary sterilization on an equal basis with others but not forced to undergo such procedures.

Discriminatory Termination of Parental Rights. 

Stereotypical views of women with psychosocial, intellectual or physical disabilities as “unfit” mothers may result in termination of parental rights by social service agencies or through divorce and child visitation and custody proceedings, especially when the other parent does not have a disability, according to the research of Lightfoot et al. in “The Inclusion of Disability as a Condition for Termination of Parental Rights.”  Fear of women with disabilities as parents persists, although evidence demonstrates that parents with disabilities are no more likely to maltreat children, or to raise so-called “defective” children than non-disabled parents.

Statutes in many countries on termination of parental rights, child custody and divorce include disability-related grounds for termination of parental rights or loss of custody, and may emphasize and focus on disability status rather than actual parenting skill or behavior, implicitly equating parental disability with parental unfitness.  Because of such legal definitions and societal prejudices, mothers with disabilities may be subjected to greater scrutiny by social service agencies than non-disabled women.  Fear of being incorrectly perceived as an unfit mother by a court on the basis of disability, and the breakdown of their relationship with children, has frequently discouraged mothers with disabilities from separating from an abusive partner.

The Disability and Parental Rights Legislative Change Project, University of Minnesota, “Guide for Creating Legislative Change” notes that in order to prevent disability discrimination, statutes should be free of discriminatory language; affirm that the statute cannot be used for disability discrimination; acknowledge that successful parenting can occur with accommodations; and require multidisciplinary approaches to address this situation.

These selected examples of limitations on access to justice for women with disabilities, and the ways in which the justice system itself violates their human rights, accentuates the urgent need to include issues of concern to women with disabilities in legal reform efforts addressing access to justice.

* This article is adapted from Stephanie Ortoleva & Hope Lewis: “Forgotten Sisters – A Report on Violence against Women with Disabilities:  & Overview of Its Nature, Scope, Causes & Consequences” (August 2012) and  Stephanie Ortoleva, “Inaccessible Justice:  Persons with Disabilities and the Legal System,” International Law Society of America, Journal of International and Comparative Law, 17 ILSA J. Int’l & Comp. L. 281 (Spring 2011), both of which can be accessed at:  http://ssrn.com/author=1875099.