Cultural Practices and cedaw: Epistemic Violence and the Marginalisation of Local Knowledge in International Human Rights Law

Abstract This article explores the realisation of rights for marginalised and disadvantaged women and girls in the Global South, with a particular focus on how the concept of “culture” is framed within international human rights discourse on violence against women ( vaw ). The article focuses on the work of the committee that monitors the major women’s convention, the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women ( cedaw ). cedaw ’s discourse predominantly presents “culture” in negative terms – as a barrier to gender equality that States must work to eliminate. This perspective creates a rigid opposition between “culture” and “rights”, implying an inherent conflict between the two. As a result, those associated with certain cultural identities are further marginalised, reinforcing their status as the “other”. There is a systemic repression of the knowledge of other cultures and the positing of cultural Europeanisation as the only valid framework for addressing vaw . As a key site for the construction of knowledge, communities, and identities, cedaw ’s interpretive framework for addressing vaw needs to be reassessed.