The Human Rights Council faces many challenges. One crucial challenge is to develop its work methods in a manner true to the sentiment repeated annually by the Commission on Human Rights: “acknowledging the need to integrate the gender perspective in a more systemic way into all aspects of [its] work.” 1 The resolve for a comprehensive gender integration process was further consolidated during the debate at the Fourth Regular Session of the Human Rights Council on March 28, 2007, when 56 states called for gender integration of the Council’s permanent agenda and programme of work as an essential first step.
This paper sets out the minimum threshold for gender integration into the Council’s main mechanisms and work methods. The following concrete steps would preserve what the Commission on Human Rights began in terms of gender integration, while also strengthening the methods and mechanisms for doing so.
These steps constitute the absolute minimum for what the Council must do to be an effective protector of the human rights of women.
Agenda and Programme of Work:
• Ensure at least one full day of discussion every year on the human rights violations suffered mainly or exclusively by women.
• Ensure adequate planning and capacity-building for the Council to address the differential impact on women and girls of all human rights situations under its consideration.
Review of the Special Procedures:
• Mandate gender integration and the explicit consideration of women’s and girls’ human rights under each relevant Special Procedure, and ensure adequate capacity building to allow for such integration.
• Continually identify protection gaps in areas of human rights violations that mainly or exclusively affect women and girls, and create a means to address these gaps.
Universal Periodic Review:
• Integration of the respect for human rights of women into the criteria on which states will be reviewed, whether qualitative or quantitative, with particular focus on gender-specific human rights violations.
• Explicit evaluation of the gender-specific criteria of the review in the UPR outcome mechanism for each state, utilizing, inter alia, analysis and observations from treaty bodies and Special Procedures as appropriate.
- 3HO Foundation
- Action Canada for Population and Development (ACPD)
- Agenda Feminist Media
- Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK)
- Amnesty International
- ARC International
- Articulação de ONGs de Mulheres Negras Brasileira, Brazil
- Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law, and Development (APWLP)
- Asia Pacific Women’s Watch
- Asociación Alemana de Educación de Personas Adultas, Bolivia
- Asociación de Trabajo Interdisciplinario
- Asociación Pampeana de Conservación del Patrimonio Cultura
- Asociación para el Desarrollo Integral de la Mujer
- Asociacion Tiempo Nuevo, Paraguay
- Associação para o Planeamento da Familia
- Association for Women’s Rights in Development
- Associazione italiana donne per lo sviluppo (AIDOS)
- Baha’i International Community
- BALANCE, Promoción para el Desarrollo y Juventud A. C. (Mexico)
- Brazilian Interdisciplinary AIDS Association (ABIA)
- Bulgarian Gender Research Foundation
- CEDAW Watch – Philippines
- Centre for Equality Rights in Accommodation (CERA)
- Centre for Health and Social Justice
- Center for Reproductive Rights
- Center for Women’s Global Leadership
- Centro de Encuentros Cultura y Mujer
- Centro de Estudios de la Mujer de la Universidad Central de Venezuela
- Centro de la Mujer Peruana Flora Tristán
- Centro Mujeres A.C.
- Coletivo De Feministas Lesbicas, Brazil
- Concertación Interamericana de Mujeres Activistas por los Derechos Humanos, Costa Rica
- Corporación Sisma Mujer
- Creating Resources for Empowerment in Action (CREA)
- Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN)
- Ediciones El Pueblo
- El Closet de Sor Juana
- El Grupo Mujer Vergarense, Uruguay
- Equilibres & Populations
- Federation of Swedish LGBT Student Organizations
- FEMNET
- FORO - Red de Salud y Derechos Sexuales y Reproductivos
- Forum of Women's NGOs of Kyrgyzstan
- Franciscans International
- Fundación Arcoiris, Mexico
- Fundación para el Desarrollo y la Educacion Integral (FUNDEIN), Colombia
- Fundación Puntos de Encuentro
- Geledés - Instituto da Mulher Negra
- Gender, Livelihoods, and Resources Forum, India
- Georgian Young Lawyers' Association (GYLA)
- Global Rights
- Grupo de Mujeres de San Cristóbal Las Casas, A.C., Mexico
- Grupo Lesbico Nicaraguense Safo, Nicaragua
- Human Rights Congress for Bangladesh Minorities (HRCBM)
- Human Rights Watch
- Inform, Sri Lanka
- Information Group on Reproductive Choice (GIRE)
- Institute of Compared Studies on Criminal and Social Sciences, Argentina
- Instituto de Estudios de la Mujer – CEMUJER
- Instituto Patrícia Galvão Comunicação e Mídia
- Instituto Runa de Desarrollo y estudios sobre género
- International Alliance of Women
- International Community of Women Living with HIV and AIDS
- International Federation for Women Lawyers
- International Federation of Women in Legal Careers
- International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission
- International Indigenous Women's Forum – FIMI
- International Lesbian and Gay Association
- International Lesbian and Gay Law Association
- International Planned Parenthood Federation
- International Romanian Women League - LIFERO
- International Service for Human Rights
- International Society for Human Rights
- International Women's Health Coalition
- International Women's Rights Action Watch
- International Women’s Rights Action Watch – Asia Pacific (IWRAW-AP)
- International Women's Year Liaison Group, Japan
- Irish Family Planning Association
- Jaku'éke Paraguay/Radio VIVA, Paraguay
- Japan's Network for Women and Health, Japan
- Japan Women's Watch (JAWW), Japan
- Jovenes en Accion
- Korea Women's Associations United
- Korea Women's Hot Line
- La Asociación Servicios Educativos Rurales
- La Liga Internacional de Mujeres por la Paz y la Libertad - Seccional Colombia
- La Red Ciudadana Feminista de México (RECIFEM)
- La Red de Mujeres Emprendedoras (Winner)
- La Red de Mujeres de La Matanza, Argentina
- La Red Lesbica Cattrachas de Honduras, Honduras
- Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women's Rights (CLADEM)
- Latin American and Caribbean Women’s Health Network
- Lesbian and Gay Federation in Germany
- Luna del Sur Asociación Civil
- MADRE
- Mahila Sarvangeen Utkarsha Mandal
- Marie Stopes International
- MATCH International Centre
- Mérida, Venezuela
- Mesa de Trabajo Mujeres y Economia (REMTE)
- Movimiento Mundial por los Bosques Tropicales (WRM - World Rainforest Movement)
- Movimiento Manuela Ramos
- Mujeres del Área Rural Lechera de Florida, Uruguay
- Mujeres Trabajando, Argentina
- Mujer y Patriarcado - Florida, Uruguay
- NAWO - National Alliance of Women's Organisations
- National Committee on the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, USA
- Network of East-West Women
- New Woman Foundation, Egypt
- Nobel Women's Initiative
- Norwegian Association for Adult Learning
- Observatorio de Equidad de Género en Salud
- OXFAM International
- Pakistan Education Watch
- Parlamento Mujer Asuncion Paraguay
- Pax Romana
- Population and Sustainability Network
- Promoting Human Rights and Education in Bangladesh (PHREB)
- People's Movement for Human Rights Learning (PDHRE)
- Plataforma Interamericana de Derechos Humanos, Democracia y Desarrollo
- Qurban Trust, Pakistan
- Red de Educación Popular Entre Mujeres de América Latina y el Caribe
- Rede Mulher, Angola
- Rede Mulher de Educação
- Red Internacional de Género y Comercio – Capítulo Latinoamericano (LAGTN)
- Red Nacional de Promoción de la Mujer
- Red Solidaria por los Derechos Humanos
- Saathi
- Samabhavana Society
- Sarathi Trust, India
- Sexuality Policy Watch (SPW)
- Solidarity and Action Against the HIV Infection in India
- South Asia Women’s Watch (SAWW), India
- Southeast Asia Women’s Watch
- Thai Women Watch (TW2), Thailand
- Toledo Parana Brazil, Brazil
- United Nongovernment Social Work and Care Initiative (UNSWCI)
- Utthan
- Women and Gender Institute of Miriam College
- Women and Media Collective
- Women Living Under Muslim Law
- Women's Association of Romania (Asociatia Femeilor din Romania)
- Women's Commission for Refugee Women & Children
- Women's Environment and Development Organization (WEDO)
- Women's Federation for World Peace International (WFWPI)
- Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice
- Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
- Women's Resource and Advocacy Centre, India
- Women's UN Report Network
- Women's World Summit Foundation (WWSF)
- World Federation of Methodist and Uniting Church Women (WFMUCW)
- World Organisation Against Torture – OMCT
- World Population Foundation
- World YWCA
- Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights
1. See most recently Commission on Human Rights res. 2005/42: “Integrating the human rights of women throughout the United Nations system.”
