Article 16(1) of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979)
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2018/08/02
Article 16
1. States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in all matters relating to marriage and family relations and in particular shall ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women: (a) The same right to enter into marriage;
(b) The same right freely to choose a spouse and to enter into marriage only with their free and full consent;
(c) The same rights and responsibilities during marriage and at its dissolution;
(d) The same rights and responsibilities as parents, irrespective of their marital status, in matters relating to their children; in all cases the interests of the children shall be paramount;
(e) The same rights to decide freely and responsibly on the number and spacing of their children and to have access to the information, education and means to enable them to exercise these rights;
(f) The same rights and responsibilities with regard to guardianship, wardship, trusteeship and adoption of children, or similar institutions where these concepts exist in national legislation; in all cases the interests of the children shall be paramount;
(g) The same personal rights as husband and wife, including the right to choose a family name, a profession and an occupation;
(h) The same rights for both spouses in respect of the ownership, acquisition, management, administration, enjoyment and disposition of property, whether free of charge or for a valuable consideration.
Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979)
The fundamental equality of the sexes comes in the form of marriage and family relations as well. Women for almost all of recorded history in most societies have been considered the property of the family, the community, the society, and, in fact, the religion. If one looks, in one example taken seriously by half of the world’s population in the Book of Exodus of the holy text collection called the Bible, there are the Ten Commandments.
In the commentary in one of the commandments about coveting one’s ox, ass, manservant, and maidservant, in the same statement, there remains a reference to the wife. Women belong to the men; the commandment references the men as the emphasis tacitly without referencing the husband but referencing the wife.
It seems within this context that we see the development of a religious foundation for historical discrimination against the women. Article 16(1) of the CEDAW, the Convention, or the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979) speaks to the equal rights of women in the sphere of marriage and family relations.
Article 16(1)(a) discusses the right to the entrance into a marriage. If a woman wants to enter into a marriage contract with someone mutually interested in her in this regard as well, then the man and the woman hold the same right to enter into such as marriage as per the stipulation – straightforward.
In Article 16(1)(b), another stipulation about the fundamental equality of the sexes comes in the form of being able to freely choose one’s spouse in life and in marriage with free and full consent for women, and for men for that matter but in most contexts that remains almost always a given.
Then this provides one of the most basic grounds for making arguably one of the most important decisions in life, which remains a cascade choice: do I want to spend my life with someone at all? If so, who do I want to spend my life with, in that case? It remains an important part of women’s right to choose as it is also an important part of a man’s right to choose.
Article 16(1)(c) states that the rights of a marriage and at its dissolution also imply a set of responsibilities; this amounts to the area of confusion among the different feminisms emergent in the modern period. The proper understanding of any acquirement of a right or a privilege is the equivalent or proportional responsibility in the relevant domain.
If someone marries another person, both have rights in and to the marriage but also responsibilities with regards to the marriage as well. This makes for an ability of either men or women in a heterosexual or homosexual marriage to stay in or leave a marriage as a fundamental human right.
Article 16(1)(d) speaks to the rights of a parent regardless of their marital status to the matters of children. The kids should have a parent and the parents have rights to the child and children in their lives barring some extenuating circumstance (one can think of examples easily).
This seems right in line with the prior thoughts that rights to children come with proportional responsibilities to them too. The rights of the children are the first and foremost concern here, but the parents remain the focus for both the rights and the responsibilities regarding the children.
Article 16(1)(e) speaks to the right of a responsible number and spacing of children with proper information and education, where the ability to partake of the community and the culture, and the family, results from the freedom to make these informed choices about family, family size, and so on.
The purpose is to note the importance, in another phraseology, of family planning through the mother being able to choose the number of children, having adequate information and education in order to make an informed choice on the matter of family life with these bases.
Through Article 16(1)(f) speaks about the identical rights and responsibilities for guardianship, wardship, trusteeship, and the adoption of children, women have the same rights as men in this regard. The purpose is to have the access and ability to partake of this part of social and societal functioning.
It also ties into the fundamental notion of national legislation devoted to the equal rights and responsibilities here. However, as in all cases regarding the rights of the parent comes the responsibility of the parent, the parent has to keep or bear in mind at all times the best interests of the child or children if these rights are to be taken into account in a serious way.
Article 16(1)(g) talks about the rights of a husband and a wife to choose a family name, profession, and occupation. That is to say, if a woman is wife is married to a husband, then the wife and the husband hold the same rights in those regards – and not one holding more than the other in accordance with this stipulation.
The final article sub-section (1)(h) talks about the rights for the spouses to be able to own, acquire, manage, administrate, enjoy, and dispose of property. This can be in a free situation or in a situation of a valuable consideration. In either case and through this, we see the sensitive, and thorough coverage of the matters of rights applied to marriage and family matters.
–One can find similar statements in other documents, conventions, declarations and so on, with the subsequent statements of equality or women’s rights:
- The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the Preamble, Article 16, and Article 25(2).
- Convention Against Discrimination in Education (1960) in Article 1.
- The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966) in Article 3 and Article 13.
- International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966).
- Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979).
- Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984).
- The Declaration on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (1993).
- Beijing Declaration(1995).
- United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (2000).
- Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children (2000).
- The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa or the “Maputo Protocol” (2003).
- Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence or the Istanbul Convention (2011) Article 38 and Article 39.
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