MARTHA NUSSBAUM'S CAPABILITIES APPROACH AS A FOUNDATION FOR WOMEN'S RIGHTS AND GENDER JUSTICE (original) (raw)

Rights of Women in a Challenging Nigerian Society

National Technical University of Ukraine Journal. Political science. Sociology. Law

Women as with all humans have a number of rights, including the right to learn, to be free from abuse and prejudice, to own property, to enjoy well-being in all of its ramifications, and to earn an equivalent income. Evidence depict women as being at the base of the pyramid in all human development indices, ranging from political participation to socio-cultural and financial independence to inheritance rights to land and property appropriation, to educational enrollment among many other measures. However, across the sphere and in the Nigerian context, a number of women still experience unfairness, given their femininity. Gender disparity emphasizes how women experience a range of rights issues and prejudices within various on-hand laws, which encourage some grave contests in view of denial and marginalization. This could be due to patriarchy; as an intensely entrenched practice in some cultures in nearly all developing societies, has upheld the feminization of poverty, exclusion, se...

A Pragmatic Approach to Raising the Bar on Womens Rights in Nigeria

2019

The expeditious growth of human rights in Nigeria coupled with the fact that nation is a signatory to a virtually all the international instruments, conventions and treaties on human rights has heightened the expectation of Nigerian women to the enjoyment of human rights and their protection from barbarous, anachronistic and archaic customary practices that unfortunately and regrettably abuses their rights to succession, inhibits their political and economic ascendancy and discriminates against them contrary to the tenets of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999. It is no longer news therefore that Nigeria has gained notoriety as a country where the inalienable rights of women are constantly abuse through domestic and gender based violence, deprivation from inheritance, subjugation, child marriage, female genital mutilation, sexual abuse, limited political representation and religious segregation amidst a host of others. This paper therefore examines these violat...

The Capabilities Approach', `The Imaginary Domain', and `Asymmetrical Reciprocity': Feminist Perspectives on Equality and Justice

Feminist Legal Studies, 2003

In this article the author revisits the question of how feminist theory/ theories could address questions regarding universalism, sameness, difference, and the quest for justice. She reconsiders the quest for justice and equality for women and the (im)possibilities of a feminist perspective on justice and a feminist 'community'. The three feminist theorists that she discusses are Martha Nussbaum, Drucilla Cornell, and Iris Marion Young. Nussbaum is closer to a liberal defense of universal values-Cornell and Young stand critical of liberalism and focus on sublimity, dignity, and asymmetrical reciprocity. The author supports the perspective of the latter two theorists and applies these perspectives to aspects of South African equality jurisprudence. She also considers critically the extent to which the Draft Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People's Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa breaks with liberal universalism and sameness. To the end she supports a notion of 'slowing down' in order to protect women's freedom and dignity, to approach each other with wonder and respect.

Gender Empowerment, Development, and the Place of Nigerian Women

Despite the numerous worldwide schemes to advance gender empowerment uniformity, Nigeria, remain a people with disfavoured gender balance which could spearhead to sustainable national development. Researches have shown that women account for a large section of Nigeria's population however, this does not increase nor translate to the economic enablement of women. Since women represent half of the Nigeria's human resources places a profound sway on the need for women/men empowerment impartiality/fairness. To this end, this study calls for a decisive progression in the socio-political and economic empowerment of women which should be relative to the male gender in every fragment of the Nigerian society. The paper draws on the intellectual engagement and theoretical frame of Liberal feminism which lays emphasis on the principle of equality of opportunity and freedom by making the legal and political rights of women equal to that of the men. Consequently, sustainable state policies must be put in place to bring about gender equality which could transmute to national development at all fronts. Government must pay practical attention to the socio-political improvement of the female gender in tandem to the male to expedite and facilitate sustainable national development in Nigeria at all spheres.

Contributions from the capabilities approach to the human rights practice

V. 13, n. 02, 2020

The article analyses the contributions offered from the capabilities approach to the human rights theory. The capabilities approach is a theory developed by Martha Nussbaum, US-American philosopher, that analyses the basic capabilities (alternative combinations of functionings that a person have the possibility to achieve) every human should achieve in order to live a life with dignity. The article demonstrates that Nussbaum´s theory contributes greatly for the development of human rights, by offering a list of specific capabilities that should be guaranteed to every human being by the State, with particular concern for vulnerable groups such as women, children and elderly. Even though the theory presents indisputable contributions, criticism is also presented, based upon mostly its essentialist point of view. In order to achieve the proposed objective, the methodology applied was bibliographical review.

Deliberative and Struggle Theories of Rights Realisation: Examining the Protection of Women in Nigeria

Journal of Law, Society and Development, 2018

This article investigates the theories of a deliberative approach to human rights protection and the struggle theory as propounded by Dembour in the first instance and also by Heyns. It contends that the protection of women against violence in Nigeria is experiencing a wave of challenges, especially in an effort to dismantle the strangleholds of culture and religion in its perception and interpretation. The article further examines the role an enhanced human rights education can play in achieving this aspiration. It notes that the Education for Justice initiative (E4J) of the United Nations Office on Crimes and Drugs represents a clear example of the role that both the deliberative and the struggle approaches can play in realising human rights towards creating lawfulness through education at all levels. Relying on a qualitative methodical approach, the authors have identified gaps and have made suggestions about bringing about the desired change.

RETHINKING THE JURISPRUDENTIAL STRATEGY OF THE QUEST FOR GENDER EQUALITY IN NIGERIA

In this article, I examine the extant approach to the struggle for gender equality, and seek to show how the wrong approach to the campaign has effectively militated against the march towards gender equality in Nigeria. I argue in a strict sense, that what we have so far striven to attain, has not been gender equality, but unequal elevation of the female human over her male equivalent. As I have argued elsewhere, that is injustice of an intolerable proportion, as it seeks to equalize only benefits and not the responsibility of society from which benefits spring. What in my opinion, we need to seek, is equality of all sexes, and equal distribution of the burdens and benefits of society among its two capable partners. I conclusively outline the steps which I believe can take the quest back to the lost track to gender equality.

A Critical Appraisal of the Legal and Policy Frameworks for the Protection of Women’s Rights in Nigeria

2020

The article critically examined the legal and policy frameworks that have been put in place to protect women's rights in Nigeria. The major aim of the research was to x-ray the relevant laws and policies with a view to finding out their effectiveness and possible constraints or shortcomings. It was discovered in the research that while in recent times, there have been robust increase in the number of laws and policies that have been enacted to protect the rights of women in Nigeria, there have been some lapses in some of the laws and governmental policies which correspondingly affected their enforcements and efficacy. The article concluded that while it is commendable that some relevant legal framework and policies have been enacted by the government at various levels to address issues of women's rights, the government and relevant stakeholders are still required to do more to promote and protect the rights of women in Nigeria. The article also recommended, inter alia, that the Nigerian government and relevant stakeholders should exercise strong commitments towards the promotion of women's rights in the country. One of such ways is by amending some of the laws and revising some policies where loopholes have been identified in the article with a view to achieving the noble aims and objectives for enacting them as well as bringing them into conformity with global and regional instruments.