The Unfinished Revolution: Voices from the Global Fight for Women's Rights

A$36.95

Minky Worden

Foreword by Christiane Amanpour

The Unfinished Revolution tells the story of the global struggle to secure basic rights for women and girls, including in the Middle East where the Arab Spring raised high hopes, but the political revolutions are so far insufficient to guarantee progress.

Around the world, women and girls are trafficked into forced labour and sex slavery, trapped in conflict zones where rape is a weapon of war, prevented from attending school, and kept from making deeply personal choices in their private lives, such as whom and when to marry. In many countries, women are second-class citizens by law. In others, religion and traditions block freedoms such as the right to work, study or access health care. Even in the United States, women who are victims of sexual violence often do not see their attackers brought to justice.

More than 30 writers — Nobel Prize laureates, leading activists, top policy makers, and former victims— have contributed to this anthology. Drawing from their rich personal experiences, they tackle some of the toughest questions and offer bold new approaches to problems affecting hundreds of millions of women.

This volume is indispensable reading, providing thoughtful analysis from a never-before assembled group of advocates. It shows that the fight for women’s equality is far from over. As Leymah Gbowee, 2011 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate says, “Women are not free anywhere in this world until all women in the world are free.”

2012 | ISBN 9781742198224 | Paperback | 211 x 140 mm | 410 pages

Minky Worden

Foreword by Christiane Amanpour

The Unfinished Revolution tells the story of the global struggle to secure basic rights for women and girls, including in the Middle East where the Arab Spring raised high hopes, but the political revolutions are so far insufficient to guarantee progress.

Around the world, women and girls are trafficked into forced labour and sex slavery, trapped in conflict zones where rape is a weapon of war, prevented from attending school, and kept from making deeply personal choices in their private lives, such as whom and when to marry. In many countries, women are second-class citizens by law. In others, religion and traditions block freedoms such as the right to work, study or access health care. Even in the United States, women who are victims of sexual violence often do not see their attackers brought to justice.

More than 30 writers — Nobel Prize laureates, leading activists, top policy makers, and former victims— have contributed to this anthology. Drawing from their rich personal experiences, they tackle some of the toughest questions and offer bold new approaches to problems affecting hundreds of millions of women.

This volume is indispensable reading, providing thoughtful analysis from a never-before assembled group of advocates. It shows that the fight for women’s equality is far from over. As Leymah Gbowee, 2011 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate says, “Women are not free anywhere in this world until all women in the world are free.”

2012 | ISBN 9781742198224 | Paperback | 211 x 140 mm | 410 pages

 

Reviews

''Any revolution that doesn't create equality for women will be incomplete.'' Amen. The book is sobering but also a testament to courage and victories great and small, such as Somali Dr Hawa Abdi's refusal to back down in the face of the militias, and a fatwa against female genital mutilation in Iraqi Kurdistan.

–The Age, Lucy Sussex

"Essential reading for those who work in the field of human rights."

–Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4 News (UK)

According to Germaine Greer, the revolution for women’s equality hasn’t even begun.
Whether you agree with Greer or not, The Unfinished Revolution: Voices from the Global Fight for Women’s Rights makes it abundantly clear that the revolution is nowhere near finished. This book is an impressive and readable collection of essays detailing the tremendous progress made over the past two decades towards recognising women’s rights as human rights.

–Sophie Read-Hamilton, Newtown Review of Books

A powerful and important anthology of articles documenting the human rights abuses that women face all over the globe and the efforts to stop them ... Unfinished Revolutions should be required reading for all who consider themselves feminists, no matter where they live.

–Me, you, and Books

"A compelling, multicultural resource."

–Booklist

"A powerful overview of contemporary women's issues... Simultaneously an inspiration and a call-to-action."

–Publisher's Weekly

Table of Contents

List of acronyms .............................................................xiii
foreword ..........................................................................xv
Christiane Amanpour A Historic Moment for Women’s Rights introduction......................................................................1
Minky Worden Revolutions and Rights
PART 1
A REVOLUTION IN THINKING:
WOMEN’S RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS
chapter 1 .............................................................................................17
Ellen Chesler
The Shoulders We Stand On: Eleanor Roosevelt and Roots of the Women’s Rights Revolution
chapter 2 ............................................................................................29
Charlotte Bunch
How Women’s Rights Became Recognized as Human Rights vii
chapter 3.............................................................................................41
Isobel Coleman Technology’s Quiet Revolution for Women
PART 2
REVOLUTIONS AND TRANSITIONS
chapter 4 ............................................................................................53
Shirin Ebadi Islamic Law and the Revolution Against Women
chapter 5.............................................................................................61
Sussan Tahmasebi
A Civil Society-Led Revolution? Promoting Civil Society and Women’s Rights in the Middle East
chapter 6 ............................................................................................73
Esraa Abdel Fattah with Sarah J. Robbins
After the Arab Spring, Mobilizing for Change in Egypt
chapter 7 ............................................................................................79
Samer Muscati
Women in Iraq: Losing Ground
chapter 8 ............................................................................................93
Christoph Wilcke
Saudi Women’s Struggle
PART 3
CONFLICT ZONES
chapter 9 ..........................................................................................109
Jody Williams
Devastating Remnants of War: The Impact of Armed Conflict on Women and Girls
viii The Unfinished Revolution
chapter 10..........................................................................................117
Dr. Hawa Abdi with Sarah J. Robbins
Under Siege in Somalia
chapter 11..........................................................................................129
Anneke Van Woudenberg
Confronting Rape as a Weapon of War in the Democratic Republic of Congo
chapter 12 .........................................................................................139
Georgette Gagnon
“I Was Sold Twice”: Harmful Traditional Practices in Afghanistan
chapter 13 .........................................................................................147
Rachel Reid
Letters in the Night: Closing Space for Women and Girls in Afghanistan
PART 4
THE ECONOMIES OF RIGHTS: EDUCATION, WORK, AND PROPERTY
chapter 14 .........................................................................................159
Janet Walsh
Unequal in Africa: How Property Rights Can Empower Women
chapter 15..........................................................................................167
Nisha Varia
Cleaning House: The Growing Movement for Domestic Workers’ Rights
chapter 16 .........................................................................................179
Mark P. Lagon
Ending Trafficking of Women and Girls The Unfinished Revolution ix
chapter 17..........................................................................................187
Elaine Pearson
Do No Harm: “Post-Trafficking” Abuses
PART 5
VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
chapter 18 .........................................................................................199
Sarah Tofte
A Needed Revolution: Testing Rape Kits and US Justice
chapter 19 ........................................................................................209
Meghan Rhoad
Violence Against Immigrant Women in the United States
chapter 20.........................................................................................221
Gauri van Gulik
Behind Closed Doors: Domestic Violence in Europe
PART 6
WOMEN AND HEALTH
chapter 21..........................................................................................231
Aruna Kashyap
Maternal Mortality: Ending Needless Deaths in Childbirth
PHOTO ESSAYS: THE UNFINISHED REVOLUTION IN IMAGES
chapter 22.........................................................................................239
Nadya Khalife
Lasting Wounds: Female Genital Mutilation
chapter 23 ........................................................................................249
Agnes Odhiambo
Fistula: Giving Birth and Living Death in Africa
x The Unfinished Revolution
chapter 24 ........................................................................................259
Marianne Mollmann Fatal Consequences: Women, Abortion, and Power in Latin America
PART 7
POLITICAL CONSTRAINTS AND HARMFUL TRADITIONS
chapter 25 ........................................................................................269
Sharon K. Hom
Claiming Women’s Rights in China
chapter 26 ........................................................................................277
Sheridan Prasso A Long March for Women’s Rights in China
chapter 27.........................................................................................287
Graça Machel and Mary Robinson
Girls Not Brides chapter 28 ........................................................................................297
Judith Sunderland
Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don’t: Religious Dress and Women’s Rights
PART 8
THE NEXT FRONTIER: A ROAD MAP TO RIGHTS
chapter 29 ........................................................................................307
Gara LaMarche
Funding an Unfinished Revolution
chapter 30 .........................................................................................317
Liesl Gerntholtz
The Challenge of Changing the World for Women
The Unfinished Revolution xi
afterword.........................................................................................325
Dorothy Q. Thomas The Revolution Continues
notes ..................................................................................................333
suggestions for further reading...............................................345
acknowledgments ...........................................................................351
index.........................................................................355