Advocating for sexual rights at the UN: the unfinished business of global development

Abstract

Twenty years ago, governments agreed that the right to have control over and decide freely and responsibly on all matters related to one's sexuality, free from coercion, discrimination and violence, is a fundamental human right. Since then, many aspects of sexual rights have been agreed by consensus at the global level, but the term “sexual rights” itself continues to be removed from negotiated outcomes and left out of international agreements, often at the last stages of negotiations.

This commentary represents our point of view on the unfinished business of the UN with regards to the fight for sexual rights. Our perspective draws from lessons learned in cross-movement organizing in various regional UN spaces and outlines some of the tactics by conservative forces to push sexual rights to the periphery. The article reaffirms the position that broadening the debate and concepts surrounding sexual rights to be more inclusive, has enormous transformational potential and should inform collective advocacy efforts moving forward.

Résumé

Il y a 20 ans, les gouvernements ont convenu que le droit de maîtriser sa sexualité et de décider librement et de manière responsable de toutes les questions s’y rapportant, sans coercition, discrimination ni violence, est un droit de l’homme fondamental. Depuis, beaucoup d’aspects des droits sexuels ont été adoptés par consensus au niveau international, mais le terme « droits sexuels » continue d’être supprimé des résultats négociés et écarté des accords internationaux, souvent dans les derniers stades de la négociation. Ce commentaire présente notre point de vue sur le travail inachevé des Nations Unies en ce qui concerne la lutte pour les droits sexuels. Notre perspective se fonde sur les leçons tirées de l’organisation de mouvements dans différents espaces régionaux des Nations Unies et souligne certaines des tactiques employées par les forces conservatrices pour marginaliser les droits sexuels. L’article réaffirme la position selon laquelle l’élargissement du débat et des concepts entourant les droits sexuels afin d’être plus inclusifs possède un formidable potentiel de transformation et devrait guider les activités collectives de plaidoyer pour aller de l’avant.

Resumen

Hace veinte años, los gobiernos acordaron que el derecho de tener control sobre todo lo relacionado con la sexualidad propia, y de decidir libre y responsablemente al respecto, sin coacción, discriminación y violencia, es un derecho humano fundamental. Desde entonces, muchos aspectos de los derechos sexuales han sido acordados por consenso a nivel mundial, pero el término “derechos sexuales” continúa siendo eliminado de los resultados negociados y omitido de los acuerdos internacionales, a menudo en las últimas etapas de las negociaciones. Este comentario representa nuestro punto de vista sobre los asuntos pendientes de las Naciones Unidas con respecto a la lucha por los derechos sexuales. Nuestra perspectiva se basa en lecciones aprendidas en la organización de movimientos en diversos espacios regionales de las Naciones Unidas y resume algunas de las tácticas por fuerzas conservadoras para empujar los derechos sexuales hacia la periferia. El artículo reafirma la postura de que ampliar el debate y los conceptos relacionados con los derechos sexuales para ser más inclusivo, tiene un enorme potencial transformativo y debe informar los esfuerzos colectivos de promoción y defensa de aquí en adelante.

Key words:

• sexual rights
• sustainable development
• sexual orientation and gender identity
• United Nations
• sexuality

It was late into the process of negotiating the outcome of the African Regional Conference on Population and Development at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in October 2013 when a delegate from the government of Mali raised objections to paragraph 17. The paragraph in question seemed non-controversial:

“Adopt and protect the human rights of all individuals, without distinction of any kind, and guarantee equality before the law and non-discrimination for all people.”

The Malian delegate had another view. The language “without distinction of any kind” contained a hidden agenda, he argued, and might force governments to protect the human rights of lesbians and gay men.

This caught the attention of other delegates in the room. One after the other, the governments of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Benin, Congo Brazzaville, Egypt, Eritrea, Burundi, Niger, Togo, and Uganda, among others, spoke up to voice their opposition to “without distinction of any kind”. Eritrea argued against what it saw as an “un-African agenda”. Niger asserted that this language was clearly intended to divide them.

A delegate from Liberia pointed out that this was core human rights language from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and African regional human rights instruments. The Tanzanian representative also tried to reason with her peers: “Whoever these people are that they are referring to, they surely still have rights as a human being.”

With the conversation degenerating rapidly, delegates moved to a closed-door meeting. In the end, the language was watered down considerably, essentially gutting the essence of a longstanding human rights principle by making it subordinate to culture, religion and national law:

“Adopt and protect the human rights of all individuals, without distinction of any kind, and guarantee equality before the law and non-discrimination for all people, in accordance with national policies, laws, religious, ethical values and cultural backgrounds .”¹

Yet, even this did not placate many of the government representatives in the room. At the close of the meeting, 16 governments issued reservations on this paragraph, as well as two others that contained similar language, and the government of Chad disassociated itself from the text altogether. Fortunately, all of them lifted their reservations in the months subsequent to the Conference after outreach by UNFPA. However, the reversals were not publicized on the ECA website and the sentiment behind the original reservations continued to be voiced at subsequent UN negotiations; most recently, during the negotiations on the political declaration for the post-2015 agenda.²

This story illustrates the nature of the current opposition to sexual rights in UN spaces. After slow but steady progress at the regional and global levels in furthering recognition of sexual rights and the rights of all people to control all matters related to their sexuality free from coercion, discrimination and violence, a more strident and overt opposition has mobilized. Variants of the arguments raised by African governments at the ECA in October 2013 are now raised regularly at UN headquarters. This opposition is centered on two key issues: the rights of people of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities (SOGI); and the rights of adolescents, particularly girls, to be able to control their bodies, sexualities and ultimately their lives.

Defining sexual rights as human rights

The right to have control over and decide freely and responsibly on all matters related to one's sexuality free from coercion, discrimination and violence is a fundamental human right. In 2006, the WHO published a working definition of sexual rights centered on the right of all persons to fulfill and express their sexuality and enjoy sexual health, with due regard for the rights of others. The definition embraced a number of human rights already recognized in national laws, international human rights documents and other consensus statements, including:

• the rights to the highest attainable standard of health (including sexual health) and social security;

• the rights to equality and non-discrimination;

• the right to marry and to found a family and enter into marriage with the free and full consent of the intending spouses, and to equality in and at the dissolution of marriage;

• the right to be free from torture or cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment;

• the right to privacy;

• the right to decide the number and spacing of one's children;

• the rights to information, as well as education;

• the rights to freedom of opinion and expression; and the right to an effective remedy for violations of fundamental rights.³

Other organizations have put forward largely similar definitions (e.g. International Planned Parenthood Federation, World Association of Sexual Health);^4,5 in all cases sexual rights are meant to comprise all rights related to sexuality, whether civil, political, economic or cultural, and include rights related to reproduction. Sexuality Policy Watch, a global forum of researchers and activists, observed that the concept of sexual rights enables us to address the intersections between sexual orientation, discrimination and other sexuality issues – such as restrictions on all sexual expression outside marriage or abuses against sex workers – and to identify root causes of different forms of oppression.⁶ Seen from this perspective, sexual rights have enormous transformational potential for both “sexual minorities” and “sexual majorities.”

One such sexual “majority” is women and girls. Indeed it is the attempts to control women’s and girls’ sexuality that result in many of the human rights abuses they face daily, from sexual violence to child, early and forced marriage or female genital mutilation and limitations on their mobility, education, health, employment and participation in public life. The same holds true for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people, sex workers, and others who transgress sexual and gender norms and who face greater risk of violence, stigma and discrimination as a result. Sexual rights underpin the enjoyment of many other human rights and are a prerequisite for equality and justice.

A sexual rights movement has emerged at the UN comprised of distinct civil society organizations, namely LGBTI groups, HIV and health groups, feminist and women's groups and reproductive health and rights groups.⁷ As a result of sustained efforts by these groups, the phrase “sexual rights” has been used and defined in regional intergovernmental negotiations at the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean and the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.¹ At the global level, as discussed in the next section, many aspects of sexual rights have been agreed by consensus since the 1990s. However, the term “sexual rights” itself continues to be removed from global intergovernmental agreements, often at the last stages of negotiations.

How far have we come?

Gender and sexuality have been debated in different UN spaces since the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These debates have accelerated over the last twenty years as a result of the landmark UN conferences of the 1990s, in particular the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo in 1994 and the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995.⁸ These conferences and their subsequent reviews have laid the foundation for significant gains for the global sexual rights movement.

Although the negotiations in Cairo were an uphill task, in the end the ICPD Programme of Action was remarkable in its recognition of sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights. While systematic opposition by the Holy See, a few of its Latin American allies, and some Islamic states succeeded in keeping the phrase “sexual rights” out of the document, its definitions of reproductive health and rights nonetheless set crucial groundwork for subsequent agreements.⁹ For example, paragraphs 7.3 and 7.4 recognize the importance of a “safe and satisfying sex life”; sexual health for the “enhancement of life and personal relations”; the need for education to ensure that adolescents are enabled to “deal in a positive and responsible way with their sexuality”; as well as the need for information and services to allow people to exercise their right to make their own decisions about reproduction and achieve the highest attainable standards of sexual and reproductive health free of coercion, discrimination and violence.¹⁰

In Beijing one year later, many feminists were intent on addressing the unfinished business of sexual rights.⁸ While the opposition to the term “sexual rights” was again formidable, this time negotiators were able to agree in paragraph 96 of the Beijing Platform for Action that:

“The human rights of women include their right to have control over and decide freely and responsibly on matters related to their sexuality, including sexual and reproductive health, free of coercion, discrimination and violence…” ¹¹

These words were groundbreaking – the first major attempt to define sexual rights in a global policy document. Yet much to the dismay of feminist, LGBTI and human rights activists, governments were slow to make significant further advances at the global level.

There were attempts, however. At the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) in Geneva in 2003, Brazil proposed a resolution on “Human Rights and Sexual Orientation” without much consultation with other governments or civil society groups. Despite the expectation by Brazil that opposition would be limited, the proposed resolution met strong objections, and Pakistan and the Holy See skillfully used procedure to postpone the resolution until the following year.⁸ This postponement allowed opposing governments in the global South to exert pressure on Brazil to drop its support for the resolution; by 2005, Brazil had withdrawn the resolution altogether.

Faced with this critical impasse, activist communities became divided on whether focusing on discrimination based on sexual orientation (and eventually gender identity) should be the objective, or whether a broader claim for the recognition of “sexual rights” would be more fruitful.⁸ Meanwhile, in 2004 the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health issued a report that contained the most comprehensive examination of sexual rights ever found in a UN document.¹² In the following years, declarations on human rights, gender and sexual identity were introduced at the new UN Human Rights Council (HRC), building up momentum again.¹³ Finally in 2011 and 2014, two groundbreaking resolutions on sexual orientation and gender identity were approved by narrow votes.^14,15

Similarly, momentum has grown recently on the sexual rights of adolescents and young people. In April 2012, after a week of intense negotiations at the 45th Commission on Population and Development (CPD), governments recognized the human rights of adolescents and youth to have control over and decide on their sexuality.¹⁶ Two months later, at Rio + 20, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, governments reaffirmed that right.¹⁷ Most recently, in July 2015, the HRC adopted a resolution on child, early and forced marriage that for the first time recognizes that all girls have the right to have control over and decide freely on matters related to their sexuality.¹⁸

As noted previously, critical advances on sexual rights were also achieved during the regional conferences for ICPD Beyond 2014. At the Latin American and Caribbean Inter-Governmental Conference on Population and Development, which concluded in Montevideo, Uruguay, on August 15, 2013, 38 governments of the region reached an unprecedented and groundbreaking consensus to define sexual rights:

“Promote policies that enable persons to exercise their sexual rights, which embrace the right to a safe and full sex life, as well as the right to take free, informed, voluntary and responsible decisions on their sexuality, sexual orientation and gender identity, without coercion, discrimination or violence, and that guarantee the right to information and the means necessary for their sexual health and reproductive health.” ¹⁹

The Montevideo Consensus is the most forward-looking document on sexual rights ever agreed at any diplomatic negotiation, thanks in large part to the highly strategic and effective advocacy from a diverse group of civil society advocates, including many indigenous, Afro-descendent, Caribbean and young people.⁸ The governments of Uruguay, Cuba, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Mexico played a key role during the negotiations.²⁰

At the Sixth Asian and Pacific Population Conference held in Bangkok in September 2013, governments adopted a similarly progressive outcome document that committed to ensure human rights are recognized as central to all population and development programs. Governments resolved “to respect, protect and fulfil the human rights of all women and girls, including their sexual and reproductive rights” (paragraph 11) and “reduce vulnerability and eliminate discrimination based on sex, gender, age, race, caste, class, migrant status, disability, HIV status and sexual orientation and gender identity” (paragraph 15).²¹ Only three states voted against the agreement (Iran, Russia and Azerbaijan).

The final ICPD regional review at the African Regional Conference on Population and Development, which concluded on October 4, 2013, also produced a declaration reaffirming “sexual and reproductive health and rights” in a number of places.¹ However, as previously noted, the negotiations proved challenging when a handful of countries resisted inclusion of broad human rights language that could be interpreted to protect the rights of LGBTI people. Unfortunately, this opposition has fuelled homophobic discourse in other UN spaces, with conservative governments challenging previously agreed language, such as “human rights without discrimination of any kind”, “gender”, and “intimate partner violence”, among other phrases, as attempts to sneak in issues of sexual orientation and gender identity. New and old fundamentalisms and extremisms have seized upon rapidly changing social and family structures and gender norms to mobilize their base of support.²²

Language on sexuality education has also faced newly energized opposition. While governments agreed upon the need to ensure adolescents have access to comprehensive education on sexuality, reproduction, and sexual and reproductive health as long ago as the ICPD, the debate has simmered along ever since. Recently, a small but vocal group of largely Arab and African governments and the Holy See have turned up the heat. The group has not succeeded in watering down existing agreements – and indeed the term “comprehensive sexuality education” was recently agreed to for the first time at the global level in a HRC resolution – but consensus on this issue remains difficult.²³

Despite this opposition, the number of countries vocally calling for recognition of sexual rights has increased significantly. During the CPD negotiations in 2014, 59 countries, including many from the global South, indicated support for language on sexual rights. In the same year, 58 countries also signed a statement delivered by South Africa during a session of the General Assembly’s Open Working Group on the Sustainable Development Goals calling for targets on “sexual and reproductive health and rights” under the health and gender equality goals.²⁴

Unlike in the 1990s, when discussions about sexual rights often divided the feminist movement at the global level, there is today consensus amongst feminists that advancing the respect, protection and fulfillment of sexual rights for all people – including LGBTI persons – is a priority. Since 2013, a reenergized Women’s Rights Caucus has emerged at the Commission on the Status of Women; it brings together a large and diverse group of feminist organizations from around the world, and has adopted recognition of sexual rights, including the rights of sex workers and of lesbian, bisexual and transgender women, as core principles. In addition, during UN discussions on the post-2015 development agenda, key coalitions of civil society organizations, including the Women’s Major Group, the Major Group on Children and Youth, Beyond 2015 and the Human Rights Caucus, collectively worked together to advance recognition of “sexual and reproductive health and rights.”

In order to build on this momentum and seek further advances at the global level, sustained, strategic and coordinated advocacy by activists remains critical.

Moving forward

In December 2014, the International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC) convened feminist and LGBTI activists* drawn from different regions and representing diverse groups to explore joint advocacy strategies to tip the scales in favor of sexual rights in global UN policy-making spaces. Activists agreed that recognition of the term “sexual rights” is in itself politically powerful, but there is a clear need to define and demystify this term. Shifting the discourse to sexual justice is crucial to acknowledge the fuller range of economic, social and environmental factors that impact people’s ability to exercise autonomy over their lives and realize their sexual rights. From this perspective, there is a need to disentangle sexual rights from reproductive rights and to frame sexual rights from a positive perspective, rather than a harm or disease prevention one.

Activists at the IWHC Sexual Rights Convening further recognized the need for inclusivity, solidarity and an intersectional approach to advocacy. Feminist organizing for sexual rights will suffer limitations as long as internal opposition persists to the involvement of sex workers and transgender women. Sexual rights advocacy should leave no one behind; the sexual rights of sex workers, LGBTI and other gender non-conforming people, people with disabilities, women and girls, adolescents and children, among others, should be given equal priority. At the same time, sexual rights advocates must also rebut arguments presented by governments in the name of culture and tradition. Reclaiming and refining culture and values, and transforming the discourse about who “owns” a woman’s body and sexuality, must be a central part of advocacy for sexual rights.

One of the key strengths of feminist and LGBTI movements has been transnational advocacy. While such collective action has been remarkably effective, as evidenced by the past 20 years’ advances, without financial resources, continued success will be difficult. It is imperative that funding institutions invest in the strengthening and building of feminist, LGBTI and allied organizations and their leaders (particularly younger generations) on the ground, and ensure consistent funding for the hard and long-term advocacy needed to achieve change at all levels. Investments should include space for advocates to reflect and strategize.

The fight for sexual rights will continue as long as the fight for human rights, “without distinction of any kind”, continues.

Notes

* Some of these activists wish to remain anonymous for their safety. A partial list of participants is available on request from IWHC.