Who Speaks for Women? (Article for Sudan Mirror supplement for International women's day)

When we see or hear of scenes of tragedy in the media it is often women who are shown as the ones who have suffered disproportionately. However when women are portrayed in such a manner, often rather than helping them or their plight it places them in the role of victims and sees them as little else. While those who portray women as constant victims may be well intentioned in doing so they rob women of their agency. Rather than being viewed as actively involved in the world in which they live they come to be viewed as passive victims.

The late John Garang said that women were the ‘Marginalized of the marginalized.’ They suffered not just because of the war but also because of their position inside their society. Their suffering was not simply because they were the wives, mothers or daughters of the fighters but because they were viewed as such. And because they were viewed as the victims of a man’s war. So much so that when women SPLM delegates campaigned for positions for women inside the new Sudan the GOS resisted saying that they had not been fighting women.

Among national liberation movements in Africa there was a tendency to ignore women’s issues. Women who dared to speak out against their oppression were accused of being selfish and ignoring the plight of their people as a whole. The result is that in the transition from one system to the next women never achieved any advances for their sex. When the struggles were gender blind when the time for negotiating peace came women’s issues were left off the agenda. So inside of the new societies women continued on with the same disadvantages as they had before. The new rulers of the society ensure that as men they are in a position of privilege and as such were not too quick to capitulate to the demands of women. So while women activists may have made sacrifices in order to help the struggle. They may not find this work rewarded especially if they were compliant with the demands of others to keep the gender issues off the agenda.

Similarly African women cannot look to European or North American women to understand their position and to help them. Western Feminists have a distinctly Eurocentric view. While the women’s struggle has been ongoing in the West for over a century the focus at present is very different. There is a danger that western feminists when looking at the situation of women in Africa will be able to see them as little more than victims. This can lead to a situation where a lack of cultural understanding can create the view of African women as being inferior in the eyes of Western Feminists and they will advocate changes which are not sensitive to the needs of African women.

The reason for this is a question of moral relativism vs. absolutism or universality. While certain human rights are taken to be Universal there are also certain rights which we consider to be a part of our culture. If we take for example the issue of Female Genital Cutting. The vast majority of cultures consider this to be an act of mutilation and an assault on a woman’s bodily integrity. Further more many quite rightly view it as a form of control that is exercised over women to deny them the right to control over their own bodies and places sexual control in the hands of men. However proponents of FGC claim that it is an integral part of their culture and say those who criticize it do not properly understand the practice.

So here then is a dilemma, should the concerned individual look upon the right to bodily integrity as a fundamental human right and campaign against FGM if they are not from a culture where it is practiced or should they regard it as a cultural practice such as any group have the right to? However there is a view somewhere in between these two. Any concerned individual does not have to openly attack FGM to oppose it but to oppose it from outside the culture in which it is practiced will actually strengthen it as a practice. Outsiders, especially westerners, opposing FGM can actually have the effect of making it seem a more important cultural act and hence increase its popularity. Here too women who are interested in their rights as women and in protecting their culture face a dilemma. While they might not agree with FGC they may want to defend themselves from what they see as an outside attack on their culture.

Similar attitudes can be seen towards the wearing of the Hijab. When the French President Jacques Chirac recently banned the wearing of veils in schools there was public uproar. Not just from conservative Muslims but also from European Liberals. In Europe the practice of women wearing a veil is seen as anti-women but the practice of opposing it is seen as anti-Muslim. So many of those Europeans who claim to promote Human Rights find themselves in a paradoxical situation. If they look at human rights in a universalistic manner practices they view as anti-women such be condemned no matter where they happen. But in order to look at them in a relativist manner, then the culture in which they occur should be respected.

Such phenomena are by no means new. In nineteenth century India as the British consolidated their control they outlawed the practice of Sati which is also referred to as wife burning. This was the practice whereby when a man died his wife while still alive would be placed on the funeral pyre and burned to death. While it was claimed that this was the wish of the wife as she did not wish to live on without her husband more often than not it was due to the husbands family who saw the wife as an economic burden and Sati as a convenient way of relieving this burden. The English placed themselves in the role of protectors feeling that it was their duty to protect brown women from brown men. However the real result of their action was that an obscure and dwindling practice enjoyed a massive revival as the Indians attempted to defend their culture from Imperialist attacks.

So in order for women to achieve their rights there must be a space inside their society for them to have their voices heard. Too often other forces will claim to represent the interests of women while fundamentally undermining their position and their rights. Many of these forces will also seek to prevent women’s voices from being heard. Rights for women are something that should be guaranteed inside of any society but in a society that denies women their rights every effort will be made to prevent their voices from being heard.