Human Rights Council holds panel discussion on the protection of the family and its members

15 September 2014

The Human Rights Council this morning held a panel discussion on the protection of the family and its members.

Jane Connors, Director, Research and Right to Development Division, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in an introductory statement said the family and the rights of its members were addressed in provisions in a range of international human rights treaties. Despite these international legal obligations, women continued to experience, in varying degrees, discrimination within the family. Violence and exploitation within the family were also serious human rights concerns, as was the situation of single-parent families, which were often headed by women.

Moderating the discussion was Yvette Stevens, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva. The Panelists were Aslan Khuseinovich Abashidze, Member of the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights; Hiranti Wijemanne, Member of the Committee on the Rights of the Child; Zitha Mokomane, Chief Research Specialist, Human and Social Development Research Programme, Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa; Karen Bogenschneider, Rothermel Bascom Professor of Human Ecology, University of Wisconsin; and Rosa Inés Floriano Carrera, Coordinator, Department of Life, Justice and Peace, Caritas, Colombia.

Ms. Stevens said that the discussion today would guide the Council on the road forward in addressing the issue of protecting the family. However, this panel discussion was not about defining a family; the definition of the family in each State was different and it was up to States themselves to decide what groups were considered a family.

Mr. Abashidze said the protection of families by States and societies was an important principle in international human rights law. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights also defined obligations of States to provide assistance and protection to the family. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in its general comment on Article 19, recognized that the definition of the family was different from State to State.

Ms. Wijemanne said the family was an integral part of human life. The Convention on the Right of the Child contained various provisions related to families, and obliged States to ensure and respect the right of every child and not to discriminate against children on any ground, including on the ground of the family environment they were growing in

Ms. Bogenschneider heartily endorsed the recommendation to undertake concerted actions to strengthen family-centred policies and programmes. They had convened over 190 Family Impact Seminars for State policy-makers in 25 states and the District of Columbia. In a contentious environment, they had been able to move beyond family rhetoric to enhancing the reality of families’ lives by building better public policies.

Ms. Floriano Carrera said that the unity and cohesion of the family unit was one of the first things affected when a family had to face the adversity that went hand in hand with conflict. If a response did not reflect the complexity of the drama and did not consider the family, it could do more harm than good. Humanitarian aid to the family had to be organized in order to guarantee the core links and cohesion of the family.

In the discussion that followed, speakers noted that family diversity was important and different forms of families required the tailored protection of the State. Even though the family unit itself was not a right holder, States still had the obligation and responsibility to protect the family and its members. Family units witnessed growing challenges such as the economic situation, lack of social protection, migration or armed conflict; research demonstrated that well protected families contributed positively to the rights of their members, particularly women and children. The gravity of violence within families, such as sexual violence or violence against children, was underlined. What were the best ways to support families in this ever evolving context? How could specific measures and policies ensure that indigenous families were protected?

Speaking in the discussion were Chile, Egypt on behalf of the main sponsors, Russia on behalf of a like-minded group, Australia on behalf of a group of States, United Kingdom on behalf of a group of States, Pakistan on behalf of the Organization for Islamic Cooperation, United States on behalf of a group of States, Finland in a joint Nordic statement, Uruguay on behalf of a group of countries, European Union, Slovenia on behalf of a group of States, Costa Rica on behalf of Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, Ethiopia on behalf of the African Group, United Arab Emirates on behalf of the Arab Group, Iran on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, Estonia, Czech Republic, Syria, Norway, Egypt, Russia, Namibia, Sierra Leone, Germany, Sudan, Ireland, and Qatar.

Allied Rainbow Communities International, on behalf of severals NGOs1, Plan International, Inc., on behalf of severals NGOs2, Howard Centre for Family, Religion and Society, Group of Non-Governmental Organizations for the Convention on the Rights of the Child and Caritas Internationalis International Confederation of Catholic Charities, on behalf of severals NGOs3, also took the floor.

The Human Rights Council during its noon meeting will continue its general debate on thematic reports by the Secretary-General, the High Commissioner and her Office. During its afternoon meeting the Council will hold its annual discussion on the integration of a gender perspective.

BAUDELAIRE NDONG ELLA, President of the Human Rights Council, said that they would be holding this morning a round table on the protection of the family and its members. The Human Rights Council recognized that the family was the natural and fundamental group unit of society, entitled to protection afforded to it by society and the State. The aim of the discussion was to strengthen cooperation at all levels, and take agreed measures to strengthen policies and programmes devoted to the family in the context of an integrated overall approach to human rights.

JANE CONNORS, Director, Research and Right to Development Division, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in an introductory statement said that the family and the rights of its members were addressed in provisions in a range of international human rights treaties. These provisions encompassed civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights; enshrined women’s right to equality within the family; and provided protection for children, persons with disabilities and older persons as members of families. Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and article 23 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights proclaimed the family as the natural and fundamental group unit of society, providing it with entitlements to protection by society and the State. Families assumed diverse forms and functions among and within countries. The principle of equality between women and men within the family was recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and reflected as a legally binding obligation on States parties in Article 23 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Despite these international legal obligations, women continued to experience, in varying degrees, discrimination within the family. This was largely a result of stereotypical notions of gender roles which envisaged women as care-givers and men as breadwinners. Violence and exploitation within the family were also serious human rights concerns. The situation of single-parent families, which were often headed by women, raised specific human rights concerns. The Convention on the Rights of the Child underscored the importance of a family environment for the child’s growth and well-being. It provided for the protection of children in situations where they had been separated from their parents and where children had been deprived of a family environment. It also referred to family reunification. The obligations were especially relevant to migration, where children were often separated from their families against their will. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities made clear that persons with disabilities and their family members should receive the necessary protection and assistance. Although no universal human rights instrument made explicit provision regarding care for older persons in the family, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights indicated in its General Comment Number 5 that protection of the family should include establishment of social services to support the family when there were elderly people at home, especially where the family was of low-income.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, in her opening remarks said that the discussion today would guide the Council on the road forward in addressing the issue of protecting the family. However, this panel discussion was not about defining a family; the definition of the family in each State was different and it was up to States themselves to decide what groups were considered a family. Turning to Mr. Abashidze, Ms. Stevens asked about the perspectives of international human rights law on the obligations of States to protect the family.

Introducing Ms. Wijemanne, YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, asked about her views on how the protection of the family and its members positively contributed to the rights of children.

HIRANTI WIJEMANNE, Member of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, said that the family was an integral part of human life and was of particular significance and importance to children as it influenced how the child grew and developed and what type of adult he or she became. The Convention on the Rights of the Child contained various provisions related to families and recognized children as right-holders, and did not refer to a unique form of family; the definition of the family varied in each State. The Convention obliged States to ensure and respect the rights of every child and not to discriminate against children on any ground, including on the ground of the family environment they were growing in. States had the responsibility to support and assist families and this related to the critical role of families in the promotion and protection of human rights. Article 9 stated that a child should not be separated from their parents, unless such separation was necessary for the best interest of the child; in reality, children were often separated from their parents because of poverty, migration, stigma or other reasons and in such situations States had the obligation to provide families with protection and support in order to prevent separation. States also had the obligation to protect children within the family, including from homicide, physical and non-physical punishment, sexual violence by family members, and harmful practices which had devastating consequences such as female genital mutilation, early and child marriage, or honour killings.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, turning to Ms. Bogenschneider, said the essence of the panel was to listen to best practices. Ms. Bogenschneider was in a good position to highlight pro-family solutions and policies. Could these be shared?

KAREN BOGENSCHNEIDER, Rothermel Bascom Professor of Human Ecology, University of Wisconsin, heartily endorsed the recommendation to undertake concerted actions to strengthen family-centred policies and programmes. This had been the focus of her work for over two decades. Since 1993, Ms. Bogenschneider and her colleagues had convened over 190 Family Impact Seminars for state policy-makers in 25 states and the District of Columbia. These seminars were occurring in a political environment so divisive that it was mathematically impossible for the United States Congress to get much more polarized. Not every seminar ended up influencing a policy decision, but some did. Policy-makers reported that the seminars influenced policy decision that could help lift families out of poverty by informing laws that ensured access to nutritious food and to health care. They had also influenced policies that could support work/family balance by informing laws on the funding of child care. Objective information and a range of policy options were provided, which had earned them a solid, non-partisan reputation. Careful attention was paid to the issues focused on. There was no focus on issues where policy-makers had already made up their minds. One way to build consensus was by focusing on family well-being. It was found that policy-makers wanted access to research on the effectiveness of various policy options so they could invest in policies that worked and cut those that did not. In a contentious environment, they had been able to move beyond family rhetoric to enhancing the reality of families’ lives by building better public policies.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, then introduced Ms. Floriano Carrera.

ROSA INES FLORIANO CARRERA, Coordinator, Department of Life, Justice and Peace, Caritas, Colombia, said the unity and cohesion of the family unit was one of the first things affected when a family had to face the adversity that went hand in hand with conflict. If a response did not reflect the complexity of the drama and did not consider the family, it could do more harm than good. If the family and the community were not considered as a whole, then there could be a re-victimization of the family. This may result in just reducing families to figures for humanitarian aid. Another risk was that if the response was not organized, the family would be disintegrated. The dignity of persons was at the heart of the humanitarian approach. The person, however vulnerable, was a subject of rights and was still able to act. Humanitarian aid to the family had to be organized in order to guarantee the core links and cohesion of the family. On what could be done, it was important to provide help that fuelled hope and the family’s ability to face the difficult context they were in. The response had to lay down clear procedures to help the family overcome the crisis and to ensure that members of families could be the drivers of their own projects. The institutional backbone of public policies that dealt with the families had to provide a clear articulate response and strategy.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, said that on many occasions the potential of the family was scarcely explored in the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals and asked about the relation of the family to sustainable development and the sustainable development goals.

ZITHA MOKOMANE, Chief Research Specialist, Human and Social Development Research Programme, Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa, said that the family had been completely left out from the Millennium Development Goals and was not being considered in the sustainable development goals or the post-2015 development agenda. The protection of the family should be included as a stand-alone goal, and this could be one action point for the Human Rights Council following this panel. There was a need for more family-focused programmes in poverty reduction programmes, including through livelihood protection, income support, universal pensions and others; many countries already had some of those measures in place, but they were focused on individuals. States should capitalize on the resilience of families and support them through stressful situations.

Discussion

GLORIA MARIA VARGAS, Vice-Minister of the National Chilean Service for Women, said that traditional roles of women and men were changing; 30 per cent of families today were single-parent families and most children were born in non-marriage unions; Chile was considering legal reforms to account for the new reality and guarantee the rights of each member of the family. Ms. Vargas urged the Human Rights Council to protect the diverse reality and composition of families, to ensure that each family member had his or her rights respected.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, said that some of the major questions had related to how they could protect against violence within families, how States could promote strong families while protecting the human rights of all individuals, and how family protection could be included in the post-2015 development agenda, among others.

ZITHA MOKOMANE, Chief Research Specialist, Human and Social Development Research Programme, Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa, said on how to involve the family in the post-2015 development agenda that it was very important to have a stand-alone goal on the family; something that could be measurable. An example from the area of HIV from Botswana could be used. At the peak of the epidemic, there had been Ministerial Coordinators. On child rearing responsibilities, one of the major things that had happened was increased labour force participation of women but despite this, there was still a structure around the model of a male breadwinner and women as caregivers. There had to be family-friendly policies. These had to be context-specific and evidence-based.

ROSA INES FLORIANO CARRERA, Coordinator, Department of Life, Justice and Peace, Caritas, Colombia, on working against violence against women said that one of the elements that had been crucial in Colombia was what had happened to former combatants that were now being reintegrated into society. All of these former combatants were from dysfunctional families that had faced violence within the family. As an option for a country that was trying to overcome many forms of violence, there had to be particular care in looking at relationships within the family, and the use of violence in the family. There had to be work on relationships between the family so that these became fair and balanced ones. In so-doing it had been possible to tackle gender-based violence. On looking at how to include the whole family in providing solutions to ensure that members were more resilient to overcome a difficult context, when this happened, they were more equipped to overcome adversity. If public policies took into account the potential for violence in the family, changed this and set aside resources to counter it, then the society had a better chance of overcoming violence in society as a whole.

KAREN BOGENSCHNEIDER, Rothermel Bascom Professor of Human Ecology, University of Wisconsin, said that the challenge was turning family rhetoric to family reality; one approach could be to include the family as a stand-alone sustainable development goal, and another was to apply family impact analysis to each one of the sustainable development goals. This should be a subject of discussion. Another way to turn rhetoric to reality was to apply family impact analysis on policies in order to address inequalities. States should decide whether to focus on issues they agreed on and take them forward and in this research evidence could help, for example in how to get children on to a good start, or how to prepare youth for workforce success.

HIRANTI WIJEMANNE, Member of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, recalled that disadvantaged and vulnerable families were often invisible and said that family programmes in most countries, which were mainly top-down, often did not reach the most vulnerable ones. There was a need to turn those policies around and promote more family-friendly interventions which would identify those families most in need, which often did not reach out for assistance but remained entrenched in their cycles of violence or poverty. Secondly, with regard to violence, children learned about violence in their families and it was important that from a very young age children needed to be taught that there were non-violent resolutions to conflict. Families which suffered from violence needed to be identified, because many remained silent although they needed to be helped. Finally, psycho-social services needed to be made available to victims, particularly through outreach.

YVETTE STEVENS, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in Geneva and Panel Moderator, asked the panellists to comment on the question asked by many: the diversity of families and how to avoid discrimination against families that did not conform to the majority of family forms.

ASLAN KHUSEINOVICH ABASHIDZE, Member of the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, said that the current international treaties and the practices of treaty bodies were based on the fact that families were defined by States and also on broad provisions on protection and assistance provided to families by States. Article 10 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights covered very broad provisions related to the protection of the family and focused on some specific aspects such as the protection of mothers and children. The definition of the family was up to each State and if it broadened that definition, then its responsibilities also broadened; States were obliged to inform the Committee in their periodic report on what definition of the family was in that particular State.

HIRANTI WIJEMANNE, Member of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, expressed her gratitude that the delegations had highlighted the issue of children and the issue of violence, including corporal punishment, and the need to address it. Ms. Wijemanne stressed again the value of outreach and community-based family services in order to work better with the families, and ensure that the rights of family members were protected.

KAREN BOGENSCHNEIDER, Rothermel Bascom Professor of Human Ecology, University of Wisconsin, said that all agreed on the importance of the family as a building block of society and said she had heard a lot of commitment from the States. Hopefully, the States would succeed to areas of agreement and act on empowering families. Families needed a voice in policy making, and research was available to guide those efforts.

ROSA INES FLORIANO CARRERA, Coordinator, Department of Life, Justice and Peace, Caritas, Colombia, said that the recognition of the diversity of families had to be recognized, and underlined the importance for civil society organizations to identify loopholes and gaps in domestic legislation, in order to move public policies forward and offer greater guarantees to family members.