Forty-five years after its entry into force, and with the adoption of General Recommendation No. 41 on gender stereotypes, can the CEDAW Committee confront gender backlash without reproducing the narratives it aims to dismantle?<\/p>\n
On 3 September 1981, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women<\/u><\/a> (CEDAW) entered into force. With 189 state parties<\/u><\/a>, the \u201cinternational bill of rights for women\u201d is the third most ratified human rights treaty. But it turns 45 in a hostile climate. In 2024, the UN Working Group on discrimination against women and girls (WGDAWG) warned<\/u><\/a> of an escalating backlash against gender equality, reaching extreme proportions in some states, including gender apartheid. It defined<\/u><\/a> backlash as the \u201cdenial of the recognition, enforcement and realization of women\u2019s and girls\u2019 rights, or retrogression in that regard\u201d (para. 11). In 2025, it added<\/u><\/a> that the backlash targets the very concept of gender, driven by transnational movements against so-called \u201cgender ideology\u201d (para. 2).<\/p>\n The Committee’s response has been double-edged. It has confronted backlash in Afghanistan<\/u><\/a> to Argentina<\/u><\/a> and Iraq<\/u><\/a> while elements of its practice have echoed its language. Tracing the Committee\u2019s work from 2022 to the adoption of General Recommendation No. 41 (GR41) on gender stereotypes in October 2026 reveals not a linear story of regression and correction. GR41 recognizes organized backlash and reinforces transformative equality, providing a foundation for further developing states’ obligations. If CEDAW is to lead the response to gender backlash, the Committee must consistently build upon its evolving normative framework without retreating from the progress it has already made.<\/p>\n Forty-Five Years of Growth and Blind Spots<\/strong><\/p>\n CEDAW\u2019s strength has always been its capacity to respond to changing circumstances. The CEDAW Committee described<\/u><\/a> the Convention as a \u201cdynamic instrument\u201d (para. 3), whose content has been progressively clarified since its adoption. For instance, although the Convention was initially silent on violence against women, the Committee later clarified<\/u><\/a> that gender-based violence \u201cis a form of discrimination that seriously inhibits women\u2019s ability to enjoy rights and freedoms on a basis of equality with men\u201d (para. 1). Furthermore, it likewise clarified<\/u><\/a> that discrimination against women encompasses both sex- and gender-based discrimination (para. 5). It also recognised that this discrimination is inextricably linked to other factors such as race, class, sexual orientation and gender identity (para. 18).<\/p>\n This dynamic reading is consistent with the general rule of treaty interpretation. Article 31(1) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) requires<\/u><\/a> a treaty to be interpreted in light of its object and purpose, allowing CEDAW to address emerging and resurgent discrimination, despite anti-gender resistance.<\/p>\n On the other hand, the Convention\u2019s growth has been uneven. Some women waited decades for it to see them. For example, while LBTI women advocated their rights since the 1990s, the Committee explicitly mentioned<\/u><\/a>\u00a0 that LBTI women are rights holders under the Convention only in 2022 (para. 9.7). Which women CEDAW sees and when, has partly reflected the Committee\u2019s own blind spots.<\/p>\n Echoing the Backlash<\/strong><\/p>\n In its 2022 concluding observations on Portugal, the Committee noted with concern<\/u><\/a> \u201cthe gradual dilution of the concept of \u2018sex\u2019 and its replacement by the concept of \u2018gender\u2019 across policies and legislation\u201d (para. 18). It recommended \u201cavoiding the broad use of the concept of \u2018gender\u2019 when addressing the rights of women\u201d (para. 19). This framing sits<\/u><\/a> uneasily with the Committee\u2019s own practice, which recognises the interconnected nature of sex- and gender-based discrimination. Said concluding observation on Portugal reflects the anti-gender movement\u2019s core aim to displace gender or erase sex in treaty-body language. It also sits against the rest of the same document, which calls for \u201ca gender perspective\u201d in sexuality education (para. 29c) and uses the term \u201cgender-based violence\u201d throughout. The inconsistency exposes an unresolved tension in the Committee\u2019s own use of the terms sex and gender.<\/p>\n A year later, the Committee reviewed<\/u><\/a> Germany, Spain, and Iceland, all of which had adopted or proposed laws on legal gender recognition based on self-identification. The dialogues and concluding observations show how the same framing entered the Committee’s texts.<\/p>\n In the dialogue with Germany, a Committee member asked<\/u><\/a> whether the proposed self-determination law protected \u201cbiological women\u2019s\u201d right to privacy and their right to take part in sporting events without having to compete against \u201cbiological males\u201d (para. 25). This is the vocabulary of gender-critical campaigns, down to the word \u201cbiological\u201d. The concluding observations then recommended<\/u><\/a> that the law\u2019s evaluation be expanded to assess its impact on \u201cthe rights of all stakeholders in the state party, including women and girls\u201d (para. 16).<\/p>\n With their dialogue with Spain, another Committee member raised<\/u><\/a> the concern against\u00a0 self-identification through child protection and the age of consent (para. 25). While the concluding observations welcomed<\/u><\/a> Law No. 4\/2023 as a \u201cpositive aspect\u201d (para. 4b), it proceeded to list its recommendation concerning the law under the sub-heading \u201cDiscriminatory laws\u201d (para. 11). There, it recommended assessing the law\u2019s impact on \u201cthe rights of all stakeholders, including women and girls\u201d (para. 12).<\/p>\n Iceland\u2019s review followed a similar line. A Committee member asked<\/u><\/a> whether the 2019 Act on Gender Autonomy would affect \u201csafe spaces reserved for females only\u201d, such as shelters, and whether affirmative action for women included trans women, \u201cand if so, why that was the case\u201d (paras. 30, 43). The concluding observations did not take up<\/u><\/a> this line of questioning but recommended assessing the impact of Iceland\u2019s gender-neutral legislation \u201con the availability of safe spaces for women and on data collection\u201d (para. 14b).<\/p>\n The wording may appear neutral. But it closely tracks a framing advanced by the Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem. In the same session, she met informally with the Committee to inter alia discuss<\/u><\/a> gender self-identification and access to \u201csex-based and gender-based safe spaces\u201d (Part 1 Chapter II Section E para. 12). She later developed<\/u><\/a> her position paper on the definition of a \u201cwoman\u201d as \u201cbiological females\u201d. Eventually, she published<\/u><\/a> a report on \u201csex-based violence\u201d (para. 4, 15, 21), which strips trans women of the category of \u201cwomen\u201d altogether. This contradicts the Committee\u2019s own position, which \u2013 in a concluding observation on Costa Rica \u2013 called<\/u><\/a> for respecting transgender women\u2019s \u201cautonomy, self-determination and legal recognition of their gender identity\u201d (para. 42). Yet some of CEDAW\u2019s own remarks and recommendations on trans rights echo Reem\u2019s language.<\/p>\n These formulations reproduce the discourse the WGDAWG identifies as driving gender backlash: the portrayal of gender as being in tension with the protection of women\u2019s rights.<\/p>\n However, they should not be read as a unified institutional turn. The Committee is composed<\/u><\/a> of 23 independent experts serving in their personal capacity, drawn from different legal traditions and holding different views on sex and gender. Questions raised in dialogues are those of individual members; concluding observations are negotiated texts adopted collectively. Any inconsistencies are best understood as the visible trace of that internal disagreement. Yet, once adopted, concluding observations speak with the authority of the Committee. A framing that enters the room as one member\u2019s question can leave it as the Committee\u2019s recommendation. Like this, it confronts the backlash and lends it authority at the same time.<\/p>\n Naming and Confronting the Backlash<\/strong><\/p>\n In the same period, however, the Committee has also shown CEDAW at its most useful, confronting very different manifestations of gender backlash.<\/p>\n In Afghanistan, the backlash transformed<\/u><\/a> into a system of rule. At its 91st session in June 2025, the Committee became the first UN treaty body to\u00a0 Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover. It documented<\/u><\/a> a systematic pattern of gender persecution that had erased women from public life \u201cin a system that may constitute gender apartheid\u201d (para. 13). Further, it stressed that gender apartheid should be recognized under international criminal law (para. 14). By using the concept, the Committee added its authority to calls<\/u><\/a> for its inclusion in the negotiated Crimes Against Humanity Treaty.<\/p>\n In Argentina, the gender backlash takes form through institutional dismantling. Under President Javier Milei, the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity was abolished<\/u><\/a>. Additionally, a range of gender-equality institutions and programmes were dismantled, reduced or defunded. In its February 2026 review, the Committee raised<\/u><\/a> concerns about the regression in women\u2019s rights institutions, cuts to programmes addressing gender-based violence, the weakening of comprehensive sexuality education and adolescent pregnancy prevention. It called on<\/u><\/a> Argentina to ensure that legislative and executive measures remain compatible with the Convention and do not result in retrogression (para. 11a). By treating these developments as questions of state obligation and retrogression, the Committee showed how CEDAW can respond to forms of backlash its drafters could scarcely have anticipated.<\/p>\n Iraq shows backlash operating through both law and language. In its February 2026 review, the Committee noted with concern<\/u><\/a> a 2023 directive replacing the term “gender” with “justice between the sexes”, alongside school curricula portraying the Convention as incompatible with family and societal values (para. 25b), and discriminatory laws justified through religious doctrine (para. 30c). By this, Iraq shows that disputes over words like “gender” are not merely semantic.<\/p>\n Now: GR 41 and the Choice Ahead<\/strong><\/p>\n CEDAW cannot fully respond to gender backlash while reproducing some of the framings the backlash itself perpetuates. Greater consistency is necessary. Three steps could help.<\/p>\n First, the Committee should articulate more clearly what gender backlash is and how the Convention requires states to respond. That account should be intersectional. Backlash does not affect all women the same way. It frequently targets those facing intersecting forms of discrimination. Also, it increasingly targets the concept of gender itself, despite gender having long formed part of the Committee\u2019s interpretation of the Convention.<\/p>\n Second, the Committee should consistently apply the transformative approach to equality reinforced in its recently adopted<\/u><\/a> General Recommendation No. 41 (GR41) on gender stereotypes. While GR41 explicitly recognizes organized gender backlash and democratic regression (para. 6), it does not articulate specific recommendations to prevent or reverse such regression. The Committee should therefore translate its transformative framework into clearer state obligations to prevent retrogression, safeguard existing protections, and dismantle the structural conditions that sustain gender backlash.<\/p>\n Furthermore, the Committee’s explicit recognition of discrimination and violence against lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LBTI) women in GR41 (para. 22) is welcome. Yet CEDAW should also extend its protection to nonbinary and gender-diverse persons. GR41 recognizes that gender stereotypes have individual and collective impacts extending beyond women and girls to LBTI individuals (para. 14). Rigid gender norms harm nonbinary and gender-diverse persons through the same structures of inequality that constrain women. This recognition should inform a more inclusive interpretation of the Convention’s protections. Under Article 31(3)(c) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, CEDAW’s interpretation should also be informed<\/u><\/a> by relevant international human rights law, including the CRPD Committee’s 2026 Guidelines on addressing intersectional discrimination against women and girls with disabilities, which expressly includes<\/u><\/a> transgender, intersex, nonbinary and other gender-diverse persons with disabilities (para. 5) within their scope. These developments offer a foundation for further clarifying CEDAW’s inclusive and transformative interpretation.<\/p>\n Beyond this, while GR41 expressly recognizes states’ obligations to regulate and hold non-state actors accountable for perpetuating gender stereotypes (paras. 40\u201341), this provides an opportunity to further articulate the extraterritorial dimensions of these obligations. Article 2(e) of CEDAW\u00a0<\/a>requires<\/u><\/a> states to eliminate discrimination by \u201cany person, organization or enterprise\u201d, while the Committee\u00a0<\/a>elaborated<\/u><\/a> (paras. 9\u201313) states’ due diligence obligations concerning private conduct. Much of today’s backlash is\u00a0<\/a>driven<\/u><\/a> by transnational anti-gender campaigns, increasingly amplified through digital platforms. Building on GR41, the Committee could clarify how states’ obligations apply to transnational corporate activities, including measures to assess and mitigate the amplification of discriminatory stereotypes while safeguarding freedom of expression in accordance with the principles of legality, necessity and proportionality.<\/p>\n Third, the Committee should apply the same standard to its own practice. Consistency cannot mean unanimity among 23 independent experts. It can, however, mean shared discipline in the texts the Committee adopts: terminology in concluding observations aligned with its own general recommendations, and closer scrutiny so that framings raised by individual members in dialogue are not carried into recommendations that contradict the Committee\u2019s established interpretation.<\/p>\n 45 years after CEDAW entered into force, the Convention\u2019s continued evolution is a necessity if it is to address contemporary forms of discrimination against women. Its her<\/em>story shows that evolution is essential to fulfilling its promise of meaningful equality. The Committee\u2019s authority in confronting gender backlash will depend, in part, on ensuring that its own practice does not retreat from that progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Forty-five years after its entry into force, and with the adoption of General Recommendation No. 41 on gender stereotypes, can the CEDAW Committee confront gender backlash without reproducing the narratives it aims to dismantle? On 3 September 1981, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) entered into force. With […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6639],"tags":[3857,7773,8146],"authors":[7965],"article-categories":[6000],"doi":[],"class_list":["post-30197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-gender","tag-gender-and-law","tag-transrights","authors-vashti-ortego","article-categories-article"],"acf":{"subline":"Resisting the Gender Backlash, Including Its Own"},"meta_box":{"doi":"10.17176\/20261102-132837-0"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30197"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30201,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30197\/revisions\/30201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30197"},{"taxonomy":"authors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/authors?post=30197"},{"taxonomy":"article-categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-categories?post=30197"},{"taxonomy":"doi","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/voelkerrechtsblog.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/doi?post=30197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}