ABSTRACT
In international politics, the global spread of violent intergroup conflict has raised alarming questions about the relevance and effectiveness of a human rights-based approach to conflict resolution between culturally diverse actors. The concept of human rights itself is a historically circumscribed and context-bound phenomenon. No social group has suffered greater violation of its human rights in the name of culture than women. The international human rights movement cannot avoid reiterating at the policy level its conceptual gender biases, notably its relentless focus on the public sphere as the primary site of violations, its pronatalist treatment of gender and the family, and its organizing principle of intergovernmental interaction. Cultural sensitivity in the international arena is important; it is equally important to retain our awareness of intracommunity gender oppression and, in so doing, fully articulate the painful coexistence of multiple oppressions. Culture's reconstitutions have taken several ironic turns over the centuries.
