ABSTRACT
The concepts of race and gender mobilise both political support and an infrastructure of organisations which are dedicated to their advancement, not least in relation to the criminal justice system. In the European Convention on Human Rights and other European documentation rules as to racial and gender equality are each understood to be straightforward questions of human rights. The US policing and security services had maintained a steady growth in personnel since the Nixon era. The point many feminist legal theorists, including Hilary Charlesworth and Nicola Lacey, continue to make is that the liberal conception of law and human rights holds to a clear demarcation between the public and the private spheres. The purpose of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was to ensure that member states prohibit discrimination against women but also that they take positive affirmative action to address issues of underlying inequality.
