The Health Rights of Women Assessment Instrument (HeRWAI) 2006
Author: Womens UN Report Network
Date: January 22, 2006
New publication:
The Health Rights of Women
Assessment Instrument (HeRWAI)
2006
HeRWAI
is a practical tool for organizations that want to bring a human rights approach
into practice. It contains practical guidance for a rights based analysis of the
influence of a policy on women’s health rights. Through a HeRWAI analysis,
organizations can link what actually happens with what should happen according
to the human rights obligations of a country. The analysis includes local,
national and international influences and is based on the norms set by CEDAW and
ICESCR. It results in practical recommendations and an action plan to lobby for
implementation of the recommendations.
HeRWAI is designed
for NGOs, in particular women’s organizations, health organizations and human
rights organizations. It helps them in a practical way in their advocacy to make
governments accountable for the implementation of women’s health
rights.
The purpose of the
HeRWAI impact assessment is to produce arguments which can be used to lobby for
policies that improve the implementation of women’s health rights. Using HeRWAI
to analyse a policy should help to:
– make a direct link
between the policy and relevant human rights
issues;
– gain a better
understanding of the current situation;
– make an assessment
of the human rights impact of the policy, both now and in the
future;
– form a conclusion
about what the government should do and what the organization can do to press
the government into action.
HeRWAI is developed
by the Humanist Committee on Human Rights, in close cooperation with Naripokkho
in
the Federation of Women Lawyers in
(FIDA-Kenya),
Servicio Integral
para la Mujer (Si Mujer) in Nicaragua, International Women’s Rights Action Watch
– Asia Pacific (IWRAW-AP) in Malaysia and Wemos in the Netherlands. It is an
innovative instrument because:
-
It provides a practical tool for
rights based analysis -
It enables NGOs to analyse
national as well as international human rights
responsibilities -
It integrates women’s rights
(CEDAW) and health rights (ICESCR) -
It creates an additional way for
NGOs to use Human Rights treaties
Four organizations
in
and the
tested HeRWAI. The organizations concluded that HeRWAI is a strategic tool to
enhance their lobby activities. The instrument is user friendly; the users do
not need to be a researcher to do the analysis. The organizations valued the
link between health rights, women’s rights and human rights and noted that it is
good to have international law (commitments) as a starting point in the
discussion with the government. The instrument made them think of issues they
would not have thought of otherwise and look at issues from different angles.
Moreover, the rights based questions they asked created awareness among policy
makers and others whom they approach to collect
information.
The tool itself is
largely self-explanatory. However, most organizations are not familiar with this
way of working. HOM therefore aims to support organizations that start working
with HeRWAI. For more information please contact s.bakker@hom.nl
http://www.hom.nl/publicaties/HeRWAI%20def05%20totaal.pdf
To order hard
copies of HeRWAI, contact HOM at info@hom.nl.
================================================================
To
leave the list, send your request by email to:
wunrn_listserve-request@lists.wunrn.com. Thank you.
Categories: Releases