A/HRC/38/46 reality (see E/CN.6/2015/3), but women’s hard-fought achievements now risk being reversed. An unprecedented pushback has been progressing across regions by an alliance of conservative political ideologies and religious fundamentalisms. Retrogressions have been occurring, often in the name of culture, religion and traditions, and threaten the hard-fought progress in achieving women’s equality. 2. Deadlocks, retrogressions and backlashes Family and culture 25. In its reports, the Working Group has demonstrated the persistence of a global discriminatory cultural construction of gender, often tied to religion, and the continued reliance of States on cultural justifications for adopting discriminatory laws or for failing to respect international human rights law and standards. It has particularly emphasized that failure to ensure the equality of women and girls within the family undermines any attempt to ensure their equality in all areas of society (see A/HRC/29/40). 26. Throughout its work, the Working Group has shown that discrimination against women and girls and the backlash against their rights all too often start in the family where, for example, women and girls are undervalued, may be limited to certain roles, experience harmful practices and patriarchal oppression, and suffer other human rights abuses, including domestic violence and sexual abuse. As indicated by the Working Group, although discriminatory laws governing family life have been repealed in most countries, such laws are still in force in a few others (ibid.). In some countries, women are deprived of their fundamental rights due to, inter alia, a lower minimum age of marriage for girls, guardianship systems, forced marriage, polygamous marriage, discrimination in nationality rights, divorce rights and unequal rights to custody, inheritance and access to property and land. In the name of perceived honour, purity and tradition, girls and women are subject to “honour” killing, child marriage,8 widowhood rites and female genital mutilation,9 among other violations of their rights. In some regions, there has been no progress at all towards eliminating child marriage.10 27. Within the United Nations system, the Working Group has observed that States have misused references to culture, religion and family in an effort to dilute their international obligations to fulfil women’s rights and achieve gender equality. One extremely revealing fact is the high number of reservations to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, particularly to article 16 on equality in the family, 11 in which States deny women’s and girls’ right to equality in deference to religious norms, and refute their accountability for the universal applicability of human rights (see A/HRC/29/40). This also shows that equality in the private domain — the family — remains one of the biggest hurdles to achieving gender equality. 28. Under the guise of protecting the family, some States are taking initiatives aimed at further diluting human rights. While recognizing that the family is the fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection, the Working Group insists on the need to reassert women’s right to equality in all aspects of family life and to recognize that diverse forms of family exist. Protection of the family cannot be used as a justification for laws, policies or practices that would deny women and girls their full and equal human rights (ibid.). The advancement of women and girls depends on the recognition in law and in practice of their right to equality as members of communities and families. 29. As the Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights has highlighted, diverse religious fundamentalists often work together tactically at the international level to thwart advances in women’s human rights. She has also observed that enabling women’s enjoyment 8 9 10 11 See www.girlsnotbrides.org/what-is-the-impact/. See www.unfpa.org/female-genital-mutilation. See www.unicef.org/media/media_102783.html. See www.universal-rights.org/urg-policy-reports/march-universality-religion-based-reservationscore-un-human-rights-treaties-tell-us-human-rights-religion-universality-21st-century/. 7