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Missed Connections in the U.N. Agenda: Applying the Women, Peace and Security Framework to the Feminization of Poverty
Women, Peace and Security, a multifaceted agenda intended to address the particular ways in which conflict affects women, has been on the United Nations agenda since the landmark Security Council Resolution 1325 passed in 2000. The unequal burden of poverty on women, a phenomenon that has been coined “the feminization of poverty,” has been on the United Nations agenda for even longer, since the 1995 Beijing Conference on Women. Yet, despite the fact that poverty and inequality both cause and result in conflict in a violent cycle, the problem of the feminization of poverty has not been integrated into the United Nation’s Women, Peace and Security agenda at large. This Note argues that the eradication of the gendered impact of poverty must be a central goal of the Women, Peace and Security agenda: first, to ensure the full enjoyment of women’s human rights, and second, because an agenda for peace can only be achieved by increasing gender equality and women’s political participation. This point is demonstrated through an analysis of the current system of international peacebuilding, which relies heavily on international financial institutions and perpetuates a neoliberal economy, to the detriment of both peace and women’s rights. This Note concludes that applying the framework of the four pillars of Women, Peace and Security (participation, protection, prevention, and post-conflict relief and recovery) can disrupt the cycles that perpetuate conflict and deny women equality, opportunity, and adequate living conditions.The Preservation of the Separate Spheres Doctrine in Congress and the Federal Courts
In Bradwell v. State, an 1872 decision upholding an Illinois law prohibiting women from practicing law, the United States Supreme Court reasoned that the law was justified because women belonged in the “domestic sphere.” While today’s sex-based workplace exclusions are not as explicit as they once were, women still face barriers to remaining in the workforce and advancing in the workplace despite the existence of major federal legislation in the areas of pregnancy discrimination and family leave policy. Congress passed the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) in 1978 to stop pregnancy discrimination, but the PDA has not come close to eliminating pregnancy discrimination. Similarly, despite Congress’s passing of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) in 1993, ineffective family leave policy continues to hinder women’s ability to balance work and their disproportionate family caregiving obligations. After tracing the development of sex-based workplace exclusions from the 1870s through the 1970s, this Note argues that the PDA and FMLA prohibited explicit sex-based workplace exclusions while preserving other forms of sex-based workplace exclusions. This Note then analyzes proposed work-family legislation and argues that policies aimed at eliminating sex-based workplace exclusions must account for the specific experiences of women while promoting anti-stereotyping principles.Right to Informed Consent, Right to a Doula: An Evidence-Based Solution to the Black Maternal Mortality Crisis in the United States
This Note seeks to build on existing research about how to improve childbirth in the United States for women, particularly for Black women, given the United States’ extremely high maternal mortality rate. Through examining the history and characteristics of American and Western childbirth, it seeks to explore how the current birth framework contributes to maternal mortality. To fight this ongoing harm, I suggest increasing access to doulas— nonmedical support workers who provide “continuous support” to the birthing person. Through this Note I seek to build on the research of others by identifying the ways medicalized birth practices fail women, particularly Black women, and possible solutions to this crisis. To that end, I examine the pathologization of childbirth, paternalism in medicine, and how the history of early gynecologists’ experimentation on enslaved Black women reverberates in the context of birth today, as both a cause of ongoing medical racism and paternalism, and as a symptom of misogyny, misogynoir, and racism. Furthermore, this Note builds on existing work in this field by suggesting a solution that has become more popular in recent years: the use of doulas to improve labor and childbirth. I identify why doulas are such an excellent tool to combat the current issues that plague women’s pregnancy and births in this country, specifically against a backdrop of how medical paternalism, racism, and the law have hamstrung women’s ability to safely birth. Finally, I suggest a workable solution to increase the usage of doulas by women who most need support: adding doulas to the “maternity and newborn care” essential health benefit, one of ten essential health benefits private insurers are required to cover under the ACA.Title IX and “Menstruation or Related Conditions”
Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 (“Title IX”) prohibits sex discrimination in educational programs or activities receiving federal financial assistance. Neither the statute nor its implementing regulations explicitly define “sex” to include discrimination on the basis of menstruation or related conditions such as perimenopause and menopause. This textual absence has caused confusion over whether Title IX must be interpreted to protect students and other community members from all types of sex-based discrimination. It also calls into question the law’s ability to break down systemic sex-based barriers related to menstruation in educational spaces. Absent an interpretation that there is explicit Title IX coverage, menstruation will continue to cause some students to miss instruction. Other students may be denied access to a menstrual product or a restroom as needed and face health consequences. They also may be teased and bullied after menstrual blood visibly leaks onto their clothes. Employees, who are also covered by Title IX, may be fired for damaging school property as a result of such leaks.1 People in perimenopause may be denied reasonable modifications like bathroom access, water, or temperature control. Collectively, this creates an educational system that prevents students, faculty, or employees from fully participating in educational institutions and causes harm.Constructing Race and Gender in Modern Rape Law: The Abandoned Category of Black Female Victims
Despite the successes of the 1960s Anti-Rape Movement, modern state rape statutes continue to prioritize white male perspectives and perceptions of race, ultimately ignoring the intersectional identity of Black women and leaving these victims without legal protection. This Note examines rape law’s history of allocating agency along gendered and racialized lines through statutory construction and other discursive techniques. Such legal constructions both uphold and cultivate the white victim/Black assailant rape dyad primarily by making the Black male the “ultimate” and most feared assailant. Rape law’s adherence to a white baseline sustains stereotypes of Black men as criminals and predators, which ultimately relegates Black women to a category of lesser and undeserving victims. Re-focusing rape reform and feminist movements on Black female experiences, as well as a rhetorical restructuring of rape laws, can improve rape law uniformity and remove white normativity standards. A departure from the current rhetorical and realized white baseline can eliminate rape law’s delineations of femininity that silence women of color.Making Mandates Last: Increasing Female Representation on Corporate Boards in the U.S.
A lack of female representation on corporate boards has plagued our country for decades. Until a few years ago, there was not a single state or federal regulation that required corporations to fill board seats with female directors. Instead, the federal government talked around the issue. In 2010, the SEC established an optional reporting structure for corporations to communicate their hiring practices, but did little else. With no national plan in place, many states implemented legislation that urged corporations to hire female directors. But this legislation barely moved the needle. The country needed a mandate. And in 2018, California implemented the first one – SB 826. SB 826 required each publicly held corporation with executive offices in California to place specific numbers of women on its board, depending on the board’s size. The private sector quickly followed, with institutions such as Goldman Sachs and Nasdaq announcing that in order to receive funding or list on its exchange, corporations must have at least one female director. After SB 826 was enacted, the number of women on California boards more than doubled. And many states are now using SB 826 as a model to enact similar bills. But while SB 826 saw few legal challenges overall, in May 2022, it was overturned under California’s Equal Protection Clause. Even if this decision is appealed, states looking to follow California’s lead should be cautious of another threat to such a mandate’s longevity – the internal affairs doctrine. The internal affairs doctrine is a conflict of laws principle that establishes that the state law of incorporation governs a company’s internal affairs. More than half of the corporations in the U.S. are incorporated in Delaware, leaving state statutes highly vulnerable to being rendered ineffective. It is clear that mandates work. But when mandates are put in place, they should stay in place. In this Note, I propose two alternative solutions [to the female representation problem] that would increase female participation on corporate boards. First, even if Equal Protection challenges ultimately fail, rather than relying on sporadic state statutes, stakeholders should pressure Delaware to enact a corporate code that would mandate female representation on corporate boards. Second, to circumvent Equal Protection challenges altogether, the private sector should expand its mandates to consider the number of female directors in relation to the size of each board, similarly to SB 826.Gentlewomen of the Jury
This Article undertakes a contemporary assessment of the role of women on the jury. In 1946, at a time when few women served on U.S. juries, the all-male Supreme Court opined in Ballard v. United States: “The truth is that the two sexes are not fungible; a community made up exclusively of one is different from a community composed of both; the subtle interplay of influence of one on the other is among the imponderables.” Three-quarters of a century later, women’s legal and social status has changed dramatically, with increased participation in the labor force, expanded leadership roles, and the removal of legal and other barriers to their civic engagement, including jury service. Theoretical developments and research have produced new insights about how genderconforming individuals enact their gender roles. We combine these insights with a substantial body of jury research that has examined the effects of jurors’ gender on their decision-making processes and verdict preferences in criminal and civil cases. We also consider how nonbinary and gender-nonconforming individuals might bring distinctive perspectives and experiences to the jury. After a review of the historical record, describing shifts over time in women’s jury participation in the face of legal and societal barriers, we summarize evidence from decision-making research, gender scholarship, and jury studies to examine whether women bring a different voice to jury service. Our review, which demonstrates substantial commonalities as well as significant areas of divergence in jurors’ attitudes and verdicts as a function of their gender, altogether underscores the importance of full and equitable participation on the jury.Gender and Corporate Crime: Do Women on the Board of Directors Reduce Corporate Bad Behavior?
Public debate on mandating gender representation on boards of directors in the United States is close to a boiling point. California introduced a mandatory quota in 2018 only to see it constitutionally disqualified in 2022, and the Nasdaq Stock Market followed suit with new diversity rules in 2021 for all corporations listed on the exchange. While public discourse focuses on corporate performance, not much is known about the link between gender diversity and corporate normative obedience. In this study we explore the relationship between boardroom gender representation and corporate compliance with the law. We examine the impact of gender diversity on corporate obedience in a sample of 660 public corporations. Our findings indicate that gender diversity has a substantial positive impact on corporate compliance. Notably, every one percent increase in female representation on the board is associated with at least a four percent decrease in the probability that the corporation will be associated with a violation of the law. The key contributions of this Article to the literature are threefold: First, the findings of this Article call for an empirical reevaluation of gendered theories of female white-collar offenders. Second, this Article adds a unique perspective to the broad discussion of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) aspects of corporate purpose. Third, this Article sheds innovative light on the discussion about corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the means to enhance it.Critical Race Feminism, Health, and Restorative Practices in Schools: Centering the Experiences of Black and Latina Girls
Restorative practices (RP) in K-12 schools in the United States have grown exponentially since the early 1990s. Developing against a backdrop of systemic racism, RP has become embedded in education practice and policy to counteract the harmful and persistent patterns of disparities in school discipline experienced by students of color. Within this legal, social, and political context, the empirical evidence that has been gathered on school-based restorative justice has framed and named RP as a behavioral intervention aimed at reducing discipline incidents—that is, an “alternative” to punitive and exclusionary practices. While this view of RP is central to dismantling discriminatory systems, we argue it reflects an unnecessarily limited understanding of its potential and has generated unintended consequences in the field of RP research. First, the reactive RP model of analysis focuses more exclusively on behavioral change, rather than systemic improvement, to address discipline disparities. Second, RP research has insufficiently examined the potential role of RP in achieving health justice. Third, RP research too rarely engages in intersectional analyses that critically examine gendered racism. This study is intended as a course correction. Building on the work of legal scholars, public health researchers, sociologists, restorative justice practitioners, and our own prior work, this original study is the first to examine non-disciplinary RP through a critical race feminist lens, and—just as importantly—a public health praxis. Our findings reveal that the interplay between RP and adolescent health, race, and gender can no longer be overlooked. Proactive non-disciplinary RP was found to promote supportive school environments that enhance five key protective health factors for Black and Latina girls. Additionally, results indicate that RP improved the mental health and wellbeing of Black and Latina girls, building fundamental resilience skills that can help overcome the complex array of social structures that serve to disempower and disenfranchise girls and harm their educational and health outcomes.Litigation, Referendum or Legislation? The Road to Becoming the First in Asia to Institutionalize Same-Sex Marriage
In the pursuit of same-sex marriage, advocates in each country evaluate the appropriate decision-making process for addressing this highly disputed issue—litigation, legislation, or referendum. The choice may be partially based on the institutional advantages of each approach, but more importantly, the choice is also conditioned by the legal and political context of each country, such as the authority of the court, the framing of public opinion, and the dynamics between movement and countermovement. Uniquely, all three decision-making processes are involved in the course of the institutionalization of same-sex marriage in Taiwan. This Article, focusing on the experience in Taiwan, examines the approaches and factors that influence the conceptualization and realization of marriage equality, and to what extent the court can be involved in the process of major social reforms. At first glance, the polarizing events subsequent to the Taiwan Constitutional Court’s (TCC) decision seem to reflect the judicial backlash thesis, which suggests that court intervention is counterproductive, as it engenders political resistance. However, this Article argues that the way the TCC adjudicated may actually be a workable alternative approach for other courts to introduce same-sex marriage. In particular, the combination of a “remedial period” for the legislature and “supplemental judicial law-making” allows the courts to facilitate substantial social change while ensuring more democratic deliberation.