Discrimination on the basis of work and descent

8 August 2002

Fifty-fourth session, 29 July – 16 August 2002
Item 5 of the Agenda

Discrimination on the basis of work and descent

Joint statement submitted by the Lutheran World Federation, International Movement Against all forms of Discrimination and Racism, and Minority Rights Group International.

The co-sponsors of this statement very much regret the fact that, due to Mr. Goonesekere not having been re-elected to the Sub-Commission, there is no expanded working paper on the topic of ‘Discrimination based on work and descent’ before the Sub-Commission in the present session, as was requested in Sub-Commission Decision 2001/110. We believe that Mr. Goonesekere has done a great service in opening up this discussion in the way that he did in his first Working Paper (E/CN.4/Sub.2/2001/16), and without him, the task that the Sub-Commission set for itself on this important issue remains incomplete. We hope and expect that another member or members of the Sub-Commission will be ready to pick up this task and fulfil it.

For it is certainly an issue that demands the attention of the human rights community. By way of example, the widely-reported incident in June this year in which a young woman was gang-raped on the orders of a Jirga or tribal council in rural Pakistan as retribution for her brother's alleged dalliance with a higher status woman has been identified as "the outcome of a caste conflict. The victim belonged to the Gujjar clan which is socially regarded to be inferior to the supposedly superior Mastoi tribe"*, from which her attackers came.

On 23 October 2000, in the village of Guthakar in Rajasthan, India, Laxman Singh was attacked by half a dozen men. The beat his legs with stones and an iron bar. His injuries and the poor medical treatment he received at the local hospital resulted in him losing both legs. He was attacked because he is a Dalit, and refused to work for higher caste villagers without pay. He would have been here to tell his own story if his application for a passport had not been refused.

Other people are here, however, to tell of the ritualized abuse of lower caste and Dalit women through the Devadasi system; of discrimination against the blacksmith castes of Nepal; of the history and social implications of casteism in Senegal; of the very similar form of discrimination suffered by the Burakumin of Japan; of the human rights violations inherent in the 'Osu' caste system of Igboland, Nigeria; and of similar practices in Niger, Somalia and Kenya. Their presence here is a small snapshot of the global dimensions of this problem. And several members of the Sub-Commission attended the CERD thematic discussion yesterday afternoon, and heard their testimonies.

The issue described by the Sub-Commission as ‘Discrimination based on work and descent’ is finally beginning to receive the attention that it had previously failed to attract in the international human rights discourse. The previous absence of attention to this issue in these forums is, frankly, difficult to understand given the nature, severity and pervasiveness of the abuses, and the truly vast numbers of persons affected.

In Durban, at the World Conference Against Racism, over 200 representatives of communities discriminated against on the basis of caste or similar social hierarchies made their demands for attention to the human rights implications of these social structures loud, clear and visible. Although the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action ultimately failed to recognize the issue even implicitly, the terminology of ‘discrimination based on work and descent’, pioneered by the Sub-Commission, was imprinted in the consciousness of every delegate there. The civil society activism surrounding this issue provoked an unprecedented, and in our submission very healthy, public debate in some of the countries most affected. These were great steps forward.

Potentially another great step forward is being taken in the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination during these very days. On 8-9 August, the Committee is convening a thematic discussion on ‘discrimination on the ground of descent’. It is under the ‘descent’ limb of the definition of ‘racial discrimination’ in Article 1(1) of the International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination that the Committee has since 1996 addressed caste-based discrimination in India, Nepal and Bangladesh, and the very similar form of discrimination against the Burakumin of Japan. And on 6-7 August, the Committee has shown an inclination to extend its jurisprudence in this area by raising numerous questions concerning caste-based discrimination in Senegal in the course of its review of that country’s periodic report currently before the Committee.

With their different mandates and possibilities, the Sub-Commission and the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination have complementary roles to play in addressing this huge and dauntingly complex issue. Whilst the Committee’s mandate is monitoring and promoting the implementation of the specific provisions of the Convention, and interpreting those provisions, the Sub-Commission has a somewhat freer hand in the discussions and analysis it can undertake. On the other hand, the Committee is the formal custodian of a legal instrument of binding effect, and of standards against which States Parties are regularly called to account.

We encourage both bodies to liaise with each other on the critical next steps that must be taken in these discussions. We urge you to find ways of complementing each other and efficiently deploying your respective capacities in the cause of the promotion and protection of the human rights of some of humanity's most severely and routinely marginalized communities.

* Zubeida Mustafa, Opinion, 'Dawn' newspaper, 8 July 2002