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Ben Warwick - 5th March 2018
When the private housing sector fails the State must use its resources to provide alternative housing, according to the latest case concluded by the CESCR. The Committee also makes its strongest finding of non-retrogression yet after thousands of public houses were sold off despite desperate need. The latest views issued under the individual complaints process […]
Charlotte Kelly - 4th March 2018
Connor Sparrowhawk, a young man of 18 with autism and epilepsy, was admitted to Slade House after he became increasingly agitated by changes as he prepared to leave school and transition into receiving adult social care services. Slade House was an Assessment and Treatment Unit/ Centre designed for short-term crisis management for people with learning […]
Shubhangi Agarwalla - 2nd March 2018
The death penalty needs to have significant social benefits, not attainable with the next most severe form of punishment, life imprisonment, for it to be justified. Existing arguments already show how death penalty fails this test by drawing attention to the inherent barbarity of the punishment, the arbitrary way it is inflicted and the lack […]
Vandita Khanna - 1st March 2018
In December 2017, the Supreme Court of India directed the Union Government to take adequate measures for proper and safe access to public spaces, roads, transport facilities, and movement on footpaths for visually disabled persons. The case of Rajive Rature v. Union of India and Ors is a landmark judgment for persons with disabilities, because […]
Isabel C. Jaramillo Sierra - 28th February 2018
Colombian women were granted to right to vote in 1954 and voted for the first time in 1957. Interestingly, the reform was part of the transitional package designed to overcome the civil unrest that had spilled the blood of many Colombians in the preceding five years; a period that would be later known as “La […]
Ayushi Agarwal - 28th February 2018
India’s law mandating quotas for women on the board of directors allows scope for tokenism, doesn’t facilitate retention of women and falls short of the required “critical mass”. It has therefore failed to achieve its desired objective. Much has been written about the need for and consequences of boardroom gender diversity. Many differences have been […]
Gautam Bhatia - 27th February 2018
Section 377, Indian Penal Code: Unnatural offences – Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment … This was the text introduced by Lord Macaulay in 1860 which, in one form or another, travelled through much of […]
Priyanka Sunjay - 26th February 2018
An appeal against the decision of Gujarat High Court in the case of Goolrokh Gupta v. Burjor Pardiwala is being heard by the Indian Supreme Court. To provide a brief background to the case: after the local Parsi trust refused to allow a Parsi woman—who had a non-Parsi spouse—to attend the funeral ceremony of her […]
Claudia Müller-Hoff and Carolijn Terwindt - 26th February 2018
There are many hurdles preventing victims of corporate rights abuses overseas from bringing claims in European courts against European companies and accessing an effective remedy. The claim against German retailer KiK is one of the few that “made it” to court. The KiK-case concerns a factory fire in 2012 in Ali Enterprises textile factory in […]
Surya Rajkumar - 25th February 2018
In an order dated 6/11/2017, the High Court of Gujarat described marital rape as “a disgraceful offence that has scarred the trust and confidence in the institution of marriage”, proposing to consider, through its own motion, whether a husband forcing his wife to perform oral sex constitutes an offence under the provisions of the Indian […]
Hannah Maruci - 24th February 2018
Women’s struggle to vote in Brazil: same fight, different strategies Women were first allowed to vote in Brazil in 1932, but their political rights only became equal to men’s in 1945, when the vote became compulsory for both sexes. The fight for suffrage is repeatedly neglected in Brazilian history. Women’s right to vote is often […]
Marie Tidball - 23rd February 2018
Today marks an important moment for the foregrounding of the rights of people with disabilities at Oxford. It is the inaugural Oxford University Disability Law and Policy Conference. This conference will launch the Oxford University Disability Law and Policy Project – established to generate exceptional taught courses and research in these areas. The Project also […]