Lacking a Human Rights Framework: Sexual Assault on U.S. College Campuses

• In Event: 097 - Section on Human Rights Roundtables (one-hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 05. Human Rights and Gendered Violence

Abstract

In the past few years, a nationwide conversation has emerged about the culture surrounding rape and especially concerning the widespread occurrence and mishandling of sexual assault cases on college campuses in the United States. New York Magazine has dubbed it, “a revolution against sexual assault on campus.” Survivors have come forward to share their stories, including the variety of ways in which their cases have been grossly mishandled by university officials and police. They have filed federal complaints against their universities based on violations of Title IX, a document that protects students against discrimination based on sex, and they have created organizations to help other survivors file complaints. Within this larger discourse however, survivors, activists and institutions have not engaged in a discourse about the human rights implications of campus sexual assault or a solution that involves the human rights community. Even though sexual assault, a form of sexual violence and gender discrimination, has been declared a human rights issue, a human rights orientation is missing here. There may be a variety of reasons for this including, lack of a human rights consciousness by U.S. college women and activists, the belief that local solutions are more promising than global solutions, the United States’ reluctance to sign and/or ratify relevant human rights documents, and the differences in importance of certain kinds of rape for the global human rights regime.

Author

• Allison Nobles, University of Minnesota