English - CEDAW Southeast Asia

A Gendered and Rights-Based Review of Vietnamese Legal Documents through the Lens of CEDAW
V.3 SOCIAL AND CULTURAL PATTERNS OF CONDUCT
(Article 5 of CEDAW)
V.3.1 OBLIGATIONS UNDER CEDAW
V.3.1.1 Text of CEDAW
ARTICLE 5
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures:
(a) To modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women, with a view to
achieving the elimination of prejudices and customary and all other practices which are
based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped
roles for men and women;
(b) To ensure that family education includes a proper understanding of maternity as a
social function and the recognition of the common responsibility of men and women in
the upbringing and development of their children, it being understood that the interest
of the children is the primordial consideration in all cases.
Article 5 of CEDAW must be read with Article 2(f) of CEDAW at all times because they are
interrelated. To recall, Article 2(f) provides that States Parties undertake to “take all appropriate
measures, including legislation, to modify or abolish existing laws, regulations, customs
and practices which constitute discrimination against women…”
V.3.1.2 General Recommendations
The following excerpts from GRs are relevant to Article 5 of CEDAW:
GR 19: Violence against Women
Paragraph 11
Traditional attitudes by which women are regarded as subordinate to men or as having
stereotyped roles perpetuate widespread practices involving violence or coercion, such
as family violence and abuse, forced marriage, dowry deaths, acid attacks and female
circumcision. Such prejudices and practices may justify gender based violence as a
form of protection or control of women. The effect of such violence on the physical and
mental integrity of women is to deprive them of the equal enjoyment, exercise and
knowledge of human rights and fundamental freedoms. While this comment addresses
mainly actual or threatened violence the underlying consequences of these forms of
gender based violence help to maintain women in subordinate roles and contribute to
their low level of political participation and to their lower level of education, skills and
work opportunities.
135
Paragraph 12
These attitudes also contribute to the propagation of pornography and the depiction and
other commercial exploitation of women as sexual objects, rather than as individuals.
This in turn contributes to gender based violence.
Social and cultural patterns of conduct (Article 5 of CEDAW)