Ruth B. Cowan, Creator and Executive Producer
January 6, 2012
The Final Prize; My Life in the Anti-Apartheid Struggle written by Norman Levy, has just been published. The author, effectively integrating biography and history, was engaged in opposing apartheid from the mid 1940's to the 1990's. In 1956 he, along with 155 others, was tried for treason in the apartheid government's effort to suppress the opposition movement. The trial was, after five greling years, dismissed as a result of prosecutorial incompetence. He was later held under the 90 Day Detention Law and in 1965 was tried and imprisoned. Norman Levy's account is riveting and beautifully written.
When I am asked, as I frequently am, about the status of democacy in South Africa, I quote Norman Levy's final paragraph:
" There is still much work to be done and our political culture has yet to match our liberal constitution. After 16 years of democracy the euphoria of liberation remains, but it is marred by contradictions that in our innocence we did not contemplate. For all our imaginings of a new society and a harmonious rainbow nation, these are ideals still in the making. There is no promised land, no earthly paradise, only the imperfect place we ourselves create and the vision we have to change it for the better. " |
January 20, 2012
Dr. Beatriz Kohen, Directora del Programa Genero y Derecho, Decano de la Facultad de Derecho, Universidad de Palermo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Introducing the screening of Courting Justice at the University of Palermo, Faculty of Law in Buenos Aires, Argentina on November 11,2011:
I believe there is a profound need to document the recently achieved increased participation of women in Argentina's public life . This need is tied to the importance for younger women to know of the very different past and of the process by which militant women's organizations allied with other organizations worked to effect democratic governance and strengthen democratic institutions. My aim is to produce a documentary film-- I'm drawn to that medium because it is able to reach masses of people. Given my expertise I would concentrate on women within the judiciary—focusing both on their progress and on the continuing challenges.
As a scholar I, of course, searched what had been and was being done in using multi-media to document women in the judiciary. In my search I discovered Courting Justice. I contacted Ruth Cowan; she sent me the dvd.
I liked what I saw: Courting Justice put flesh on the bones of the concerns those of us who press for judicial gender diversity deal with: law's built-in masculinity, women's difficulties fitting into an institution infused with a male- gendered logic, women's difficulties in accessing justice, the reasons behind the importance of appointing women to the courts, and the possibilities women judges present for a making a difference..
Concededly, no one now dares question the importance of having more women judges. At least the arguments appear to be accepted that the judiciary should reflect society's diversity—and that diversity relates to the judiciary's legitimacy. Interest is even shown to alternative feminist models.
Some of the arguments for more women on the bench are controversial—such as the view that women's traditional role as care givers would enhance justice in the justice system. But, whatever the disagreements surrounding the arguments for increasing women's judicial representation, there can be no disagreement about the significant the two women on this country's Supreme Court and the woman as the Head of the National Public Defenders have had on the enforcement of women's rights. These three women have made a difference , not only through their own official actions, but by influencing , for example, the creation of Women's Office of the Supreme Court of the Nation, the Domestic Violence Office, gender mainstreaming in the Public Defender's office—all of which are serving to further women's rights. Argentina's experience is one validation of position advocated in UNWOMEN's last Biannual Report on Women's Advancement in the World—i.e., that placing women in leadership positions is an important strategy for enforcing women's rights. |
