Women’s human rights have seen astonishing advances in recent decades, thanks to new laws and sustained organizing around the world. These campaigns aim to stop violence against women; improve their safety and security both inside and outside the home; eliminate discrimination against women in law and practice; advance their sexual and reproductive autonomy; and create a robust human rights ecosystem that is nurturing of, responsive to, and values women’s intersectional identities. Despite this progress, women’s human rights are still under threat – and while women in some countries are still fighting hard for their rights to be recognized in the first place, others are trying to save their existing rights from being rolled back.

The United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) has been a crucial means to defend women’s human rights around the world since coming into force in 1981. Why is CEDAW still so important four decades after its adoption? What have been its major contributions? What still needs to be done, and where can we be hopeful as we look at the state of women’s human rights worldwide?

In honor of International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month, join Perry World House for a wide-ranging conversation between experts Rangita de Silva de Alwis and LaShawn R. Jefferson, as they discuss this revolutionary lawmaking and strategic organizing tool and other strategies to make women’s human rights a universal reality.