Beth Goldblatt
Biographic Data
| ID | 78921 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Beth Goldblatt |
| GIVEN NAMES | Beth |
| FAMILY NAME | Goldblatt |
| SIGNATURE | GOLDBLATT B |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Technology Sydney |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4687-3176 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 40 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 69 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 39 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1979 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Regenerative equality laws for a changing climate
Climate change is both a consequence and a cause of inequality. Deep system recalibration is needed to repair the harms that the dominant economic system has inflicted on humans and the non-human world. This includes rethinking our legal frameworks and the way we address equality in law. The article draws on ecofeminist and Indigenous ideas of human/non-human relationality to consider how new equality frameworks might reorient the law in service …
Prefiguring legal alternatives in environmental and climate justice struggles in Australia
This article examines attempts by environmental advocates to engage with the law’s failure to adequately respond to climate change by using alternative legal framings or venues to ‘imagine law otherwise’ and to foster legal ontological shifts. It examines these actions – including the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council’s Fitzroy River Declaration and treaty making projects, and a recent successful UN Human Rights Committee communication brought by …
Legislating for the future: Situated health and embodied justice
In response to the short-term political cycles that govern law-making, there is growing international attention to the obligations owed to future generations. Within the diverse approaches there is often a single, temporally defined inequality; that is, between now and a depleted future. While inequality is imagined between generations, these generations are often constructed as homogenous. This elides not just contemporary inequalities, but that…
A lounge of one’s own: Art, gender, discrimination and the law
In this essay, the authors consider the recent discrimination law decision of the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal in relation to the ‘Ladies Lounge’, an artwork by Kirsha Kaechele at the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart. The article first considers the question of whether there was unlawful direct discrimination before turning to the application of defences (referred to as ‘exceptions’ in the relevant legislation, the Anti-Discrimi…
The right to a healthy environment and social and economic rights—responding to climate change in Australia
The United Nations General Assembly recently recognised the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. This new right offers to reorient human rights to better address the interdependent relationship of humans and the environment. At the same time, it provides a novel lens to ensure that laws related to the environment account for injustices confronting humans within it. In the context of climate change, and the complex inequalities t…
Climate Change, Inequality and Discrimination Law: The Example of Swimming Pool Access in Moree
Climate change exacerbates disadvantage and deepens inequality. Mitigation and adaptation measures to address climate change thus require equality-informed responses. This aligns with the goals of climate justice, which emphasise the rights of the most vulnerable, equality and fairness. Climate law and strategic litigation in pursuit of climate justice are rapidly evolving areas with a growing resort to human rights. This article argues that disc…
Contested Common Space, Regulation and Inclusion at the Coogee Women’s Pool
This article concerns two disputes that occurred between 2020–22 at the Coogee Women’s Pool, a public ocean pool in Sydney reserved for use only by women. One contest concerned the governance of the pool by its Management Committee related to differing conceptions of the ethos of the pool and the nature of its custodianship. The other concerned the exclusion of trans women from the pool over the definition of ‘women’ allowed access to the facilit…
The Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions: Responding to Complex Global Challenges
What does the right to the continuous improvement of living conditions in Article 11(1) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights really mean and how can it contribute to social change? The book explores how this underdeveloped right can have valuable application in response to global problems of poverty, inequality and climate destruction, through an in-depth consideration of its meaning. The book seeks to interpret a…
Disposable Menstrual Products as Law's Objects
During the past few years, scholars and activists have increasingly engaged with law as a means to challenge stigma, silence, and disadvantages associated with menstruation. Menstrual items (predominantly in the form of disposable menstrual products) are becoming increasingly prominent in this “legal turn.” There have been legislative reforms to provide access to free menstrual items, litigation and legislative reforms to remove taxes on menstrua…
Equal access to social and economic rights in Australia – the troubling case of ParentsNext
This reflection considers the slow progress towards domestic recognition of social and economic rights in Australian law and the notable gaps that remain. It focuses on the lack of actionable rights to social security and non-discrimination in relation to a government program called ParentsNext. This legal gap leaves some of the most vulnerable members of our community without protection against policies that impinge on their rights to equality o…
Remedying depletion through social reproduction: A critical engagement with the United Nations’ business and human rights framework
The growing recognition of unpaid work in international law and the Sustainable Development Goals acknowledges that gendered labour supports the global economy. This work can have harmful impacts, leading to ‘depletion through social reproduction’ (Rai et al, 2014). When corporate harms impact on workers and communities, family members are often required to provide caring labour for those directly affected. However, the consequential harms of dep…
Introduction to the themed section: Law, harm and depletion through social reproduction
In this article, we outline an interdisciplinary exploration into the invisibilisation of social reproduction, most of which still continues to be done by women. In this introduction and themed section, we argue that the neglect of social reproduction has material costs for those responsible for it, which we theorise as ‘depletion through social reproduction’ (Rai et al, 2014) – and these costs are gendered. As a facet of governing processes, the…
Engaging with Law's Menstrual Moment
Menstruation is a hot topic. Period. End of Sentence., a film about production of menstrual pads in India, won an Oscar for best short documentary at the 2019 Academy Awards.1 The period emoji (a d
Bloody Unfair: Inequality Related to Menstruation — Considering the Role of Discrimination Law
Social and economic rights to challenge violence against women – examining and extending strategies
Violence against women and poverty are closely connected. Measures to address this violence must tackle the social and economic factors that contribute to gender inequality. Violence against women is now recognised as a human rights violation but this is often understood narrowly in relation to violations of civil and political rights. Social and economic rights offer rich possibilities to look beyond punitive responses to violence to more preven…
Claiming women’s social and economic rights in Australia
The article discusses the status of social and economic rights within Australia and why these rights have special significance for women, particularly under neoliberalism. It argues that unless these rights are realised, women’s equal and meaningful participation within our democracy will remain constrained. The article examines the issues that advocates have raised regarding these rights through international and domestic avenues. It suggests th…
Recognizing the Full Costs of Care? Compensation for Families in South Africa’s Silicosis Class Action
This article concerns recognition and compensation of the intimate, gendered work of caring by family members for workers who became ill with lung diseases as a result of poor labour conditions in the mines in South Africa. It focuses on a recent decision by a court in South Africa ( Nkala and Others v. Harmony Gold Mining Company Limited and Others, 2016) that took the unusual step of acknowledging this care work and attempting to compensate it …
Developing the Right to Social Security - A Gender Perspective
The right to social security, found in international law and in the constitutions of many nations, contributes to the alleviation of poverty globally. Social security and its articulation as a human right have received increased attention in recent years both in response to austerity cuts to welfare in developed countries and as a means of lifting millions out of poverty in developing countries. Women, disproportionately affected by poverty in al…
Substantive equality: A conceptual framework
The principle of equality in international human rights instruments is expressed in very general and open-textured terms. Thus, Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) provides that every human being is entitled to all the rights and freedoms within the Declaration ‘without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other s…
Using the equality framework to evaluate social and economic policy and provisions
The above analysis illustrates that the four-dimensional framework of substantive gender equality set out in the first part of this paper is implicitly followed in the recent observations and recommendations of the human rights treaty bodies and special procedures mandate holders. These groups and individuals routinely locate their work on gender equality within the four dimensions set out above, even if this is not always explicitly stated. This…
Intersectionality in international anti-discrimination law: Addressing poverty in its complexity
The concept of intersectionality has been progressively incorporated into international anti-discrimination law. This article considers the nature of this incorporation and the different understandings of the term and related concepts by United Nations treaty body committees. It discusses the importance of intersectionality within a substantive equality framework in challenging poverty that is often complex in nature. This is illustrated with exa…
Gender Equality and Human Rights
This editorial introduces an issue of INSTRAW News that commemorates the 50th anniversary of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This introduction notes that the lead article in the journal expresses optimism about potential progress towards achieving gender equity and human rights because 1) industrialized countries are undergoing a "powershift" to an information society that will offer more and better jobs for women and give women g…
Gender, poverty and the development of the right to social security
The international right to social security has been given limited attention as a vehicle for addressing women's poverty. This paper highlights some of the issues shaping women's poverty globally that require a more responsive right to social security. It discusses the nature and purpose of social security and examines the international law relating to this right, arguing that recent interpretations lack an adequate framework for ensuring women's …
Social Security in South Africa - a Gender and Human Rights Analysis
VRÜ Verfassung und Recht in Übersee , page 22 - 42
Justice for All? Ten Years of the International Criminal Court
(2012). Justice for All? Ten Years of the International Criminal Court. Australian Journal of Human Rights: Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 69-74
Gender and social assistance in the first decade of democracy: A case study of South Africa's Child Support Grant
Although South Africa's democracy is only ten years old, the country has one of the most extensive welfare systems of any developing country in the world. The Constitution provides a right to social security. A monthly grant (the Child Support Grant) paid to the primary caregiver of every poor child under the age of 14 is reaching millions of children. However, the introduction of this grant coincided with the loss of a previous grant paid to the…
Gender Equality and Human Rights
This editorial introduces an issue of INSTRAW News that commemorates the 50th anniversary of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This introduction notes that the lead article in the journal expresses optimism about potential progress towards achieving gender equity and human rights because 1) industrialized countries are undergoing a "powershift" to an information society that will offer more and better jobs for women and give women g…
Dealing with the Aftermath: Sexual Violence and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Beth Goldblatt, Sheila Meintjes, Dealing with the Aftermath: Sexual Violence and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity, No. 36, No to Violence (1997), pp. 7-18
Recognizing the Full Costs of Care? Compensation for Families in South Africa’s Silicosis Class Action
This article concerns recognition and compensation of the intimate, gendered work of caring by family members for workers who became ill with lung diseases as a result of poor labour conditions in the mines in South Africa. It focuses on a recent decision by a court in South Africa ( Nkala and Others v. Harmony Gold Mining Company Limited and Others, 2016) that took the unusual step of acknowledging this care work and attempting to compensate it …
Engaging with Law's Menstrual Moment
Menstruation is a hot topic. Period. End of Sentence., a film about production of menstrual pads in India, won an Oscar for best short documentary at the 2019 Academy Awards.1 The period emoji (a d
Complementing or conflicting human rights conventions? Realising an inclusive approach to families with a young person with a disability and challenging behaviour
United Nation’s conventions exist to help facilitate and protect vulnerable people’s human rights: including people with disabilities (Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, 2006) and children (Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989). However, for some families where a family member has a disability, there may be inherent conflicts in meeting stand-alone human rights conventions. These conventions should work together to ensu…
Legislating for the future: Situated health and embodied justice
In response to the short-term political cycles that govern law-making, there is growing international attention to the obligations owed to future generations. Within the diverse approaches there is often a single, temporally defined inequality; that is, between now and a depleted future. While inequality is imagined between generations, these generations are often constructed as homogenous. This elides not just contemporary inequalities, but that…
Remedying depletion through social reproduction: A critical engagement with the United Nations’ business and human rights framework
The growing recognition of unpaid work in international law and the Sustainable Development Goals acknowledges that gendered labour supports the global economy. This work can have harmful impacts, leading to ‘depletion through social reproduction’ (Rai et al, 2014). When corporate harms impact on workers and communities, family members are often required to provide caring labour for those directly affected. However, the consequential harms of dep…
Developing the Right to Social Security - A Gender Perspective
The right to social security, found in international law and in the constitutions of many nations, contributes to the alleviation of poverty globally. Social security and its articulation as a human right have received increased attention in recent years both in response to austerity cuts to welfare in developed countries and as a means of lifting millions out of poverty in developing countries. Women, disproportionately affected by poverty in al…
Case note: Same-sex Marriage in South Africa –the constitutional Court's Judgment
Prefiguring legal alternatives in environmental and climate justice struggles in Australia
This article examines attempts by environmental advocates to engage with the law’s failure to adequately respond to climate change by using alternative legal framings or venues to ‘imagine law otherwise’ and to foster legal ontological shifts. It examines these actions – including the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council’s Fitzroy River Declaration and treaty making projects, and a recent successful UN Human Rights Committee communication brought by …
The right to a healthy environment and social and economic rights—responding to climate change in Australia
The United Nations General Assembly recently recognised the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. This new right offers to reorient human rights to better address the interdependent relationship of humans and the environment. At the same time, it provides a novel lens to ensure that laws related to the environment account for injustices confronting humans within it. In the context of climate change, and the complex inequalities t…
Climate Change, Inequality and Discrimination Law: The Example of Swimming Pool Access in Moree
Climate change exacerbates disadvantage and deepens inequality. Mitigation and adaptation measures to address climate change thus require equality-informed responses. This aligns with the goals of climate justice, which emphasise the rights of the most vulnerable, equality and fairness. Climate law and strategic litigation in pursuit of climate justice are rapidly evolving areas with a growing resort to human rights. This article argues that disc…
Equal access to social and economic rights in Australia – the troubling case of ParentsNext
This reflection considers the slow progress towards domestic recognition of social and economic rights in Australian law and the notable gaps that remain. It focuses on the lack of actionable rights to social security and non-discrimination in relation to a government program called ParentsNext. This legal gap leaves some of the most vulnerable members of our community without protection against policies that impinge on their rights to equality o…
Introduction to the themed section: Law, harm and depletion through social reproduction
In this article, we outline an interdisciplinary exploration into the invisibilisation of social reproduction, most of which still continues to be done by women. In this introduction and themed section, we argue that the neglect of social reproduction has material costs for those responsible for it, which we theorise as ‘depletion through social reproduction’ (Rai et al, 2014) – and these costs are gendered. As a facet of governing processes, the…
Intersectionality in international anti-discrimination law: Addressing poverty in its complexity
The concept of intersectionality has been progressively incorporated into international anti-discrimination law. This article considers the nature of this incorporation and the different understandings of the term and related concepts by United Nations treaty body committees. It discusses the importance of intersectionality within a substantive equality framework in challenging poverty that is often complex in nature. This is illustrated with exa…
Gender, poverty and the development of the right to social security
The international right to social security has been given limited attention as a vehicle for addressing women's poverty. This paper highlights some of the issues shaping women's poverty globally that require a more responsive right to social security. It discusses the nature and purpose of social security and examines the international law relating to this right, arguing that recent interpretations lack an adequate framework for ensuring women's …
The Right to Social Security – Addressing Women’s Poverty and Disadvantage
Women in South Africa are generally poorer than men and more vulnerable. They perform the bulk of the caring functions in society, usually without remuneration. Their greater need is reflected in their disproportionate use of the social assistance system. This system is evaluated in terms of the right to social security contained in South Africa's Bill of Rights. The right is explored, interpreted and developed from a feminist legal perspective. …
The Interrelation Ship Between Equality and Socio-Economic Rights Und Er South Africa’s Transformative Constitution
This article develops the interrelationship between the equality and socio-economic rights in the Bill of Rights to enhance the responsiveness of our jurisprudence to the mutually reinforcing patterns of poverty and inequality in South Africa. We proceed from the principle that rights are interdependent and interconnected, and examine the implications of this for our evolving socio-economic rights and equality jurisprudence. We argue that such a …
Facing the Challenge of Transformation: Difficulties in the Development of an Indigenous Jurisprudence of Equality
(1998). Facing the Challenge of Transformation: Difficulties in the Development of an Indigenous Jurisprudence of Equality. South African Journal on Human Rights: Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 248-276
Government aid to small-scale industries and the self-employed: A case study from Calcutta
Government aid to small-scale industries and the self-employed: A case study from Calcutta
The formation of a labour union in a slum quarter of Calcutta
Dealing with the Aftermath: Sexual Violence and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Beth Goldblatt, Sheila Meintjes, Dealing with the Aftermath: Sexual Violence and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity, No. 36, No to Violence (1997), pp. 7-18
A Feminist Perspective on the Law Reform Process: An Evaluation of Attempts to Establish a Family Court in South Africa
‘Historically, law has been considered a “public arena”, and its focus has been on public concerns. Traditionally, women belonged to the “private” recesses of society, in families, in relationships controlled and defined by men, in the legal silences. The family has now been explicitly moved into the public arena of regulating policy. The policies, however, indeed the very terms of discourse, continue to be fashioned by a largely male elite withi…
Cases and Comments
Facing the Challenge of Transformation: Difficulties in the Development of an Indigenous Jurisprudence of Equality
(1998). Facing the Challenge of Transformation: Difficulties in the Development of an Indigenous Jurisprudence of Equality. South African Journal on Human Rights: Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 248-276
Cases and Comments
Notes and Comments
Giving Money to Children: The State’s Constitutional Obligations to Provide Child Support Grants to Child Headed Households
One of the most tangible effects of the HIV epidemic is the growing number of orphans and the emergence in ever increasing amounts of households headed by children. These new family configurations pose a wide range of challenges to our society. Not least of these is the challenge to change laws that hamper these households from accessing desperately needed benefits. The state currently provides a child support grant (CSG) for children in need. Th…
Gender and social assistance in the first decade of democracy: A case study of South Africa's Child Support Grant
Although South Africa's democracy is only ten years old, the country has one of the most extensive welfare systems of any developing country in the world. The Constitution provides a right to social security. A monthly grant (the Child Support Grant) paid to the primary caregiver of every poor child under the age of 14 is reaching millions of children. However, the introduction of this grant coincided with the loss of a previous grant paid to the…
Case note: Same-sex Marriage in South Africa –the constitutional Court's Judgment
The Interrelation Ship Between Equality and Socio-Economic Rights Und Er South Africa’s Transformative Constitution
This article develops the interrelationship between the equality and socio-economic rights in the Bill of Rights to enhance the responsiveness of our jurisprudence to the mutually reinforcing patterns of poverty and inequality in South Africa. We proceed from the principle that rights are interdependent and interconnected, and examine the implications of this for our evolving socio-economic rights and equality jurisprudence. We argue that such a …
Introduction — Focus on Sexuality and the Law
"Introduction — Focus on Sexuality and the Law." South African Journal on Human Rights, 23(3), pp. 407–408
The Right to Social Security – Addressing Women’s Poverty and Disadvantage
Women in South Africa are generally poorer than men and more vulnerable. They perform the bulk of the caring functions in society, usually without remuneration. Their greater need is reflected in their disproportionate use of the social assistance system. This system is evaluated in terms of the right to social security contained in South Africa's Bill of Rights. The right is explored, interpreted and developed from a feminist legal perspective. …
Complementing or conflicting human rights conventions? Realising an inclusive approach to families with a young person with a disability and challenging behaviour
United Nation’s conventions exist to help facilitate and protect vulnerable people’s human rights: including people with disabilities (Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, 2006) and children (Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989). However, for some families where a family member has a disability, there may be inherent conflicts in meeting stand-alone human rights conventions. These conventions should work together to ensu…
Justice for All? Ten Years of the International Criminal Court
(2012). Justice for All? Ten Years of the International Criminal Court. Australian Journal of Human Rights: Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 69-74
Gender, poverty and the development of the right to social security
The international right to social security has been given limited attention as a vehicle for addressing women's poverty. This paper highlights some of the issues shaping women's poverty globally that require a more responsive right to social security. It discusses the nature and purpose of social security and examines the international law relating to this right, arguing that recent interpretations lack an adequate framework for ensuring women's …
Social Security in South Africa - a Gender and Human Rights Analysis
VRÜ Verfassung und Recht in Übersee , page 22 - 42
Substantive equality: A conceptual framework
The principle of equality in international human rights instruments is expressed in very general and open-textured terms. Thus, Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) provides that every human being is entitled to all the rights and freedoms within the Declaration ‘without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other s…
Using the equality framework to evaluate social and economic policy and provisions
The above analysis illustrates that the four-dimensional framework of substantive gender equality set out in the first part of this paper is implicitly followed in the recent observations and recommendations of the human rights treaty bodies and special procedures mandate holders. These groups and individuals routinely locate their work on gender equality within the four dimensions set out above, even if this is not always explicitly stated. This…
Intersectionality in international anti-discrimination law: Addressing poverty in its complexity
The concept of intersectionality has been progressively incorporated into international anti-discrimination law. This article considers the nature of this incorporation and the different understandings of the term and related concepts by United Nations treaty body committees. It discusses the importance of intersectionality within a substantive equality framework in challenging poverty that is often complex in nature. This is illustrated with exa…
Gender Equality and Human Rights
This editorial introduces an issue of INSTRAW News that commemorates the 50th anniversary of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This introduction notes that the lead article in the journal expresses optimism about potential progress towards achieving gender equity and human rights because 1) industrialized countries are undergoing a "powershift" to an information society that will offer more and better jobs for women and give women g…
Developing the Right to Social Security - A Gender Perspective
The right to social security, found in international law and in the constitutions of many nations, contributes to the alleviation of poverty globally. Social security and its articulation as a human right have received increased attention in recent years both in response to austerity cuts to welfare in developed countries and as a means of lifting millions out of poverty in developing countries. Women, disproportionately affected by poverty in al…
Claiming women’s social and economic rights in Australia
The article discusses the status of social and economic rights within Australia and why these rights have special significance for women, particularly under neoliberalism. It argues that unless these rights are realised, women’s equal and meaningful participation within our democracy will remain constrained. The article examines the issues that advocates have raised regarding these rights through international and domestic avenues. It suggests th…
Recognizing the Full Costs of Care? Compensation for Families in South Africa’s Silicosis Class Action
This article concerns recognition and compensation of the intimate, gendered work of caring by family members for workers who became ill with lung diseases as a result of poor labour conditions in the mines in South Africa. It focuses on a recent decision by a court in South Africa ( Nkala and Others v. Harmony Gold Mining Company Limited and Others, 2016) that took the unusual step of acknowledging this care work and attempting to compensate it …
Political science (37 works) · Law (35 works) · Sociology (33 works) · Law (22 works) · Human Rights and Development (18 works) · Human rights (14 works) · Legal Issues in South Africa (14 works) · Economics (10 works) · Law and economics (10 works) · Politics (8 works)