p1521 -
Seeking Eastern Representation: Syrian and Lebanese Women and the Development of International Women's Rights Norms at the League of Nations
On February 20, 1938, Nour Hamada marched up the steps of the Palais des Nations. The
Syrian-born activist was in Geneva to discuss the representation of an “Eastern” woman on the
Committee of Experts on the Legal Status of Women, which the League had established the year
prior. The committee was charged with establishing how women's rights would be
internationalized through the League—a task that was thwarted by the outbreak of World War II.
A group of women living under the French Mandate for Syria—a League-imposed system of
colonial rule that operated in modern-day Syria and Lebanon—took note of the committee’s
creation and lobbied for an “Eastern” representative. Nour led their campaign. This paper
explores the domestic and international consequences of Syrian and Lebanese women’s efforts to
make the committee globally representative. Ultimately, Syrian and Lebanese women’s activism at
the League did not achieve its aims: the committee was formed without “Eastern” representation and
the Mandate-successor states of Syria and Lebanon did not honor women’s claims for equal
citizenship rights, including the right to vote. The campaign exposes that women in the French
Mandate for Syria thought international government had the capacity create, and enforce,
international women’s rights norms. In addition, it reveals their attempts to utilize international
women’s rights norms to affect the distribution of women’s rights at home.