“CEDAW is Up in the Sky:” Reimagining Participation in Human Rights Advocacy Through Mechanism-Based Feminist Participatory Action Research (FPAR)

Since its adoption in 1979, the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) has provided a critical framework for holding governments accountable for addressing gender discrimination and advancing women’s rights. However, structural inequalities significantly restrict the ability of marginalised groups, particularly Indigenous and Ethnic Minority (IEM) women, to engage with CEDAW and similar high-level advocacy mechanisms. This paper explores the innovative potential of Feminist Participatory Action Research (FPAR) grounded in the CEDAW mechanism as a method for amplifying the voices of young IEM women while engaging them in processes of conscientisation, empowerment, and self-advocacy. FPAR is a community-based methodology rooted in feminist and decolonial theories that allows those most affected by systemic injustices to shape research agendas and produce contextually grounded knowledge. The research focuses on a two-year FPAR study conducted with young IEM women in Cambodia, led by a local women’s rights organisation. The Action Researchers (ARs) received training in human rights norms and mechanisms, including CEDAW, before carrying out fieldwork in their own communities to explore patterns of discrimination and resilience. Findings from a reflective group discussion conducted with the ARs demonstrate the transformative potential of this approach in strengthening advocacy capacities while enhancing self-perception and rights awareness. ARs described how engaging with CEDAW shifted their understanding of justice from abstract to actionable, positioning them not only as knowledge producers but also as emerging advocates. This article argues that mechanism-based FPAR offers an innovative bridge between grassroots realities and high-level rights mechanisms. It promotes an inclusive, decolonised approach to the cyclical processes of evidence gathering that underpin human rights advocacy. The findings highlight why, for IEM women, it is necessary to “bring CEDAW home” in order to make rights a reality and build pathways for meaningful engagement in global advocacy.