Hegemonic Human Rights and African Resistance: Female Circumcision in a Broader Comparative Perspective

The issue of Female Circumcision is usually discussed in the framework of extreme human rights violations victimizing non western women. This paper questions this approach by broadly comparing Female Circumcision with similar "cutting" practices routinely performed in Western societies. An integrative approach to comparative law is suggested in order to understand phenomena in context and to avoid ethnocentrism.