This publication aims to reveal de jure challenges and legal gaps that undermine women’s fundamental freedoms and rights. Based on case studies from Asia, it reviews the legal systems of Indonesia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Viet Nam to assess the extent of their legislative compliance with the articles of the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). It uses a total of 113 indicators to assess legislative compliance with the sixteen substantive articles of CEDAW that encompass diverse aspects of public and private spheres affecting women’s legal rights —constitutional, criminal, civil, political, economic, social and family laws.

Even without going into the de facto situation on the ground, the study demonstrates how women continue to face significant discrimination within the legal systems they face. This is despite legal reform—legislative change and the use of progressive judicial precedents. More specifically, legal challenges are three-fold: absence of laws; the existence of discriminatory laws; and conflicts between constitutional guarantees of equality vis-à-vis unequal customary laws and practices. It is to these three-fold challenges that one must turn for positive change in laws.