error comes from assuming that women and men are heterosexual, which is false. This
miscategorization is the result of our heteronormative bias.
To avoid these issues is important to pay attention when we define the variables or the
terms we will use for data collection and registration.
Tips to use HR standards for variables
definition
★ Be careful on using international human rights standards as an unique or exclusive
source of indicators definitions for data registration purposes. Using universal
standards as a source is useful and necessary but not enough.
ACNUDH, said: “The enunciation of human rights regulations (...) can be very
general; furthermore, many human rights seem to overlap. This means that the
provisions of the rights treaties are not particularly useful for defining appropriate
indicators”. (See the full statement in the footnote)1.
★ Select definitions consciously and strategically. Remember that the definitions you
choose will affect the type of data you include and exclude in your analysis. The
definitions have ulterior consequences and reflect our position regarding the topic
to be studied.
★ Even in the human rights field, the conceptual definitions we establish for research
or data collection purposes could be based on broader perspectives than the
judicial or legal standards.
1
“The enumeration of human right standards in treaties and their further elaboration by the treaty monitoring
bodies and other human rights mechanisms and instruments may remain quite general and many human
rights appear to overlap. So human rights treaty provisions are not particularly helpful in the identification of
appropriate indicator(s). As a starting point, it is therefore important that the narrative on the legal standard of
a human right is transcribed into a limited number of characteristics or attributes of that right. By identifying
the attributes of a right, the process of selecting and developing suitable indicators or clusters of indicators is
facilitated as one arrives at a categorization that is clear, concrete and, perhaps, more “tangible”. Indeed, the
notion of attributes of a right helps in making the content of a right concrete and makes explicit the link
between identified indicators of a right on the one hand and the normative standards of that right on the
other”.
8