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Crossing and Not Crossing: Gender, Sexualityand Melancholy in the European Court of Human RightsChristine Goodwin v. United Kingdom(Application no. 28957/95) [2002] I.R.L.R. 664,[2002] 2 F.L.R. 487, [2002] 2 F.C.R. 577,(2002) 35 E.H.R.R. 18, 13 B.H.R.C. 120, (2002)67 B.M.L.R. 199, I v. United Kingdom(Application no. 25680/94) [2002] 2 F.L.R. 518, [2002] 2 F.C.R. 613 (ECHR)

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Abstract

In the cases of Goodwin v. U.K.and I. v. U.K. the European Court of Human Rights held the U.K. Government to be in breach of Articles 8 and 12 of the European Convention for denying certain rights and entitlements, particularly the right to marry, to post-operative transsexuals. This article argues that although on some level these are welcome decisions, they are also conservative and recuperative in that they seek to shore up traditional binarist ideas of gender and sexuality. The article concludes, however, that the Court's conservatism is problematic in a number of ways; and that it may be most profitable to read these cases as an invitation to imagine further and more profound challenges to the old order.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Law, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK

    Ralph Sandland

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  1. Ralph Sandland
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Sandland, R. Crossing and Not Crossing: Gender, Sexualityand Melancholy in the European Court of Human RightsChristine Goodwin v. United Kingdom(Application no. 28957/95) [2002] I.R.L.R. 664,[2002] 2 F.L.R. 487, [2002] 2 F.C.R. 577,(2002) 35 E.H.R.R. 18, 13 B.H.R.C. 120, (2002)67 B.M.L.R. 199, I v. United Kingdom(Application no. 25680/94) [2002] 2 F.L.R. 518, [2002] 2 F.C.R. 613 (ECHR). Feminist Legal Studies 11, 191–209 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1025031126520

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