Intersectionality and Intersectional Discrimination: The Critical Approach to Anti-Discrimination Law

Discrimination in law is defined on the basis of separate identity grounds such as gender or race, etc. Critical law theorist, Kimberly Crenshaw, challenged the single-axis approach to the discrimination with the introduction of the concept of intersectionality in 1989, and since then, the intersectional approach has rapidly expanded into different fields and disciplines under different ways and methodologies. In this article, three basic critiques of intersectionality with anti-discrimination law, including legal essentialism and the experience of discrimination, a single-axis framework of discrimination, and additive approach and multiple discrimination are debated. So, Intersectional discrimination is defined as unequal positions based on social categorization shaped in the complex power relations according to context and in conflict with social justice. The approach of this article is a descriptive-critical approach and the method of the article is to explain each of the criticisms of intersectionality based on the judgments of Iranian Supreme Court.