Violence against Women in a Fragmenting International Order

Eliminating violence against women is a gender norm that emerged in the 1990s and has evolved into a complex regime comprising partially overlapping and non-hierarchical institutions. The current fragmentation of the liberal international order and the ongoing transition to a new model—where the old configuration has died, and the new one is yet to emerge— is driven by a sustained contestation of the liberal norms that underpin the rules-based order. This normative contestation has caused a significant setback in the international regime aimed at eliminating violence against women. This book uses the Cosmopolitan vs. Communitarian cleavage as an analytical framework to examine how the elimination of violence against women is contested, and the extent to which it has been eroded. What impact has the increasing reclaim of sovereignty had on the international norm advocating for the elimination of the violence against women? How has the growing illiberal tide affected the individual rights underpinning this norm? The attacks on this gender norm come from diverse political forces and international actors, operating across multiple levels, leading to the erosion of the norm’s validity and its legal de-positivization. The book’s eight chapters explore this contestation at the global (United Nations), regional (European Union, Organization of American States) and domestic levels (Türkiye, Argentina). The chapters focus on key political and social actors, such as the anti-gender movement, as well as legal institutions, including global and regional human rights courts that act as containment mechanisms against the anti-gender movement. Additionally, this book examines new legal avenues, such as the concept of “gender apartheid,” proposed to counteract the severe violence and discrimination faced by Afghan women.