Beyond Victimhood: Gender, Migration, and the Repoliticization of Humanitarian Law

Abstract

Over the last thirty years, international attention to the issue of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in humanitarian contexts has grown steadily. This attention has led to strategies for its prevention, resolution and management; however, these are either consistently disregarded by Member States or generally prove ineffective in improving living conditions during and after crises. Taking a philosophical-political perspective, this article adopts an intersectional and postcolonial lens to analyse these approaches, with a particular focus on migration contexts. The article’s thesis is as follows: the difficulty in applying international humanitarian law to cases of SGBV in crisis contexts, particularly in migration contexts, stems from a humanitarian paradigm rooted in the victimisation of groups defined as vulnerable – including women – and in the exclusion of these individuals from spaces of agency and public power.