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En este artículo se pretende plasmar cómo a través de un enfoque metodológico feminista desarrollado desde las doctrinas iusfeministas, el análisis del Derecho Internacional de las Personas Refugiadas deviene en una regulación androcéntrica del mismo. El objetivo último es demostrar cómo a través de la aplicación del enfoque iusfeminista se pone en evidencia que las experiencias de refugio de las mujeres están marcadas por la violencia de género que sufren tanto en origen, en su trayecto como en el Estado donde solicitan ser reconocidas bajo el estatuto de protección y que esta realidad no está contemplada por el Derecho Internacional de las Personas Refugiadas. De este modo, el artículo mostrará, en primer lugar y con detalle, cuáles son las premisas del método feminista. Así, se hará un repaso de los estándares que señala el conocimiento situado, el método feminista, los aportes del feminismo postcolonial y, por último, la perspectiva interseccional. Tras este primer punto, en segundo lugar se presenta cuál es el resultado de aplicar los valores del método feminista a la regulación del Derecho Internacional de las Personas Refugiadas, así, en este apartado, expondremos en primer lugar el androcentrismo que padece la Convención de Ginebra de 1951 sobre el Estatuto de las Personas Refugiadas, pasando a continuación a señalar la evaluación que en el Derecho Internacional de las Personas Refugiadas ha tenido el sujeto «mujer» y/o «femenino», pasando de concebirse como sujetos vulnerables a sujetos subordinados y discriminados. Finalmente, se conceptualizará la «violencia de género» para lo que nos apoyaremos en diferentes instrumentos regulatorios internacionales de soft law en materia de igualdad de género. Por último, a modo de conclusión, se señalará cómo afecta dicha violencia de género en las experiencias de refugio de las mujeres, pudiendo constituir bien una forma determinada de persecución o bien siendo el motivo último por el cual están siendo perseguidas.
This article aims to show how, through a feminist methodological approach developed from iusfeminist doctrines, an analysis of the International Law of Refugees shows how it takes on an androcentric regulatory function. The ultimate objective is to demonstrate how, through the application of the iusfeminist approach, that women’s refugee experiences are marked by the gender-based violence they suffer both at origin, on their journey, as well as in the state where they request to be recognized under the status of refugee protection. At the same time, it is the intention of this article to show how the reality of gender violence is not contemplated by the International Law of Refugees. The article will first illustrate, and in detail, what the premises of the feminist method are. Thus, a review of the elements of Haraway’s ‘situated knowledge’ will be made, which suggests that knowledge is a virtue, and is traversed not only by the historical and cultural context in which the research takes place, but also by the gaze of the person who investigates. Second, the article will expose the premises of the feminist method that calls into question the alleged universality, objectivity and impartiality of International Refugee Law, while taking into account gender relations and the experiences of women. In the development of the feminist method that this article will carry out, it will be structured around the question of women, feminist practical reason and the principle of awareness. In relation to the third point of the feminist method, it will be described how the application of postcolonial feminism affects the regulation of the law of refugees, which allows the deconstruction of the concept of equality such as: non-discrimination and non-subordination as well as explicitly examining the hierarchies of colonial powers and gender at stake in the research process itself. As for the fourth point of the feminist method, Crenshaw’s intersectionality is presented, which will make it easier for us to show the multiple factors that discriminate against refugees: gender-biological; sexual identity, sexual orientation; race, cultural, social, economic, etc.
After this first section of the research, the second presents the results of applying the values of the feminist method to the regulation of International Refugee Law. To this end, the first sub-section will expose the androcentrism inherent in the 1951 Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees. The Geneva Convention has been elaborated on masculine experiences and on the silence of women. This has meant that the interpretive framework of the refugee definition has been made from patriarchal structures, which leads to the homogenization and generalization of the male refugee experiences to all others. The first consequence of this is that many human rights violations committed against women have not been conceived as persecutory practices that entail protection through shelter. The result of this is that women find themselves in a position of not being subject to this Right because it seeks to universalize the male experiences that must be protected. The second sub-heading of this section indicates that in the International Law of Refugees the subjects “woman” and/or “feminine” have gone from being conceived as vulnerable subjects to subordinate and discriminated subjects. The most classical internationalist doctrine has been homogeneous when it has affirmed that refugee women are vulnerable subjects. In this article we position ourselves in the critical current that assumes that refugee women are subordinate and discriminated against. This distinction makes it possible to take vulnerability as an intrinsic issue of women and relate it to the fact that we live in patriarchal societies that create relationships of subordination and discrimination. Finally, and as a conclusion, “gender-based violence against women” will be conceptualized, for which we will rely on different international regulatory instruments of soft law in matters of gender equality and refugees: from the Convention on the Elimination of all forms Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women (DEVAW), as well as various Resolutions of the Executive Committee of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Thus, for this research, gender-based violence against women will be that which is suffered by women because they are women —that is, because of their gender—, or where it affects them disproportionately. Within this category, sexual violence is understood to be included, and we shall explain why violence against women is conceptualized with the adjective “gender”. In this article we recognize that gender violence can also be carried out by people whose gender is not the dominant male category. Thus, for this, we subscribe to the thesis that advocates overcoming the reductionist conceptualization of “gender equality” as equality between men and women, and therefore also that of “gender violence.” The construction of gender has been developed under the male/female binary imperative, without taking into account the existence of other sexes, and also the construction of other genders. The result is that the principle of gender equality developed and internalized has been that of equality between men and women. Finally, within this section of conclusions we will point out how this gender violence affects the experiences of women refugees. Through this feminist analysis, it is concluded that violence against women based on gender directly interferes in the determination of refugee status. These constitute a form of persecution or may motivate the persecution itself. Therefore, the need to include the gender variable in the regulation of the granting of the Refugee Status is made clear to overcome the androcentrism with which this International Law of Refugees was configured. For this reason, we put forward that the maximum rules will be of no use to deal with refugee claims that present violence against women based on gender in their experiences; rather, they will have to be studied case by case to know how such violence configures either the “form” or the “motive” of the persecution, or both.
