Justice in Transitional Societies: has gender become a central issue?
of prosecutions as a pillar of transitional justice faces is that the harms
experienced by women as a result of conflict cannot be strictly confined
to sexual violence. Women face a complex set of different harms as a
result of conflict, many of which are indirect. There is a danger that an
overly centred importance on sexual violence crimes may demonstrate a
patriarchal prejudice that reduces women to mere sexual beings (Turano
2011: 1066).
This raises another problem for prosecutions as a pillar of transitional
justice, namely that many of these indirect harms are not considered to
be criminal (Turano 2011: 1066). For example, both the inability to access primary healthcare and the economic stress suffered in the absence
of a male provider are harms suffered by women that cannot be resolved
or addressed through prosecution. Thus, it is important to illustrate that
prosecutions only address a limited proportion of harms committed
against women and fail to address all gender-based harms.
Truth
The problems associated with achieving convictions in transitional societies have resulted in the emergence of ‘truth-seeking’ as a pillar of
transitional justice (O’Rourke 2013: 101). The attempt to implement a
gender sensitive approach to truth-seeking has been seen in various truth
commissions (TCs). For example, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, following the abolition of apartheid, organised public
hearings where women could recall their experiences and call for justice
and reparations (Quast 2008: 18). This in turn established a precedent for
the establishment of a gender perspective in TCs. Peru’s TC included a
gender unit to ensure a gender perspective to the findings of the commission, which resulted in the final report containing a chapter specifically
relating to gender (Falcon 2013: 192). Moreover, in the case of Sierra
Leone, the United Nations Development Fund for Women provided specific staff for women victims as well as technical advice, training and
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