Feminist Quandaries on Gender and Violence: Agency, Universality, and Human Security

The issue of gender-based violence demonstrates the importance of both women’s agency and the extent of their victimization historically. The World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993 became the milestone of recognition of violence against women as a human rights issue. The United Nations (UN) Declaration on Violence against Women and the creation of the post of UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Its Causes and Consequences, that followed soon after, were essential building blocks in this understanding. To understand gender and violence also requires understanding the dynamic relationship between universality and diversity. Violence against women is one of the most common experiences of women, but it can only be understood and combated by seeing it in all its diversity. Violence is always particular in that it is shaped by the intersection of race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, age, physical ability, culture, or other factors with gender in any given time and place.