Gender-Related Persecutions: Why Do Women Flee?

Abstract

This chapter will examine the reasons why women may be forced to flee their countries and the types of persecution which can be labelled as gender-related persecutions. The notion of persecution is central to the definition of a refugee in international laws and conventions but it is a concept which is very ill-defined. As we will see in Chapter Four, women seeking asylum have often been refused refugee status in Western states because the violence and discrimination that they have experienced in their countries of origin are not regarded as ‘persecution’ within the sense of the Geneva Convention. This does not mean, however, that women are not persecuted. In fact, women worldwide are subject to a wide range of violence and persecutory treatments which are related to their social, economic and political status as women. So-called traditional practices such as female genital mutilation, forced marriage or dowry murder continue to harm some women, whilst others are subject to forced abortion or sterilisation, rape (particularly in times of war and conflict) or domestic violence. All of these forms of violence and persecution may force women to flee their homes and countries and seek international protection. However, for many women flight is not an option, either because their material circumstances will not allow it throughlackof money, inability to travel withoutrisk, physicalrestraint¹-or because the violence and persecution has been normalised to such an extent that women accept it without questioning whether there is an alternative.