Between Exigency and Backlash: International Responses to Conflict-Related Sexual Violence

When the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) recognized conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) as a matter of international security in 2008, this jump-started the institutionalization of a global norm of CRSV prevention.

A plethora of UNSC resolutions, institutions, initiatives and procedural changes marked a clear upwards trajectory in the global commitment to curbing CRSV over the following years.

Recently, however, a combination of anti-feminist backlash among certain members of the UN and emerging signs of withdrawal from erstwhile norm-promoting states point to a regressive turn in CRSV prevention.

To date, this regressive turn has evaded academic scrutiny and we lack understanding of its magnitude and its manifestations.

To address this gap, this project aims to systematically analyze 1) to what extent, and how, the commitment to preventing CRSV is contested globally; 2) how norm-promoting states respond to such contestation; and 3) the implications of contestation for global efforts to prevent CRSV.

Combining the analysis of policies, statements and debates, a global statistical analysis of budget data, interviews in norm-promoting states (Sweden and Germany), and a practitioner-oriented survey, we make significant contributions to policy and scholarship on CRSV, and notably also to the research field on norm contestation in international relations more generally.

This knowledge is critical in current times of global democratic recession and normative upheaval.