A Tale of Two Pandemics and the Shortcomings of International Law: Examining gender-based violence in Bolivia in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by scrutinizing international laws’ limitations in mitigating human rights abuses during periods of crisis

Chamon, Micaela

A Tale of Two Pandemics and the Shortcomings of International Law: Examining gender-based violence in Bolivia in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by scrutinizing international laws’ limitations in mitigating human rights abuses during periods of crisis

dc.contributor.advisor	Morais de Sa e Silva, Michelle
dc.contributor.author	Chamon, Micaela
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Costa Morais de Sa e Silva, Fabio
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Cruise, Rebecca
dc.date.accessioned	2021-05-14T16:57:04Z
dc.date.available	2021-05-14T16:57:04Z
dc.date.issued	2021-05
dc.date.manuscript	2021-05-03
dc.description.abstract	International law was established as a part of the international relations sphere to prevent mass atrocity from ever occurring again in the way that it had throughout World War I and World War II. With the passage of time, it continued to evolve, seeking to address all issues, including human rights. Then, gender-based violence was defined and categorized as a human rights violation. Yet, although numerous international instruments have since been instituted to address and fight the issue, the prevalence of gender-based violence continues to plague communities worldwide. The COVID-19 pandemic further exacerbated the issue of gender-based violence. This was mostly as a consequence of quarantine measures that sought to mitigate the public health crisis, since they confined women to their potential aggressors and left them with life-threatening choices – staying home and risking domestic violence or in the slight chance that they could, leaving and risking infection of the virus. As a result, domestic violence cases rose all over the world. This prompted a questioning of the true global impact that international law has, particularly in protecting women and their rights. In the case of Bolivia, a country where gender inequality and corruption are deeply rooted in its institutions, cultures, and traditions, accountability measures alone are unable to stop gender-based violence from taking the lives of women during normal circumstance. As a result, it has the most cases of gender-based violence in the continent, and in the case of COVID-19, a surge in those cases was also evident. This thesis, therefore, seeks to examine the interaction of COVID-19 and gender-based violence in Bolivia, and the shortcomings of international law to advocate for proactive measures and a re-evaluation of the elitist and quasi-judicial nature of international law related to this issue.	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/11244/329569
dc.language	en_US	en_US
dc.subject	Gender-based violence	en_US
dc.subject	International Law	en_US
dc.subject	COVID-19	en_US
dc.subject	Bolivia	en_US
dc.thesis.degree	Master of Arts in International Studies	en_US
dc.title	A Tale of Two Pandemics and the Shortcomings of International Law: Examining gender-based violence in Bolivia in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by scrutinizing international laws’ limitations in mitigating human rights abuses during periods of crisis	en_US
ou.group	David L. Boren College of International Studies	en_US