Justice and gender disparity in Bosnia-Herzegovina

Looking for justice in BiH. Photo: guardian.co.uk

Gender analysis has become increasingly significant when determining the ways in which conflict and rebuilding processes affect men and women. As notable scholars from The Feinstein International Center at Tufts University have recently reported, separating gender from significant fields, including international development, conflict management, humanitarian response, or policy-making, is neither feasible nor desirable, and will lead to incomplete conclusions about the effects of policymakers’ actions and impact. The Impunity Watch reports aim to understand how gender, transitional justice, atrocities prevention, and post-conflict policies have been addressed in these three cases, providing both strengths and shortcomings.

Shortcomings of the Process in BiH

1. In the processes related to truth, women’s participation so far has been limited.
2. When it comes to guarantees of non-recurrence, it appears that a rather one-sided picture after the conflict in BiH has been created, whereby women are mostly seen as victims of the war, while men are mostly seen as heroes.
3. While women make up one half of the Expert Working Group that drafted the Transitional Justice Strategy, and the president of the EWG is a woman, judging from the first draft of the TJS, there is room for improvement regarding the issue of gender-sensitivity. Sexual violence was widely excluded in the document, and a more widespread support from civil society organizations (CSOs) was lacking.

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