State responsibility for violence against women: a legitimate and desperate claim : the case of Ciudad Juarez

Abstract

This work will explore how developments in the international law of State responsibility can be applied towards ensuring the effective protection of women against violence. It will be argued that the attribution of State responsibility for the systematic failure to protect women from gender-based violence, even when committed within the private sphere, through the “complicit approach”, is not only an adequate way to address this abuse, but a necessary action within the international human rights regime. Through the application of the “complicity approach” for the determination of Mexico’s responsibility concerning the cases of murders and disappearances in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua it will be shown that this method effectively addresses women’s realities and surpasses some of the current limitations of the international human rights framework on violence against women. It will be proposed that, complemented with the full implementation of the due diligence standard, the principle of “effectiveness” and the contextualisation as legal artefact, this method enhances States obligations in order to tackle gender-based violence. Thus, a threshold of action which States must demonstrate to fulfil their responsibility to protect women from violence in a more comprehensive and real way would be established, and some proposals in order to implement this legitimate and desperate demand at the international and national level will be presented.