Rule of Law for Whom: Strengthening the Rule of Law as a Solution to Sexual Violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
This article suggests that programs designed to strengthen the rule of law in general are unlikely to be effective against the widespread problem of sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. I argue that while weak rule of law perpetuates sexual violence, only rule of law programs designed specifically with respect to the needs, risks, and cultural norms pertaining to Congolese women can help curb this problem. The article begins with a brief history of conflict in the Great Lakes region of Africa to provide context for a discussion of the scope of sexual violence in the eastern provinces of the DR Congo. It then introduces the notion of "rule of law" before evaluating the ways in which weak rule of law in the eastern DR Congo contributes to the problem of sexual violence. Finally, the article makes four arguments to support the central claim that strengthening the rule of law will be effective against sexual violence only if specifically tailored in the ways noted above. INTRODUCTION 140 I.A BRIEF HISTORY OF CONFLICT IN THE GREAT LAKES REGION 141 II.THE CRISIS OF SEXUAL VIOLENCE 145 A. Scope of the Crisis 145 B. Socio-cultural Implications of Sexual Violence ........ ........ 147 J.D. Candidate, 2011 University of California, Berkeley School of Law; M.T.S., Harvard Divinity School; A.B., University of Missouri. I would like to thank Professor Kate Jastram for valuable guidance and consistent encouragement on this project. My colleagues in the Global Migration Seminar at Berkeley were excellent discussion partners and offered helpful feedback. Kerry Gough, Elizabeth Hawkins Lincoln, Stephen Rosenbaum and Ernesto Verdeja each put a critical eye to various drafts of this paper. Finally, thanks to Alison Mollman and the excellent staff of the Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice for their keen editing. I welcome comments, questions, corrections and other correspondence about the subject of this article; I can be reached at ryanlincoln@post.harvard.edu. BERKELEY JOURNAL OF GENDER, LAW & JUSTICE 139 BERKELEY JOURNAL OF GENDER, LAW & JUSTICE III.RULE OF LAW IN THE DR CONGO. ...... 149 A. Defining the Rule of Law ...... 149 B. Rule of Law Programs in the DR Congo 151 C. Sexual Violence and the Rule of Law in the DR Congo 153 1. Government Bound by Law......... 154 2. Equality Before the Law 155 3. Law and Order 156 4. Predictable and Efficient Justice 156 5. State Violation of Human Rights 157 6. Rule of Law Institutions ........ 158 IV.CREATING A VIABLE RULE OF LAW SOLUTION 158 A. Limitations of Armed Conflict and Political Efficacy on the Rule of Law ...... 159 B. Rule of Law as Evaluative / Rule of Law as Creative .... ...... 160 C. Gender Issues and the Rule of Law 161 D. Rule of Law Must Take Norms Into Account 164 CONCLUSION 167
Impact of Violent Rapes Among Women in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo
Impact of Violent Rapes Among Women in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo by Benoit Munganga Mirindi MPH, Tulane University, 2005 MPA, University of Maine at Orono, 2000 BA, University of Maine at Orono, 1998 Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Doctor of Philosophy Epidemiology
The Lord's Resistance Army and Forced Conscription in Northern Uganda
On 13 October 2005, the International Criminal Court unsealed warrants of arrest for five senior leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) for the forced conscription of children and other war crimes in northern Uganda. We compiled a database of 25,231 children and youth who had been registered by receptions centers in northern Uganda after their return from the LRA. Most of the LRA returnees were thirteen to eighteen years old (37 percent) and nineteen to thirty years old (24 percent). Twenty-four percent of the LRA returnees were female and 76 percent were male. The average length of abduction was 342 days, and the median number of days of abduction was ninety-two days. Among women aged nineteen to thirty years old, the average length of abduction was four and one half years. At the multivariate level, gender, age, and the interaction between them were associated with length of captivity (F-Statistic = 229.8, p-value = 0.0001). Using triangulation methods, we estimate the LRA abducted 54,000 to 75,000 people, including 25,000 to 38,000 children, into their ranks between 1986 and 2006.