Join us for the launch of Noemí Pérez Vásquez's new book, Women's Access to Transitional Justice in Timor-Leste.
This book delivers an assessment of access to transitional justice from a gender perspective. Drawing from interviews with female participants, judges and prosecutors, this book provides a deep analysis of the situation in Timor-Leste, and how justice is served amid post-conflict reconciliations and reparations mechanisms.
By raising women's experiences in dealing with the law and policies as well as the implications of community and family practices during post-conflict situations, the book shows how these mechanisms may have been implemented mechanically, without considering the different intersections of discrimination, the public and private divides that exist in the local context or the stereotypes and values of international and national actors.
Inspired by the work of Hannah Arendt, with a post-colonial theoretical component and based on extensive field research in Timor-Leste, Noemi's book has larger implications for the overarching debate on the social consequences of transitional justice.
Meet the speaker and chair:
Noemí Pérez Vásquez's work falls within the intersections between law and politics. Noemi is currently working as a Legal Officer at the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Colombia. She has worked mainly with the United Nations on issues of the justice sector, human rights, women and children, including for the OHCHR, UNDP, UNMISS, UNICEF as well as for the The International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute (IBAHRI). She was a Visiting Researcher at the Universidade Nacional Timor Lorosa’e, in Dili, Timor-Leste from 2016 to 2017, where she carried out her fieldwork research.
Chair: Sarah Smith, is the Centre Manager at the LSE Centre for Women, Peace and Security. She was previously a Research Officer where she worked on the 'Feminist International Law of Peace and Security', 'Gendered Peace' and ‘Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls’ projects. She is author of Gendering Peace: UN Peacebuilding in Timor-Leste (Routledge, Gender in Global Politics Series, 2019). Before joining LSE WPS she was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Gender Studies at Central European University in Budapest and has also taught at Monash University, Swinburne University of Technology and Australian Catholic University in Melbourne.
Image credit: Carlos Oviedo