The International Institutions as Promoters of Systemic and Symbolic Violence - Feminist Approach to the Climate Change Regime
| Autor | Douglas de Castro |
| Cargo del Autor | Post-Doc in International Economic Law - São Paulo Law School (fgv) |
| Páginas | 133-178 |
e International Institutions as
Promoters of Systemic and Symbolic
Violence – Feminist Approach to
the Climate Change Regime*
Douglas de Castro**
International regimes are formed to mediate the relationship
between the distribution of power and the anarchical structure
of the international system. In this sense, the formation of
international institutions in the twentieth century occurs under
a scenario marked by the rule of colonialism and imperialism.
1
1 D.S. Pahuja, Decolonising International Law: Development, Economic Growth
and the Politics of Universality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
* I want to thank especially my research assistants Caroline Romano Pelucio,
Giuliana Lopes Simões Romeiro, and Paula Fernandes Maschio, for helping with
the data collection in regard to the climate change conferences.
** Post-Doc in International Economic Law – São Paulo Law School ().
PhD in Political Science – University of São Paulo (-). Master’s in Law
- University of São Paulo (-). LL.M. in International Law – J. Reuben Clark
Law School (). Visiting scholar in the Foundation for Law and International
Aairs (Washington D.C.). Researcher in the Global Law Center – São Paulo Law
School (). Attorney in the Cerqueira Leite Abogados (). Email: douggcas-
tro@gmail.com
133
us, instead of reducing inequalities in the world sys-
tem, international institutions reproduce a prevalent logic of
material and subjective discrimination based on a imperial-
istic ideology marked by violence, which is communicated in
a certain way so that it can justify its importance and legiti-
macy, while imperial violence is perpetuated under the form
of (1) symbolic violence, manifested in language that imposes
a universal meaning, and (2) systemic violence that manifests
itself in the form of the “perfect” functioning of the world eco-
nomic and political system as the ultimate and only possible
form of development.2 One of the most perverse and subtle
dimensions of the colonial violence is gender discrimination.
As such, there is a tension generated by the struggle for
recognition and representation of the women against the
violence can be traced to the 1968 movement.3 Eagleton
commenting on the post-1968 indicates that:
Signicant changes in the common culture or the acad-
emy may not be met by similar advances in political and
economic spheres or those advances, though real, may be
oset by other retreats or areas of neglect. e estimation
that is so dicult to make is whether the glass of feminism
is half empty or half full.4
Upon these initial considerations, the central argument of
this paper is that there is a construction of a “moral grammar”
2 S. Zizek, Violence: Six Sideways Reections. Picador, 2008.
3 S.M. Lipset, “Students and Politics in Comparative Perspective.” Daedalus,
no. 97, 1968.
4 M. Eaglaton, A Concise Companion to Feminist eory. Cambridge, Mass:
Wiley-Blackwell, 2008, p. 2.
134
Derecho internacional: investigación, estudio y enseñanza
that permeates international institutions and norms, which
discriminates against minorities to the point of denying par-
ticipation, thus, increasing the discrepancy of experiences and
expectations between the peoples of the Developed and ird
Worlds.5 is feature of international institutions and norms
generate what Santos6 calls “una tensión dinámica entre el
pilar de la regulación y el pilar de la emancipación,” which is
the tension between International Law and minorities that
are marginalized by the globalization process.
To test how strong the argument is empirically, the paper
selects the climate change regime case.7 e Figure 1 below
is representative of, among other things, the discrepancy in
terms of the women´s participation in the climate change
regime, which is very signicant considering the nature of the
threat that falls upon the very existence of the humankind.
5 A. Honneth, e Struggle for Recognition: e Moral Grammar of Social
Conicts. New York: Polity, 2015.
6 Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Sociología jurídica crítica: Para un nuevo sentido
común en el derecho. Madrid: Trotta, 2009, p. 32.
7 “e typical case study focuses on a case that exemplies a stable, cross-case
relationship. By construction, the typical case may also be considered a representative
case, according to the terms of whatever cross-case model is employed. Indeed, the
latter term is often employed in the psychological literature (e.g. Hersen and Barlow
1976, 24). Because the typical case is well explained by an existing model, the puzzle
of interest to the researcher lies within that case. Specically, the researcher wants
to nd a typical case of some phenomenon so that he or she can better explore the
causal mechanisms at work in a general cross case relationship.” Jason Seawright
and Jonh Gerring, “Case Selection Techniques in Case Study Research A Menu
of Qualitative and Quantitative Options.” Political Research Quarterly, no. 61, 2008,
pp. 294–308. https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912907313077
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e International Institutions as Promoters of Systemic and Symbolic Violence – Feminist
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