Article Gendered Experiences of Subsistence Harms: A Possible Contribution to Feminist Discourse

The article aims to contribute to feminist critiques of the treatment of gendered harm in international law, specifically in relation to socio-economic forms of violence. It focuses on deprivations of subsistence needs, in the form of forced displacement and attacks on homes, livelihoods and basic resources, as one particular type of gendered harm that has remained marginalized in international law. Whilst existing feminist research provides some significant insights into the gendered nature of socio-economic forms of violence, there has yet to be systematic analysis and conceptualizations of such harm. The article argues that the concept of subsistence harms, in foregrounding the interrelated physical, mental and social harms of deprivations of subsistence needs, provides a way both of contesting current concepts and framings of violence and of exploring gendered experi-ences of forced displacement and attacks on homes, livelihoods and basic resources. Whilst the concept only focuses on one particular type of harm, it could contribute to feminist discourse on gendered harm in providing a framework and language with which to analyse gendered experiences of these harms and therefore providing one way of taking the current debate forward