New book examines feminist, human rights struggles in Peru

1:07 p.m., Sept. 28, 2015--A new book by Pascha Bueno-Hansen, assistant professor of women and gender studies and director of the Sexualities and Gender Studies minor at the University of Delaware, examines gender-based violence and reconciliation in post-civil war Peru.

Feminist and Human Rights Struggles in Peru: Decolonizing Transitional Justice was published in August by the University of Illinois Press as part of the "Dissident Feminisms" book series. 

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Bueno-Hansen, who also is affiliated with the Department of Political Science and International Relations and with the Latin American and Iberian Studies Program, examines the period that followed a generation of armed conflict and authoritarian rule in Peru. 

In 2001, that nation established a Truth and Reconciliation Committee (TRC), which Bueno-Hansen explores to demonstrate the tension between the state’s promise of transitional justice and the reality of persistent inequality.

The book discusses the TRC, along with feminist and human rights movements and various nongovernmental organizations, in a historical context and shows the difficulties in addressing gender-based violence.

Reviewers have praised Feminist and Human Rights Struggles in Peru as “a compelling analysis of the Peruvian transitional justice process” and an “interdisciplinary and theoretically innovative book.”

“Bueno-Hansen expands the framework of transitional justice to encompass the afterlife of colonialism,” wrote Rosa-Linda Fregoso, co-editor of Terrorizing Women: Feminicide in the Américas. “She extends the definition of gender-based violences beyond sexual violence. Feminist and Human Rights Struggles in Peru is soundly argued and thought provoking.” 

Bueno-Hansen, who earned her doctorate at the University of California, Santa Cruz, has taught courses at UD on subjects including introduction to sexualities and gender studies, women’s studies in a global context, transnational feminisms and social media, feminism and global activism. 

She is also an affiliated faculty member of the master’s in community psychology program at the Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Peru.