The Human Rights of Women in Syria, Between Discriminatory Law, Patriarchal Culture, and the Exclusionary Politics of the Regime

In an effort to research the effects and consequences of systematic legal exclusion, social marginalization, and the regime’s punitive practices (administrative, political, and security) in perpetuating women’s vulnerability and promoting legal, and societal, exclusion of women, and the consequences on women’s status as citizens with deficient rights, a series of field consultations were held to explore the views and positions of women in Syria, Turkey, and Lebanon regarding these issues. The consultations were organized by Dawlaty and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, in partnership with Zenobia, Release Me, Nophotozone, Start Point, Syrian Women Survivors, and Damma. These consultations also aimed at monitoring the gender effects of successive displacements on women, and the failure of judicial and legal structures to address the undermining of women’s legal and social status. In this effort, the organizations involved sought to develop a preliminary conception of transitional justice mechanisms in need of adopting a gender perspective.