ABSTRACT
To read from the South entails at least to confront the machinery of the so-called ‘colonial difference,’ which constantly and pervasively inscribes a hierarchical dichotomy between ‘the West’ and its ‘others.’ Reading from the South thus entails an ideology critique of the illusion of separation and insists instead on a single world system. The various instruments of international law have hitherto played an important role in perpetuating the colonial difference, even as they propose to overcome it, i.e., to build bridges of liberation from the Enlightened centre to the global margins. International Criminal Law shares in this predicament, as will be shown, particularly in relation to the various courts’ and tribunals’ approaches to sexual violence in armed conflict. While developments in ICL around SVAC hold much potential for victim-survivors, what exactly are the implications of this critical analysis for transnational feminist solidarity and the future of ICL?
