Dr Jess Gifkins initiated a program of research on Queering Atrocity Prevention in collaboration with Dr Dean Cooper-Cunningham at the University of Copenhagen and the team at Protection Approaches in London. The project integrates queer perspectives and experiences which have been missing from research, policy, and practice on the prevention of mass atrocity crimes. We also bring an intersectional approach to the project and aim to interogate structures of power and oppression across different lived experineces. Queer persecution should have been an intrinsic part of atrocity preventio and the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) since the outset, as we know that LGBTQI+ people have been targeted during and in the lead up to mass atrocity crimes as far back as the Holocaust.
Protection Approaches appointed Dr Gifkins as their Queering Atrocity Prevention Research Fellow in 2021 in recognition of this partnership. This research has been discussed in the UN Security Council and This research has been cited in a UK House of Commons Select Committee report and in a UN General Assembly report published by the UN Independent Expert on sexual orientation and gender identity, Victor Madrigal-Borloz
Outputs from this Project
Report: Queering Atrocity Prevention (2022) published by Protection Approaches, co-authored with Dean Cooper-Cunningham, Kate Ferguson, Farida Mostafa, and Detmer Kremer.
Journal Article: Jess Gifkins and Dean Cooper-Cunningham (2023) ‘Queering the Responsibility to Protect’, International Affairs, 99(5): 2057-2078 (open access).
Podcast: Expert Voices in Atrocity Prevention, (2023) hosted by the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, Episode 23, Kate Ferguson and Jess Gifkins
Blog: Why and How Should we Queer Atrocity Prevention? (2023) with International Affairs, coauthored with Dean Cooper-Cunningham
Magazine article: Can the UN Protect Queer Rights? (2023) with Foreign Policy, coauthored with Dean Cooper-Cunningham, Jamie J. Hagen, and Maria Susana Peralta Ramon.
Blog: Bringing Queer Perspectives into Atrocity Prevention (2022) with Australian Outlook for the Australian Institute of International Affairs, coauthored with Dean Cooper-Cunningham
Media coverage: Queering Atrocity Prevention report makes National and International impact (2022) coverage of report coauthored with Kate Ferguson, Dean Cooper-Cunningham, Detmer Kremer, and Farida Mostafa
