Violence against women in Brazil and the Inter-American human rights system

Towards a transconstitutional approach

Abstract

Sovereignty, understood as the possibility of a State creating, independently of external orders, institutions and laws, is one of the classic themes of Political Science. However, from the post-war period, the international community realized that domestic legal systems could be insufficient to protect human rights. Thus, the Global Human Rights System emerged and, later, regional protection systems were created: the European and the Inter-American. From this perspective, this article analyzes the contributions of the inter-American system to the fight against domestic violence in Brazil. The general objective of this presentation is to reflect on the importance of the Maria da Penha Law, enacted after recommendations from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, while the specific objective is to identify how this regional system can contribute to legislative and institutional advances in relation to the confrontation of violence domestic, in the light of “transconstitutionalism” (Neves, 2014). The methodology used will be documentar ethnographic and bibliographic research. It is concluded that the interdependence of internal and external systems is beneficial to the evolution of legal systems.