Banning Child Pornography: Women’s Political Participation and Domestic Regulation
Presenter: Minju Kwon
Why do some states establish more robust legislative bans on child pornography than others? Despite the development of international institutions created to protect children from sexual violence, laws prohibiting child pornography still significantly vary from state to state. This research will be the first large-N cross-national analysis of the causal factors that affect states’ varying degrees of domestic regulations of child pornography. Taking the position that child pornography is primarily a gender issue, I predict that a state with a higher degree of women’s political participation is more likely to legislate more comprehensive child pornography bans. By statistically analyzing an original dataset that includes the varying strength of domestic regulations in 196 countries from 2006 to 2018, I investigate how women’s political participation in three types of institutions—legislative systems, cabinet systems, and civil society organizations—affects child pornography bans.
February 26
3-4pm
337 O'Shaughnessy
Minju Kwon is a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science with a graduate minor in Gender Studies. Her research interests are in international human rights and humanitarian institutions, with a particular focus on child rights. Her dissertation topic is non-state actors’ compliance with international law on child rights in armed conflicts. She is currently working on child pornography bans with the support of the Gender Studies Graduate Research Grant.