PHD THESIS
 

Title: Violence Against Women: An Inquiry into Feminist Critiques and the Epistemological Value of International Law

PhD Supervisor: Neus Torbisco Casals

Expected completion date: 2027.

This research aims to clarify the normative basis of international provisions on violence against women and to examine law’s function in global society in relation to gender equality. This will require a conceptual analysis of gender-based violence in all its forms, ranging from discriminatory acts to heinous crimes. Ideally, this work will also serve to assess the existence of a coherent legal regime on violence against women only, and whether this can bridge the absence, in feminist legal theories, of an overarching framework for addressing issues of gender in law. As such, this research will highly rely on the connections between criminal law, human rights law, and the gender dimension of equality. It seeks to bring feminisms in communication with sociological theories of law and social justice.
 

PROFILE

Alessia is a PhD candidate in International Law at the Geneva Graduate Institute, where she also obtained her master’s degree in International Law. She graduated cum laude in Political Sciences and International Relations from the University of Florence, Italy. She was a project and research assistant at the Global Health Centre, where she worked on the Geneva Global Health Platform and the Governing Pandemics Initiative, seeking to promote discussion and collaborations in order to improve health policies at the global level. Previously, she interned at the UN’s International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and at Data Life Lab, a research centre of the University of Florence. 
 

Research Interests

• Feminist legal theories
• Gender studies
• International human rights law
• International criminal law
• Global health law
   

ACADEMIC WORK EXPERIENCE
 

Research Assistant, Global Health Centre

RELEVANT PUBLICATIONS AND WORKS
 

• Nicastro A. (2021) “The Passivity of Italy in Counteracting Domestic Violence: the Talpis v. Italy Case”, Amsterdam Law Forum 13(3). 
• Civil Society Alliance for Human Rights in the Pandemic Treaty, “Human Rights Concerns in the Zero Draft of the WHO CA+”, the Civil Society Alliance for Human Rights in the Pandemic Treaty, 24 February 2023.
• Hosseinalipour S.-M. & Nicastro A., ‘Pandemic Financing: Losing on All Fronts?’ Health Policy Watch – Governing Pandemics Snapshot (Geneva, 4 July 2023). 
   

FELLOWSHIPS, GRANTS AND AWARDS
 

• Graduate Scholarship, The Graduate Institute, PhD in International Law, 2023
• Erasmus Program Scholarship, Exchange Student in Maastricht University, 2019
   

Other Work Experience
 

• Project and Research Assistant, Global Health Centre