Consent-based Rape Definitions

In Equality Now’s 2021 study, 23 of the 43 jurisdictions surveyed in the Americas require the use of additional violence, threat, or using the victim’s physical helplessness, incapacity, or inability to resist as elements of rape.

This sheet explores why consent-based definitions are necessary, why forced-based definitions fail survivors, outlines the key elements of a consent-based rape definition, offers a standard to which governments can align their laws, and presents the international and regional human rights standards that provide the framework on which this information is based.