The deaths and disappearances of more than 400 women in Ciudad Juarez since 1993, and particularly the research and activism regarding these brutalities, serves as the catalyst for Violence and Activism at the Border. Kathleen Staudt deftly reviews key theories, case studies, testimonies, organizations, and strategies of resistance in the most comprehensive study of femicide along the border to date.

Staudt does more than simply catalog the extant body of literature or filter the many cultural and political expressions through an academic lens; she immerses and engages. Specifically, she contributes to a cross-national intellectual community through the production of in-depth research using multiple methods, including surveys, fieldwork, and interpretive frameworks. She couples these with an ongoing commitment to feminist activism and yields a poignant study of femicide, the border region, and the normalization of violence against women. In the end, Staudt brings together the best insights of emerging scholarship with her own applied practice to offer a grounded analysis of relevance for political scientists and practitioners alike.

Four questions anchor this book (p. 3):

Staudt systematically unpacks each of these questions employing various explanatory frameworks, including a critique of neoliberalism, a comparative institutions approach, and cultural and textual analyses.

Key to this work is the examination of femicide in the border region of Ciudad Juarez/El Paso and its relationship to the broader incidences of violence against women from interpersonal and domestic violence to the gendered economic violence stemming from the virtually unlimited growth in free trade. While Ciudad Juarez is known for the hundreds of deaths of young women, Staudt notes how this violence is connected to a larger pattern of displacement and economic marginalization rooted in the region's growth as Mexico's manufacturing capital, which has more than 300 factories and 200,000 workers. Moreover, she shifts from viewing the proliferation of domestic violence and the incidences of femicide as disconnected anomalies and traces their connection to a normalization of violence that is equally economic and political. Thus, she asserts (p. 46):

The fruits of Staudt's grounded research are best demonstrated in Chapter 3 in which she reports on an innovate survey of domestic violence and family life developed in conjunction with Ciudad Juarez-FEMAP (Federación Mexicana de Asociaciones Privadas/Mexican Federation of Private Association), a leading women-centered nongovernmental organization (NGO) in Juarez. The survey of 615 women asks respondents to reflect on their own experiences with interpersonal violence. These responses are supplemented by a series of workshops facilitated by FEMAP organizers in which the women expressed their feelings about violence through nontraditional forms, including posters and plays. The combination of methods yields rich empirical observations (e.g., approximately 100,000 women between the ages of 15 and 39 in Juarez are survivors of violence) and even more vibrant personal observations. Staudt aptly uses the variety of data to underscore the expansiveness of violence and to draw out the many forms of coping, resistance, and even resignation among the women.

Chapters 4 and 5 mirror each other with analyses of the social movements and NGO and activist responses to femicide in Juarez, followed by a review of government responses. Through the heuristic lens of gender performance, the author captures the successful mobilizations of activists as well as the limitations, exhaustions, and tensions within the movement as it expands.

Particularly notable is her analysis of the movement itself, from its foundation in antiglobalization organizing through the initial response of local community-based groups, and ultimately its emergence as a national and international platform. Her intimate knowledge of the individual actors, institutions, and local and national organizations yields a particularly brave and pointed assessment of what worked, who benefited, and the strategic failures.

In addition, Staudt's appreciation for the moments of disruption among feminist activists resonates strongly with anyone who has engaged in social justice work, particularly in a transnational context. From the description of tensions with “far-away” feminists who profit from political performances of other women's pain to the exhaustion of local activists struggling to keep working despite the stall in media coverage, her analysis reminds us of the enduring obstacles to democratic organizing. Ultimately, the frustrations, disruptions, and successes that she describes are not only powerful case studies for students of democratic theory; they are also captured with care and an attention to context that make them poignant lessons for any activist.

Staudt concludes in Chapter 6 by revisiting the links between the incidences of femicide in Mexico and Guatemala and the normalization of violence in these locations. However, despite the continuation and even expansion of femicide, the retrenchment of the Mexican federal government (signaled by the end of the termination of the federal criminal investigation in Juarez), and the seemingly insurmountable nature of this violence, Staudt reminds us of the possibilities for change, particularly through the kind of transnational feminist praxis modeled on page 157: