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"The establishment of the International Criminal Court (icc) and the adoption of the Rome Statute were viewed by many as a step forward in the defence of women’s rights on an international scale, and above all in the fight against gender-based violence in armed conflicts. But the inclusion of ‘gender’ in the Statute was not acquired without a struggle, especially on the part of women’s rights ngos. In this article, we examine the history of the gender debates in international criminal law, in order to trace the process through which gender-related crimes were acknowledged in the Rome Statute. We then analyse the application of international criminal law to specific cases of gender-related crimes, in order to show the enduring obstacles that prevent gender issues from genuinely being taken into account by law; finally, we discuss the way in which icc jurisprudence could have a wider influence on the acknowledgement of gender in other spheres of international or domestic law."