A Critical Analysis of Feminist Legal Theory and its Application to Nigerian Gender Law Reform

Feminist legal theory offers powerful analytical frameworks for critiquing the gendered assumptions embedded in law and identifying pathways for transformative legal reform. This study applies feminist legal theory to an analysis of Nigerian gender law reform processes between 2019 and 2024, examining the development and implementation of legislation including the VAPP Act domestication, the Gender and Equal Opportunities Bill, and State-level child marriage legislation. A qualitative jurisprudential design was employed, combining critical legal analysis with 40 in-depth interviews of gender lawyers, feminist scholars, legislators, and civil society advocates. Feminist standpoint theory and critical race feminism guided the analytical framework. Findings reveal that gender law reform in Nigeria is characterised by incremental compromise that frequently dilutes feminist intent, driven by patriarchal legislative cultures, religious objections, and federalism-related coordination failures. The Gender and Equal Opportunities Bill's repeated failure to pass the National Assembly is analysed as a case study in the limits of liberal feminist legal strategy in a culturally conservative legislative environment. The study develops a Nigerian Feminist Legal Reform Model that incorporates movement building, religious engagement, and coalition politics as prerequisites for effective legislative change. This research makes an original theoretical contribution by contextualising global feminist jurisprudence within Nigeria's plural legal system. Keywords: feminist legal theory, gender law reform, Nigeria, jurisprudence, women's rights