Overview

Historically states have failed to seriously confront violence against women. In response, in many countries women's rights movements have called on the government to prioritize state intervention in cases involving violence between intimate partners, sexual harassment, rape, and sexual assault by both strangers and intimate partners. Those interventions have taken various forms, including the passage of substantive civil and criminal laws governing intimate partner violence, rape and sexual assault, and sexual harassment; the development of civil orders of protection; and the introduction of procedures in the criminal legal system to ensure the effective intervention of police and prosecutors. Indeed, many countries have relied upon intervention by the criminal legal system to meet their requirements under international human rights standards that obligate states to prevent, protect from, prosecute, punish, and provide redress for violence. Although states have taken divergent approaches to the passage and implementation of criminal laws and procedures to address violence against women, two things are clear: criminalization is a primary strategy relied upon by most nations, and yet criminalization is not having the desired impact. This collection explores the extent to which nations have adopted criminal legal reforms to address violence against women, the consequences associated with the implementation of those laws and policies, and who bears those consequences most heavily. The chapters examine the need for both more and less criminalization, ask whether we should think differently about criminalization, and explore the tensions that emerge when criminal law, civil law and social policy speak or fail to speak to each other. Drawing on criminalization approaches and recent debates from across the globe, this collection provides a comparative approach to assess the scope, impact of, and alternatives to criminalization in the response to violence against women.

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9780197651841

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This ground-breaking anthology challenges the widely held belief that all those involved in the feminist movement to end violence against women seek punitive criminal justice responses to the plight of abused women. The readings show that while some feminists still seek increased enforcement of existing laws and harsher penalties for violent men, this is only part of the picture. Many feminists are now at the forefront of progressive efforts to create holistic, non-criminal justice responses and they warrant careful consideration because they effectively address the needs of marginalized survivors that are not met by criminalization. * Walter DeKeseredy, Ph.D. Professor, Anna Deane Carlson Endowed Chair Of Social Sciences, Director, Research Center on Violence â Sociology, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, West Virginia University * At a time when the world is rightly concerned with gender-based violence and the violence of racism, policing, and imprisonment, The Criminalization of Violence Against Women: Comparative Perspectives is essential reading. The book brings together ideologically, geographically, and demographically diverse experts who provide deep analyses of the promises and perils of criminalization and imagine new ways of achieving gender and social justice. * Aya Gruber, Ira C. Rothgerber Professor of Constitutional Law and Criminal Justice, University of Colorado Law School * This book is a preeminent example of the unique value of edited collections in developing scholarly knowledge. It is a timely and important contribution to our understanding of the place of criminalization in addressing violence against women. The chapters, brought together masterfully by the editors, are rich, thoughtful, and engaging. With a global range of contributors, including leading and emerging scholars, the book offers a genuine diversity of approaches and analyses (or methods and arguments). The collection brings vital new perspectives and crucial nuance to debates about the role of the criminal law in state responses to domestic and family violence. It is a must-read for all those working on combatting violence against women. * Arlie Loughnan, Professor of Criminal Law and Criminal Law Theory, University of Sydney * This book is essential to the debate about criminal responses to gender-based violence. It brings perspectives from different countries, from the global north and south, allowing us to examine the nuances and different responses to a complex phenomenon that has no simple solutions. This collection invites us to reflect deeply on the theme and is fundamental reading to advance the development of more effective proposals than the traditional approach from the criminal justice system. * Carmen Hein de Campos, Independent researcher and author of Feminist Criminology: Feminist Theory and Criticism of Criminologies (Lumen Juris, 2013 and 2020) and the edited collections Manual of Criminal Law with a Gender Perspective (Lumen Juris, 2022); Feminist Criminologies: Latin American Perspectives (Lumen Juris, 2020). * This remarkable collection from leading researchers in the field is a much-needed contribution to current feminist debates about the role that the criminal legal system should play in responding to violence against women. The authors bring a range of perspectives - each one well-researched, nuanced, and illuminating. With writing that spans differences across geography, disciplines, and methodologies, the book is a must-read for scholars, students, and for all those who grapple with how to respond to the global problems of violence against women in the context of state systems that are frequently themselves sites of colonial and racial violence. * Professor Donna Coker, University of Miami School of Law *

Author Information

Heather Douglas is Professor, Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne, Australia Kate Fitz-Gibbon is Professor of Social Sciences and Director, Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre, Faculty of Arts, Monash University, Australia Leigh Goodmark is the Marjorie Cook Professor of Law and director of the Gender, Prison, and Trauma Clinic at the Francis King Carey School of Law, University of Maryland, United States Sandra Walklate is the Eleanor Rathbone Chair of Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology, University of Liverpool, England

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