Engendering Justice: Constructing Institutions to Address Violence Against Women
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26522/ssj.v2i1.967Keywords:
state institutions, violence, gender, justiceAbstract
This paper addresses how states improve their responsiveness to violence against women in developing countries with little political will and few resources to do so. One key to engendering justice and improving responsiveness is building specialized institutions within the state that facilitate the implementation of laws addressing violence against women. Why and how do states engage in institution-building to protect marginalized populations in these contexts? I propose that developing countries are more likely to create and maintain specialized institutions when domestic and international political and legal frameworks make the state more vulnerable to women’s demands, and when civil society coordinates with the state and/or international organizations to take advantage of this political opportunity. This coordination brings necessary pressure and resources that would be difficult, if not impossible, to deliver otherwise. This inter-institutional coordination is necessary for building and maintaining new state institutions and programs that help to monitor the implementation of laws, develop public policies, provide services for victims, and improve responsiveness of the justice system. This fills an important lacuna in the literature, which focuses on women’s state institutions as an important catalyst for responsiveness to violence against women, but does not explain how these institutions are initially constructed.Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Articles are published in Studies in Social Justice under the Creative Commons "Attribution/Non-Commercial/No Derivative Works" Canada licence.
The copyright for the articles published in this journal is retained by the authors, with first publication rights granted to the journal. By virtue of their appearance in this open access journal, articles may be used, with proper attribution, in educational and other non-commercial settings. The submission of a manuscript to Studies in Social Justice will be taken to mean that the author understands and agrees to the following:
- the manuscript represents original work not previously published;
- the manuscript is not being considered elsewhere for publication in the same language (publication elsewhere in an alternate language does not preclude acceptance of submission to Studies in Social Justice);
- appropriate written copyright permissions have been secured for republication of any copyrighted material contained in the manuscript;
- copyright for this article is retained by the author, with first publication rights granted to Studies in Social Justice;
- by virtue of its appearance in this open access journal, it is understood that the article is freely available for use, with proper attribution, for educational and other non-commercial purposes;
- reuse of the article for commercial purposes by anyone other than the author requires permission of the author;
- the author agrees to cite Studies in Social Justice as a source whenever h/she later republishes or reuses the article in other platforms.