Women’s police stations are a distinctive innovation that emerged in postcolonial nations of the global south in the second half of the twentieth century to address violence against women. This article presents the results of a world-first study of the unique way that these stations, called Comisaría de la Mujer, prevent gender-based violence in the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. One in five police stations in this Province was established with a mandate of preventing gender violence. Little is currently known about how this distinctive multidisciplinary model of policing (which includes social workers, lawyers, psychologists and police) widens access to justice to prevent gender violence. This article compares the model’s virtues and limitations to traditional policing models. We conclude that specialised women’s police stations in the postcolonial societies of the global south increase access to justice, empower women to liberate themselves from the subjection of domestic violence and prevent gender violence by challenging patriarchal norms that sustain it. As a by-product, these women’s police stations also offer women in the global south a career in law enforcement—one that is based on a gender perspective. The study is framed by southern criminology, which reverses the notion that ideas, policies and theories can only travel from the anglophone world of the global north to the global south.
The criminalisation of domestic violence during the 1970s and 1980s was lauded by feminists as a victory, as the state taking responsibility for the safety of women. The problem was that its regulation was delegated to a masculinist judicial system and its policing delegated to a militarised and masculinised police service that left victims disappointed, re-victimised or disbelieved. Our paper investigates how to re-imagine the policing of victims/survivors of gender-based violence from a women-centred perspective. Drawing on secondary and primary empirical research on women's police stations (WPS), that first emerged in Brasil in 1985 and Argentina in 1988, this paper investigates whether this model could offer an innovative remedy to the masculinised ill-equipped traditional models of policing of gender-based violence. Framed by southern theory our project reverses the notion that knowledge/policy transfer should flow from the Anglophone countries of the Global-North to the Global-South. Our project aimed to discover, firstly, how women's police stations – a unique invention of the Global-South, respond to and prevent gender-based violence and, secondly, what aspects could inform the development of new approaches to policing and prevention of gender-based violence elsewhere in the world. We conclude that this uniquely South American innovation might serve as an inspiration to Australia and elsewhere in the world struggling with the shadow pandemic of gender violence. Our paper draws on original empirical and historical research undertaken in Brasil, Argentina and Australia to offer new practical and conceptual insights into how to enhance the policing of gender-based violence.
En el Sur Global abundan cuestiones vitales para la investigación criminológica y de relevancia política, con importantes implicancias para las relaciones Sur/Norte y para la seguridad y la justicia globales. Contar con un marco teórico capaz de apreciar la importancia de esta dinámica global contribuirá para que la criminología pueda entender mejor los desafíos del presente y del futuro. Empleamos la teoría del Sur de una manera reflexiva para dilucidar las relaciones de poder enraizadas en la producción jerárquica de conocimiento criminológico que privilegia teorías, supuestos y métodos basados en las especificidades empíricas del Norte Global. Nuestro propósito no es desestimar los avances teóricos y empíricos realizados sino, en forma más productiva, descolonizar y democratizar la caja de herramientas criminológicas disponibles. Como una forma de ilustrar cómo la Criminología del Sur podría ser útil para contribuir a informar mejor las respuestas a la justicia y la seguridad globales, este artículo examina tres proyectos distintos que podrían ser desarrollados bajo esta rúbrica. Estos incluyen, en primer lugar, ciertas formas y patrones de delitos específicos de la periferia global; en segundo lugar, los patrones distintivos de género y delito en el Sur Global; y, finalmente, las peculiaridades históricas y contemporáneas de la penalidad en el Sur Global y sus vínculos históricos con el colonialismo y la construcción del imperio.
El ingreso de las mujeres a la policía, una ocupación tradicionalmente masculina, ha sido teorizada casi enteramente a través de los lentes teóricos del feminismo liberal donde la igualdad con los hombres es el objetivo final. Desde este punto de vista teórico, las comisarías de la mujer en el Sur Global creadas específicamente para responder a la violencia de género han sido conceptualizada como vestigios del pasado. Nosotros argumentamos que esa interpretación está basada en una epistemología global que privilegia al Norte Global como referencia normativa a partir de la cual definir el progreso. Enmarcados en la criminología del sur, ofrecemos una forma alternativa de teorizar el progreso de las mujeres en la policía empleando las comisarías de la mujer que emergieron en América Latina en los 1980s, específicamente aquella en la Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Desde el año 2008, el Programa Delito y Sociedad de la Universidad Nacional del Litoral lleva adelante una Encuesta sobre Delito, Sensación de Inseguridad y Sistema Penal a una muestra representativa de ciudadanos mayores de 15 años que residen en la ciudad de Santa Fe, Argentina. Entre otras problemáticas sociales, esta Encuesta indaga sobre los contactos de las/los ciudadanas/os con la institución policial y las actitudes públicas con respecto a la policía. El presente artículo describe una serie de observaciones empíricas surgidas de las diferentes ondas de la Encuesta, a lo largo del período 2008 a 2019. En primer lugar, detalla los distintos tipos de experiencias de contacto, diferenciando si han sido iniciados por la policía (involuntarios) o por las/los ciudadanas/os (voluntarios). En segundo lugar, expone las valoraciones generales y específicas que las/los ciudadanas/os producen a partir de dichas experiencias. Finalmente, analiza el vínculo entre ambos temas, esto es, si los distintos tipos de contacto impactan o no en las valoraciones específicas y generales que la ciudadanía construye con respecto a la policía. Sobre estos dos objetos —y su relación—, se explora simultáneamente su evolución a lo largo del tiempo como sus particularidades en torno las variables género, edad, nivel educativo y haber atravesado o no una experiencia de victimización.
This thesis is the first study on establishing and transforming Women's Police Stations (WPS) in Argentina and their impacts on policing gendered violence. It explores the opinions and representations of WPS employees regarding their practices, their links with social actors, and the cases in which they intervene. This research is a case study of WPS in Argentina that combines semi-structured interviews with 100 WPS' workers, participant observations in 10 WPS, and documentary data analysis. Within the framework of Southern and Feminist Criminology, this thesis addresses the scarcity of studies on policing gendered violence in the Global South.
Women’s entry into policing, a traditionally masculine occupation, has been theorized almost entirely through a liberal feminist theoretical lens where equality with men is the end target. From this theoretical viewpoint, women’s police stations in the Global South established specifically to respond to gender violence have been conceptualized as relics from the past. We argue that this approach is based on a global epistemology that privileges the Global North as the normative benchmark from which to define progress. Framed by southern criminology, we offer an alternative way of theorizing the progress of women in policing using women’s police stations that emerged in Latin America in the 1980s, specifically those in the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina.
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