Whereas victims' rights and demands have gained attention in practice and scholarship of transitional justice (TJ), victims are at best consultees and witnesses, not decision makers. Victims' participation as political actors, and the impact of socio-political participation on survivors is still an under-researched area in TJ. This article provides an analysis of how victims' participation is given shape in the everyday functioning of Colombia's Victims' Law. This law offers an excellent case to examine this, since it provides an ongoing and ambitious TJ mechanism with a detailed framework for participation. This allows for a better understanding of this phenomenon in practice, beyond the understanding of victim-centred justice as the mere presence of victims. This article critically engages with victim-centred TJ theories which are based on long-held assumptions of how participation will lead to ownership and citizenship. It moreover explores the impact that participation throughout the different phases of non-judicial TJ procedures has on victims. It asks whether their engagement means that TJ processes indeed respond better to victims' needs, whether victims feel a greater ownership of these processes as a result, and whether victims even want to participate. It concludes by reflecting on the implications for victim-centred TJ, by explaining that participation should privilege genuinely participatory processes which take survivors and their agency as 2 a starting point. This requires recognising and building upon victims' pre-existent internal organisational and decision-making processes and timeframes, to create a more horizontal way of relating.
Experiencing sexual violence may have serious long-term consequences for victims. Seeking help may decrease the chances of developing long-term physical and psychosocial problems. Still not every victim seeks help, and especially with victimization of sexual violence, there may be several reasons as to why. The barriers to help-seeking are diverse and may depend on several contextual factors. This study, as part of a larger research project, aimed to determine the barriers that victims of sexual violence experience in their decision to seek help in a non-college setting. This mixed-methods study included an online survey ( N = 133) and open-ended survey ( N = 207) amongst victims of 18 years and older. The online survey data were analyzed using chi-square tests for independence and t-tests; the open-ended survey data were analyzed using a descriptive approach. The online survey data showed that minimization of the incident was higher for non-help-seekers, whilst distrust toward support providers and issues with the accessibility of help were higher for help-seekers. No further significant associations were found between the decision to seek help and the barriers to help-seeking. From the open-ended survey data, three categories of barriers were distinguished: (a) individual barriers, such as feelings of shame, (b) interpersonal barriers, such as the fear of negative social reactions and (c) sociocultural barriers, such as societal stereotypes regarding sexual violence. The findings suggest that victims experience various, but primarily individual, barriers to help-seeking and that these barriers do not strongly differ between help-seekers and non-help-seekers. This study highlights the importance of addressing barriers to help-seeking on an organizational and societal level to encourage help-seeking.
General rightsCopyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.• Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policyIf you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
The new millennium has meant a new start for Peruvian society. After decades of political violence, economic crisis, and an internal war, democracy was restored, and economic growth resumed. The many grassroots organizations that had been established to address the economic and political crisis seem to have lost their initial raison d'être. Still, they have remained in operation to this very day. In this article, we analyze the history and continued presence of two types of urban grassroots organizations: the communal kitchens and the victim-survivor organizations. Our leading question is: what is the present-day rationale sustaining these grassroots organizations that originated as responses to the political and economic turmoil from the previous decades? As we will argue, insight into the values of economic solidarity, participatory democracy, and gender equality is important to better understand the organization's continuity. They shed light on the organizations' changing roles and diverging meanings that their members attribute to them. Nowadays, members see the organizations as a platform for self-expression. Resumen El nuevo milenio ha significado un nuevo comienzo para la sociedad peruana. Tras décadas de violencia política, crisis económica y una guerra interna, se restauró la democracia y se reanudó el crecimiento económico. Las muchas organizaciones de base que se habían establecido para abordar la crisis económica y política parecen haber perdido su razón de ser inicial. Sin embargo, han seguido funcionando hasta este día. En el presente artículo, analizamos la historia y la presencia continuada de dos tipos de organizaciones urbanas de base: las cocinas comunitarias y las asociaciones de víctimas sobrevivientes. Nuestra pregunta inductiva es: >cuál es la lógica actual que sustenta a estas organizaciones de base que se originaron como respuesta a la agitación política y económica de las décadas previas? Como argumentaremos, el conocimiento de los valores de solidaridad económica, democracia participativa e igualdad de género es importante para comprender mejor la continuidad de la organización. Estos valores arrojan luz sobre los papeles cambiantes y los significados divergentes de las organizaciones que sus miembros les atribuyen. En la actualidad, los miembros ven a las organizaciones como una plataforma para la autoexpresión. Résumé
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.