Event and Victimization

Abstract

This article contributes to recent existentialist interventions in critical criminology (see Lippens and Crewe 2009) and offers the existential concept of 'event' as a guiding image for critical victimology. Whereas existential criminologists have examined crime and wrongdoing, very little attention has been given to victimization. I utilize the existential phenomenology of Martin Heidegger and Claude Romano to offer a critique of existing approaches to victimization within mainstream criminology and develop an evential analytic to understand the event of victimization. This paper brings together existential philosophy and victimology to offer an alternative approach to victimization. I engage with the 'problem of number' in conventional victimology and offer a critique of quantitative approaches to victimization based on the unsubstitutability and singularity of existence. Through a discussion of selfhood and embodiment from an evential standpoint, this paper moves beyond existing victimological approaches to identity. I also consider the relationship between victimization and trauma. In the final section of the paper I carve out an alternative research agenda through a discussion of bearing witness and events of victimization.

The Aftermath of Human Trafficking: Exploring the Albanian Victims’ Return, Rehabilitation, and Reintegration Challenges

“…Victims of any kind have always generated feelings of compassion, with the more defenseless victims being the primary targets of altruistic human sentiments (Fattah, 2016). However, victimization is not an objective reality and what a victim experiences almost never matches the legal and social interpretations of victimization (Spencer, 2011;Walklate, 2012). The following sub-sections reflect on the contrast between the seemingly victim-centered legal measures and theoretical discussions of return and reintegration, and the tangible reality as experienced by victims.…”

‘Seeing’ gender, war and terror

“…Some time ago Berger (1972) commented that human beings learn much from their senses and this includes their visual senses. Moreover, Spencer (2010) suggests images constitute an opportunity, or a space, to reflect upon the past, to think about the future and ruminate on the connections between the two. Given the work I was engaged with during 2014 (an edited collection on criminology and war and ongoing preparatory work with a French colleague in relation to violence against women prior to a research visit with her), these photographs certainly afforded me that opportunity.…”

Nils Christie: On the periphery but in the centre

“…This position reflects some parallels with that of Quinney who advocated a role for the criminologist as witness (Quinney, 1998). Taking this one step further Spencer has also made the case for a victimology that bears witness to the 'event' of victimisation of the self, the harms experienced by others, and the process of witnessing as a practice (Spencer, 2010). We have advocated elsewhere for a similar view of victimological work that distinguishes between 'witnessing' what we 'see', and 'bearing witness' to see beyond what we 'see':…”