Victimology in transitional justice: Victimhood, innocence and hierarchy

Abstract

Although addressing the needs of victims is increasingly proffered as the key rationale for transitional justice, serious critical discussion on the political and social construction of victimhood is only tentatively emerging in the field. Drawing from Anglo-American victimology, the first part of this paper suggests that victims of crime as a category are often perceived as the mirror opposite of perpetrators of crime. It suggests that such a perspective narrows the notion of victims’ rights or needs so they become intrinsically linked to the punishment of perpetrators; that victims and perpetrators are reified and distinct categories; and that ‘true’ victim status demands innocence. The second part of the paper takes these insights and applies them to the context of transitional justice. In particular, it questions the notion of ‘innocence’ as a prerequisite for victim recognition and explores the ways in which victims and perpetrators are not always easily identified as distinct categories in conflicted or transitional societies. The paper concludes that incorporating blame in the calibration of human suffering results in the morally corrosive language of a ‘hierarchy of victims’.

Deconstructing Victim and offender Identites in Discourses on Child Sexual Abuse: Hierarchies, Blame and the Good/Evil Dialectic

“…Victimcentric discourses have underpinned the contemporary regulatory regime with the co-optation of the crime victim providing 'an all-purpose justification for measures of penal repression' (Garland, 2001: 143) and a whole industry of 'offender-focused corrections ' (McEvoy andMcConnachie, 2012: 530, citing Rock, 1998). Other scholars have explored what has been termed 'the politics of victimhood' (Bouris, 2007: 10) within the context of peace making or transitional justice (McEvoy and McConnachie, 2012). This article extends this discussion by examining the construction and reproduction of victimhood, as well as offending behaviour, within the context of risk-centric discourses concerning sex offending against children.…”

Victims of Terrorism and Political Violence: Identity, Needs, and Service Delivery in Northern Ireland and Great Britain

“…The question of the innocence of victims was never raised. Particularly for the 28 victims of the London bombings, there was a sense that public empathy was high. Perhaps due to the random nature of their experience, it resonated with all Londoners who took a daily commute.…”

Child Sexual Exploitation: Definition and the importance of language

“…The use of biased language relates to the notion of the 'deserving victim', a concept that has been widely debated within victimology literature. Researchers have observed that a hierarchy exists among victims, where some individuals are viewed as deserving of victim status and others are viewed as being responsible for their experiences (McEvoy & McConnachie, 2012). In historical victimological theory and research, some victims were classified in the hierarchy based on how much they were perceived to have contributed to, or caused, their own victimisation.…”

“…In historical victimological theory and research, some victims were classified in the hierarchy based on how much they were perceived to have contributed to, or caused, their own victimisation. This was termed 'precipitation', where victims are viewed as having contributed to their experiences and, consequently, blame is assigned to them, whereas others are viewed as innocent (McEvoy & McConnachie, 2012). This debate extends to victims of sexual abuse, where it is argued that an 'ideal victim' is vulnerable, that they should appear to others as being powerless in the encounter and that they are dominated by the perpetrator.…”