Doctoral Dissertation Research: Domestic Violence at the Crossroads: the interaction of the criminal, civil and child protection responses

本研究审查了三个独立但相互关联的法律程序--刑事司法系统、民事保护秩序程序和儿童福利制度--家庭暴力的女性受害者经常与之互动，并可能在这些程序中经历很大程度的体制管理。这项研究将研究受害者的行为如何被那些被指控干预他们的案件的人命名和解释。观察将在刑事和民事法庭以及工作地点进行，并对加利福尼亚州旧金山的30名机构工作人员进行采访。由30名曾参与国家事务的受虐妇女组成的焦点小组将解释该系统的用户如何理解其运作。对20名全国范围内的家庭暴力倡导者的采访将讲述国家政策发展如何影响当地正在进行的工作。工人叙述将提供丰富的数据，以检查受害者的行动是如何被阅读的，以及这些阅读是随着时间的推移还是在机构之间发生变化，并将开发突出同时干预的关键时刻的地图。这些叙述和地图将使人们能够查明体制进程内部和之间出现的矛盾，以及在发生冲突时将责任归咎于谁或什么。

This study examines three separate but interrelated legal processes with which female victims of domestic violence interact on a regular basis, and where they potentially experience a large degree of institutional managing -- the criminal justice system, the civil protection order process and the child welfare system. The research will study how the actions of victims are named and interpreted by those charged with intervening in their cases. Observations will take place in criminal and civil courts, and work sites, and interviews conducted with 30 institutional workers in San Francisco, California. Focus groups with 30 battered women who have been involved with the state will explicate how users of the system understand its functioning. Interviews with 20 nationally based domestic violence advocates will speak to how national policy development informs work that is being done locally. Worker narratives will provide rich data to examine how victim actions are read, and whether these readings change over time or between agencies, and maps that highlight key moments of simultaneous intervention will be developed. These narratives and maps will make it possible to identify contradictions that arise within and between institutional processes and to whom or what blame is affixed when conflicts arise.