“Human Rights Protection, Democratic Deliberation”
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number of problems, including, but not limited to, how to subvert
patriarchal institutions, empower women and victims of VAW,
overcome affective dependency and victim’s sense of shame and
self-blame, provide aids and assistances to co-nationals with
ambiguous immigrant status who are among those suffering sexual
and physical violence in the hands of (ex-)boyfriends and
(ex-)husbands, come to terms with the often non-coerced nature of
veiling in contrast to the imposed practice that has been officially
banned in France, and promote a “zero tolerance” approach to
VAW. How then should these issues be addressed? There are, I
gather, no easy answers.
54
But one needs to keep in mind that the
policing approach, as I have presented it, is a remedy for notable
gaps in the current campaign to eradicate VAW. As such, its aim is
to supplement, not to supplant, the existing approaches. It does
that by shining light, and building, on the innovative police-led
strategies and the exemplary legal measures that the theoretical
literature and the empirical findings, such as the United Nations
experts,’ have largely overlooked. Thus, I do not propose a be-all
and end-all alternative seeking to topple the global approach;
rather, I want to
couple
the policing approach
with
other
governmental organizations and actors (Edwards, 2013; Hellum &
Aasen, 2013), as well as civil society organizations and actors (Klein,
2012), who are certainly the best equipped to tackle all the
non-police-enforcement issues.
That the policing approach is narrow in scope and piecemeal
in nature should not point to its limitation but the most attractive
feature: its greatest potential for success at genuinely preventing
VAW. As the European Court of Human Rights has noted,
55
in
54
Here is not the place to propose glib answer(s) to these questions; their solutions
are best attempted in separate occasion(s), where the issues may be treated
thoroughly. Within the scope of this article, and due to limitation of space, it is
impossible to examine these subject-matters fairly.
55
“The [European] Court [of Human Rights] does not usually refer to the term due
diligence in respect of cases involving violence against women” (Manjoo, 2015:
13).
