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From Legislation to Everyday Practices in Guatemala's Violence against Women Courts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 September 2021

Erin Beck Open the ORCID record for Erin Beck [Opens in a new window]  and
Lynn Stephen
Erin Beck*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Oregon
Lynn Stephen
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected].
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Abstract

We explore how formal mandates associated with Guatemala's 2008 ‘Law against Femicide and Other Forms of Violence against Women’ and with specialised violence against women (VAW) courts have encountered significant challenges due to state-imposed constraints. Drawing on courtroom observations, analyses of case files, and interviews, we find that while formal mandates incorporated feminist understandings of violence against women, which were often internalised among court officials, in daily practice specialised courts reproduced tendencies to depict violence as interpersonal, fragment people's experiences and enact narrow forms of justice that do not incorporate the full intent of the 2008 VAW Law and institutions intended to support it. This case study thus illuminates how and why legal solutions alone are not sufficient to reduce gender-based violence and feminicide, particularly in the face of uneven and openly hostile challenges posed by governments.

Spanish abstract

Spanish abstract

Este artículo explora cómo en Guatemala mandatos formales asociados con la Ley en contra del Femicidio y Otras Formas de Violencia contra la Mujer, de 2008, y con cortes especializadas en violencia contra la mujer han encontrado desafíos significativos dadas las limitaciones estatales impuestas. A partir de observaciones en las mismas cortes, análisis de documentación de casos, y entrevistas, encontramos que mientras los mandatos formales incorporaron entendimientos feministas de la violencia en contra de las mujeres, mismos que con frecuencia fueron internalizados por funcionarios en las cortes, en la práctica cotidiana las cortes especializadas reproducían la tendencia de mostrar dicha violencia como algo interpersonal, fragmentar las experiencias de la gente y aplicar formas estrechas de justicia sin incorporar las intenciones plenas de la ley de 2008 y de las instituciones de apoyo. Este estudio de caso, entonces, ilumina cómo y por qué las soluciones legales por sí mismas no son suficientes para reducir la violencia basada en género y el feminicidio, particularmente frente a los desafíos disparejos y abiertamente hostiles mostrados por los gobiernos.

Portuguese abstract

Portuguese abstract

Este artigo investiga como na Guatemala mandatos formais associados à Lei contra o Feminicídio e Outras Formas de Violência contra a Mulher, de 2008, e aos tribunais especializados de violência contra a mulher têm encontrado desafios significativos devido a restrições impostas pelo Estado. Com base em observações feitas em tribunais, análises de arquivos de casos, e entrevistas, descobrimos que, embora os mandatos formais incorporassem entendimentos feministas a respeito da violência contra as mulheres, algo muitas vezes internalizado entre os funcionários dos tribunais, na prática diária os tribunais especializados reproduziam a tendência de descrever a violência como interpessoal, fragmentar as experiências das pessoas e promulgar formas restritas de justiça que não incorporam a intenção plena da lei de 2008 e das instituições destinadas a apoiá-la. Este estudo de caso, portanto, ilumina como e por que as soluções jurídicas por si só não são suficientes para reduzir a violência de gênero e o feminicídio, particularmente em face dos desafios desiguais e abertamente hostis apresentados pelos governos.

Keywords

violence against womenGuatemalagenderjusticegender-equality reformethnographyviolencia contra las mujeresGuatemalagénerojusticiareforma para la equidad de géneroetnografíaviolência contra a mulherGuatemalagênerojustiçareforma da igualdade de gêneroetnografia
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 53 , Issue 4 , November 2021 , pp. 741 - 766
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

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3 The law uses ‘femicide’, but some use ‘feminicide’ to implicate the state in the gender-based murder of women. We use ‘femicide’ when referring to Guatemalan institutions reflecting the legal terminology, but ‘feminicide’ when discussing the broader phenomenon of the gender-based murder of women in the context of impunity.

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19 Godoy-Paiz, Paula, ‘Violence in Guatemala's Metropolitan Area: Violence, Law, and Social Justice’, Studies in Social Justice, 2: 1 (2008), p. 39Google Scholar. Emphasis in original.

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21 Godoy-Paiz, ‘Women in Guatemala's Metropolitan Area’; Menjívar, Enduring Violence.

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23 Sarah England, ‘Protecting a Woman's Honor or Protecting Her Sexual Freedom?: Challenging the Guatemalan Patriarchal State through Reforms to Sexual Violence Legislation’, Latin American Perspectives, 41: 1 (2014), pp. 124–42; Cindy Foster, ‘Violent and Violated Women: Justice and Gender in Rural Guatemala, 1936–1956’, Journal of Women's History, 11: 3 (1999), pp. 55–77.

24 Victoria Sanford, ‘From Genocide to Feminicide: Impunity and Human Rights in Twenty-First Century Guatemala’, Journal of Human Rights, 7: 2 (2008), pp. 104–22; Victoria Sanford, Kathleen Dill and Sofia Duyos-Alvarez, ‘Women as State Targets: Systematic Gender Violence during the Guatemalan Genocide’, in Elissa Bemporad and Joyce Warren (eds.), Women and Genocide (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2018), pp. 207–22.

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28 Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas de Guatemala (INE), ‘XII Censo Nacional de Población y VII de Vivienda’, available at http://redatam.censopoblacion.gt/bingtm/RpWebEngine.exe/Portal?BASE=CPVGT2018&lang=esp, last access 23 June 2021. These figures are based on respondents’ definition of work; as such they are likely to include work in formal and informal sectors.

29 Menjívar, Enduring Violence, pp. 214–22.

30 Dinorah Azpuru, ‘Approval of Violence towards Women and Children in Guatemala’, AmericasBarometer Insights, 2015, available at www.vanderbilt.edu/lapop/insights/IO923en.pdf, last access 23 June 2021.

31 Sarah England, Writing Terror on the Bodies of Women: Media Coverage of Violence against Women in Guatemala (Lanham, MD: Lexington, 2019).

32 Hilda Morales Trujillo, ‘Femicide and Sexual Violence in Guatemala’, in Rosa-Linda Fregoso and Cynthia L. Bejarano (eds.), Terrorizing Women: Feminicide in the Américas (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010), pp. 127–37.

33 Amnesty International, cited in Prieto-Carrón, Marina, Thomson, Marilyn and Macdonald, Mandy, ‘No More Killings! Women Respond to Femicides in Central America’, Gender and Development, 15: 1 (2007), p. 31CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

34 Government insiders pushing for VAW legislation included Congresswomen Nineth Montenegro, Delia Back, Zury Ríos, Myrna Ponce, then first lady Sandra Torres, and members of the oversight agency, the Coordinadora Nacional para la Prevención de la Violencia Intrafamiliar y Contra la Mujer (National Coordinator for the Prevention of Intrafamilial Violence and VAW, CONAPREVI).

35 Author interview with Nineth Montenegro, congresswoman, Guatemala City, 11 July 2017; author interview with Delia Back, congresswoman, Guatemala City, 23 May 2017.

36 Comisión Internacional de Juristas (CIJ), Buenas prácticas y resultados de la justicia especializada en femicidio y mayor riesgo (Geneva: CIJ, 2016), p. 50.

37 Congress of the Republic of Guatemala, Law 22-2008, available at www.congreso.gob.gt/assets/uploads/info_legislativo/decretos/2008/22-2008.pdf, last access 23 June 2021.

38 Guatemalan Supreme Court of Justice, Accord 30-2010, available at http://ww2.oj.gob.gt/es/QueEsOJ/EstructuraOJ/UnidadesAdministrativas/CentroAnalisisDocumentacionJudicial/cds/CDs%20compilaciones/Normativa%20Femicidio/3_acuerdos/3-04.html, last access 23 June 2021.

39 Guatemalan School of Judicial Studies, Protocol for the Law against Femicide and Other Forms of Violence against Women (Guatemala City: School of Judicial Studies, 2010), available at: www.oj.gob.gt/justiciadegenero/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/PROTOCOLO-de-la-Ley-contra-el-Femicidio-y-otras-formas-de-Vi.pdf, last access 23 June 2021.

40 Diane M. Nelson, Who Counts? The Mathematics of Death and Life after Genocide (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015), p. 42.

41 Sally Engle Merry and Summer Wood, ‘Quantification and the Paradox of Measurement: Translating Children's Rights in Tanzania’, Current Anthropology, 56: 2 (2015), pp. 205–29.

42 Congress of the Republic of Guatemala, Law 22-2008, Chapter 2.

43 Guatemalan School of Judicial Studies, Protocol for the Law against Femicide, p. 16.

44 Ibid., pp. 6–10.

45 Ibid., pp. 11–12.

46 Ibid., p. 27; Guatemalan Supreme Court of Justice, Accord 30-2010, Article 5.

47 Congress of the Republic of Guatemala, Law 22-2008, Article 3, paragraph G.

48 Guatemalan School of Judicial Studies, Protocol for the Law against Femicide, p. 15.

49 Ibid., p. 21.

50 Guatemalan Supreme Court of Justice, Accord 30-2010, Articles 16 and 17.

51 Guatemalan School of Judicial Studies, Protocol for the Law against Femicide, pp. 29–30.

52 Unidad de Control, Seguimiento y Evaluación de los Órganos Especializados en Delitos de Femicidio y Otras Formas de Violencia contra la Mujer del Organismo Judicial (UJEFEM), Tercer informe de los órganos jurisdiccionales penales en delitos de femicidio y otras formas de violencia contra la mujer, violencia sexual, explotación y trato de personas (Guatemala City: UJEFEM, 2014), p. 86, available at http://ww2.oj.gob.gt/justiciadegenero/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Tercer-Informe.compressed.pdf, last access 23 June 2021.

53 Author interviews with Sandy (17 July 2017), Isabel (1 July 2016), Ariel (23 July 2017) and Sergio (5 July 2016), judges in specialised courts; and Monica (1 Aug. 2017), member of oversight agency for specialised judicial institutions.

54 Author interview with Sergio, judge, 19 June 2016.

55 Author interview with Luisa, specialised public prosecutor, 26 July 2017.

56 Author interview with Lucero, judge, 2 July 2018.

57 Author interview with Ariel, judge, 23 July 2017.

58 Author interview with Sergio, judge, 16 July 2017.

59 Beck, ‘The Uneven Impacts of Violence against Women Reform in Guatemala’.

60 Godoy-Paiz, ‘Women in Guatemala's Metropolitan Area’.

61 United Nations Development Council (UNDP), Violencia en contra de las mujeres a lo largo del ciclo de vida: Análisis sobre Guatemala, año 2018 (Guatemala City: UNDP, 2019).

62 INE, Estadísticas de violencia en contra de la mujer, 2018 (Guatemala City: INE, 2018), p. 131.

63 UJEFEM, Ocho años de la justicia especializada en delitos de femicidio y otras formas de violencia contra la mujer y violencia sexual, 2010–2018 (Guatemala City: UJEFEM, 2019), p. 88.

64 Guatemala lacks case-tracked data. Thus, the annual numbers for VAW reports, pre-trial hearings, and trials do not necessarily represent the same cases.

65 UJEFEM, Ocho años de la justicia especializada.

66 Author interview with Anita, judge, 21 July 2017.

67 INE, ‘XII Censo Nacional de Población y VII de Vivienda’.

68 Observatorio de las Mujeres del Ministerio Público, ‘Estadísticas del Portal’, available at http://observatorio.mp.gob.gt/wordpress/index.php/estadisticasportal/, last access 23 June 2021.

69 INE, ‘XII Censo Nacional de Población y VII de Vivienda’.

70 Observatorio de las Mujeres del Ministerio Público, ‘Estadísticas del Portal’.

71 Stephen, ‘Fleeing Rural Violence’; Beck, ‘The Uneven Impacts of Violence against Women Reform in Guatemala’.

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74 Maria, technical investigator from the public prosecutor's office, speaking at an attempted-femicide trial at the specialised VAW court in Huehuetenango, 2017.

75 Ibid.

76 Ibid.

77 White and Du Mont, ‘Visualizing Sexual Assault’.

78 Godoy-Paiz, ‘Violence in Guatemala's Metropolitan Area’.

79 Author interview with Francisco, judge, Huehuetenango.

80 Maria Martinez and David Casado-Neira, ‘Fragmented Victims: Women Victims of Gender-Based Violence in the Face of Expert Discourses and Practices in Spain’, Women's Studies International Forum, 59 (Nov. 2016), p. 44.

81 World Bank, ‘Guatemala’, available at https://data.worldbank.org/country/GT, last access 23 June 2021.

82 Fourcade, ‘Cents and Sensibility’, p. 1734.

83 Beck, ‘The Uneven Impacts of Violence against Women Reform in Guatemala’.