Open Access‘You Can’t Actually Escape It’: Policing the Use of Technology in Domestic Violence in Rural Australia
Author(s) -
Bridget Harris,
Delanie Woodlock
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
international journal for crime, justice and social democracy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.36
H-Index - 16
eISSN - 2202-7998
pISSN - 2202-8005
DOI - 10.5204/ijcjsd.2190
Subject(s) - cityscape , domestic violence , agency (philosophy) , space (punctuation) , criminology , economic justice , criminal justice , action (physics) , ideology , militarization , sociology , political science , public relations , human factors and ergonomics , poison control , law , social science , medicine , politics , medical emergency , art , linguistics , philosophy , physics , quantum mechanics , visual arts
The abuse of technology by perpetrators of domestic violence is ‘spaceless’; however, in this article, we argue that experiences of and responses to digital coercive control are shaped by both the place (geographic location) and space (practical and ideological features of a location) that a victim/survivor and criminal justice agency occupy. We examined this issue by conducting interviews and focus groups with 13 female victim/survivors in regional, rural and remote Australia. All participants had contact with police as part of their help-seeking for domestic violence, and some suggested that officers sometimes paralleled perpetrator behaviours, resulting in a narrowing of women’s ‘space for action’. We conclude that, in the interests of protecting and empowering women, socio-spatial frameworks must be considered by practitioners and researchers, and there should be a concerted effort to expand resourcing and training for justice agencies beyond the cityscape.