Prosecuting Domestic Abuse: Amplifying the Survivor's Voice in Neoliberal Times

Domestic abuse accounts for nearly one in five CPS prosecutions. Women withdraw their support for the prosecution in one third of those cases (CPS, 2016). At the same time, the CPS regards domestic abuse offences as 'particularly serious' and prosecutors are told that it will be rare that criminal proceedings will not be pursued on public interest grounds (CPS, 2018). This post-doctoral fellowship will explore current CPS working practices in circumstances where the domestic abuse victim is no longer supportive of the prosecution. The fellowship will build on observations made in my PhD thesis which identified amongst a sample of prosecutors a 'tenacious' CPS working practice with the aim of driving up conviction rates in domestic abuse cases. Yet this CPS commitment has the potential to compromise the autonomy of women who have been victims of abuse.

Seeking to unpick some of the discourses and perspectives that may have contributed to the current CPS priority, my PhD thesis sets the policy and empirical work within the context of the women's movement and an era of neoliberalism. Using the lenses of feminism and neoliberalism, the thesis identified key values, philosophies and ideologies that have seemingly informed and shaped the prosecutorial approach. More specifically, feminist campaigners committed to motivating the state into taking domestic abuse seriously, have found recent neoliberal governments particularly receptive in the area of criminal justice and crime control (Halley, 2017; Bumiller; 2008).

The aim of this fellowship is to build upon these theoretical foundations and move towards suggesting theoretically informed best practice for prosecutors. Moreover, the observations and insights arising from the fellowship will also be relevant for those working with domestically abused women and for magistrates. The practitioner-friendly publication (in the form of a booklet) will aim to promote attention to the specifics of each case rather than conflating domestic abuse cases within a one-size-fits-all assessment. In a climate that prioritises convicting the offender, the fellowship aims to redress the lack of attention paid to the reluctant victim. Amplifying her perspective and recognising the myriad ways women exercise their agency becomes key to meeting her needs. It is anticipated this approach will necessarily draw into question the notion of the criminal justice system as the pre-eminent state response to domestic abuse.
The monograph produced during the fellowship will have significant impact and make a substantial
contribution in the academic field of feminist legal scholarship and also for practitioners working in the field of violence against women. By drawing together insights from the monograph, the workshops and practitioner-friendly publications will straddle a significant gap between academic theory and research and prosecutorial daily working priorities. The fellowship's aim is to support the practitioner to make decisions that are at once pragmatically founded and also theoretically justifiable. The major contribution of this fellowship, therefore, is to give confidence to prosecutors (and other closely associated stake holders such as support workers and magistrates) to make decisions that do not immediately align with current neoliberal demands (where that is appropriate).

The practitioner-friendly publication and accompanying short animation to be created with Scriberia will not only be disseminated at workshops but also through appropriate social media platforms.