RISK FACTORS AND CONSEQUENCES OF VICTIMIZATION OF WOMEN AND GIRLS

Abstract

Initial teachings on victimology are mostly masculinist oriented. On the scene of victimology, and criminology in general, there is insufficient gender sensitivity, which contributes to constantly shifting the blame to the victim or considering her to be the provocateur of the crime, when it is a woman – victim. Therefore, we believe that by focusing on the woman as a victim separately, by analyzing the risk factors that would contribute to her victimization and their consequences, this insensitivity would be mitigated or, hopefully, reduced. After all, criminological understandings force a separate study of each marginalized group where the potential of being a victim of a crime is significantly high. Thus, a special victimological study of the elderly, younger persons, persons with disabilities, persons susceptible to domestic violence, prisoners, etc. Is needed. Each target group has its own special features, which require separate treatment.

What’s more, this kind of analysis is especially necessary because of the thin border between victimization and criminalization, that is, turning the victim into a perpetrator of a crime. Victimization as a significant public health problem for women can easily turn the abused woman into a criminal. The atrophy of the social organs in the prevention of violent crimes, especially domestic violence, where the woman is in continuous victimization, contributes to her metamorphosis from one border point to another, which is unacceptable in a democratic, technologically developed society. That is why the creation of real parameters, through a prior understanding of the impact of factors on becoming a victim, are crucial in the direction of crime prevention.