Contested concepts : sex and sexual violation in the criminal law

• Main Author: Palmer, Tanya Victoria
• Published: University of Bristol 2011
• Subjects: 364.153
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.629413

This thesis is a feminist response to the question: What is the difference between sex and sexual violation? It explores the boundary between sexual conduct that is legitimate, acceptable, ethical or morally permissible on the one hand and sexual violation on the other, and considers how that boundary might be represented within the criminal law. It opens with a critique of the current legal construction of sex and sexual violation. This is followed by a rethinking of the values and risks that give sexual activity meaning, drawing on a recent strand of feminist legal scholarship taking in the work of Drucilla Cornell, Jennifer Nedelsky; Nicola Lacey and Sharon Cowan. This reorientation of the values that ought to underpin sexual offences laws leads to a rejection of consent in favour of reframing the boundary around the concept of negotiation, as proposed by Michelle Anderson (2005). This alternat ive framework for conceptualising sex and sexual violation is adapted and further developed in response to findings from an original qualitative empirical study which explored the views of a self-selecting sample of lay people, police officers, domestic violence support workers, and case workers supporting women engaged in street based sex work. A novel methodological approach based on 'empirical ethics' methodologies, developed within the discipline of Bioethics, is used to develop, refine and test conceptual categories through ' the dialogue and interrelation between normative theory and empirical data. Ultimately the thesis proposes an original model of sexual offending based around the concept of freedom to negotiate.