Political Mobilization of Justice: Social Movements and Judicial Institutions in the fight against the gender-based violence

Abstract

This paper seeks to contribute to studies on the mobilization of judicial institutions by social movements, looking specifically at women’s movements in combating violence against women. The concept of political mobilization of justice is proposed, which is a specific type of “interaction repertoire” that allows us to look at a complex set of interactions between social movements and judicial institutions. From an exploratory analysis of some cases, we demonstrate that social mobilization took place in three distinct moments: initially, through the “fight for the right”, by the activation of judicial institutions and the political struggle around the limits of judicial decisions prior to the Maria da Penha Law and the Feminicide Law; then, through the “guarantee of the right”, with the approval of compreenthe relevant legislation; finally, through the “political mobilization of justice”, with the agents training and networking, with the effect both of the actions of the justice system actors in guaranteeing the application of legislation and of some institutional changes in the judicial institutions that operate combating violence against women.