Conversations - A New Dialogic Process For Sexual Violence Victims

This thesis designs a new community-based facilitated dialogic process for victims of sexual violence. ManyNew Zealand sexual violence victims only have nominal access to the courts or an alternative community process to resolve their harm. The adversarial trial disadvantages acquaintance rape victims. It is argued that two groups in particular experience this disadvantage: young New Zealand women raped by young men drinking alcohol or taking drugs; and Māori victims who want a resolution process based on tikanga that can restore the collective intergenerational mana. Currently, the main community alternative to an adversarial trial is restorative justice, but restorative justice conferences are usually only available if perpetrators accept full responsibility for the harm caused to victims which they frequently do not. Consequently, some sexual violence victims may not be able to access an existing resolution option to deal with their harm.

Responding to the paucity of New Zealand research on victims’ justice needs and the lack of cohesion in theinterdisciplinary literature on alternatives to the adversarial trial, this research outlines a novel qualitative research approach to design a new alternative. A problem-solving approach using the author’s research experience, postgraduate study, and professional work experience is utilised that does not rely on one theory or discipline but appropriates the best theoretical explanation for each issue. The thesis focuses on adult female cisgender victims of heterosexual rape whose cases lack the evidence to support prosecution but encourages future research with other groups interested in dialogues.

The thesis develops a legally confidential specialist facilitated dialogic option called Conversations. This process permits victims to dialogue with perpetrators who take little responsibility, provided this would be safe. It is argued that a flexible process is the best way to accommodate victims’ wide-ranging and unpredictable justice needs. Conversations’ dialogic process predicates two ordinary people have very different perceptions of what happened, and fundamentally disagree sex was consensual. Māori who do not require an indigenous process may decide to adopt or adapt Conversations for their specific needs.

Conversations is a practical contribution and a dialogic alternative for some New Zealand sexual violence victims. Its primary purpose is to help victims deal with their harm and to help protect victims and society from future harm. A new paradigm reframes most victims and perpetrators as ordinary people who might be able to resolve their different perceptions of what happened with the right support. The dialogic process focuses on the unacceptable and wrong behaviour that harms victims, not on establishing its criminality. Conversations could be used for other sexual and criminal offences that the State is unlikely to prosecute due to evidential insufficiency. It could be an exploratory process to develop shared understanding or a possible diversion for Police and Prosecutions to use with Pākehā and Māori or to help accused understand the harm they caused.