Women’s Access to Justice: Barriers Experienced when Applying for an Order of Protection.

• In Event: Protecting Victims of Intimate Partner Violence by Promoting Access to Justice

Abstract

This paper discusses preliminary findings from an on-going research project that seeks to understand the role of law in addressing inequality and gendered violence. Evaluative and comparative research on self-help centers assisting self-represented litigants with civil domestic violence protective orders will contribute to an interdisciplinary understanding of how legal systems, including courts, operate as complex systems that may either constrain or facilitate access to justice, how legal consciousness is developed through lived experiences, including within legal institutions, and how emerging understandings of the role of advocacy (by lawyers and others) either provides or hinders access to justice. By analyzing over 300 civil protection order cases, this paper will discuss some barriers women face while applying for an order of protection.

Authors

• Emily Troshynski, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

• Dory Mizrachi, University of Nevada, Las Vegas