Gender-based violence policy reform: assessing the risks and public value of co-production with survivors

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Lisa J. Wheildon Monash University, Australia

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Asher Flynn Monash University, Australia

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Jacqui True Monash University, Australia

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Abby Wild Monash University, Australia

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Article Category:
Research Article
Copyright:
© Centre for Gender and Violence Research University of Bristol 2023
Online Publication Date:
14 Jun 2023
Pages:
1–17
Publisher:
Policy Press
Volume/Issue:
Early View
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1332/239868021X16842395248135
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Governments worldwide are increasingly engaging service users to reform public policies and services and enhance public value. Survivors of gender-based violence (GBV) are one group seeking to be heard by governments and gradually being engaged to improve policy outcomes. However, the history of the victims’ rights movement and feminist scholarship on political institutions indicate significant risks for survivors in these engagements with the state. This article examines the nature of these risks and how they are experienced and challenged, through a case study analysis of the implementation of the Australian state of Victoria’s Victim Survivors’ Advisory Council. Analysing government reports and interviews with survivors and policymakers, the article investigates how the state asserts control over survivors under the guise of co-production, inadvertently compromising public value creation. Informed by a feminist institutionalist lens, our analysis finds that efforts to address the power imbalances and gendered norms reflected in the informal rules of co-production are likely to better realise public value in terms of improved outcomes for all members of society, especially those experiencing GBV. The co-production risks we highlight and the ways to mitigate them we suggest are also relevant to other areas of co-production with other marginalised service users.

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Lisa J. Wheildon Monash University, Australia

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https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7795-1275
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Asher Flynn Monash University, Australia

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Jacqui True Monash University, Australia

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Abby Wild Monash University, Australia

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Lisa.Wheildon@monash.edu
Asher.Flynn@monash.edu
Jacqui.True@monash.edu
Abby.Wild@monash.edu

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Journal of Gender-Based Violence