The Role of Service Providers in Helping Women's Access to Justice for Domestic Violence Cases in Bangladesh and Papua New Guinea

What are service providers’ perspectives on how they help women access justice services, and do these perspectives reflect different viewpoints on what justice is? How are recent legal and policy reforms impacting service provision and practices, and fostering a more collaborative approach among services? How do multiple intersectional factors affect service provision and women’s access to justice in both countries?

Based on qualitative fieldwork in Bangladesh and Papua New Guinea, in this pre-submission seminar Subrata will present findings that show noteworthy progress in improving women’s access to specialised and district courts, the police, village courts, and victim support services. Women’s access to those services remains limited in rural areas, however, where culture, religion, patriarchy, and community power structures are also influential factors in village court settings. The findings also reveal persistent biases based on class, education, and geography among service providers in rural and urban locations. The study develops a framework for measuring access to justice that incorporates legal protection, accessibility, empowering victims, and support. It argues that feminism and human rights movements have informed legal and institutional reforms in both nations significantly and that the concepts of vernacularisation and intersectionality are useful to illustrate the differences, challenges, and adaptations encountered during policy implementation. Aware of his positionality, being from Bangladesh, Subrata focuses on Bangladesh but explores key themes across the two countries.