Legal Reform

Abstract

The previous three chapters have illustrated some of the issues and problems associated with defences for homicide defendants who kill their partners. In particular, I have sought to demonstrate the way in which gender politics enters into interpretations of homicides between intimate heterosexual partners and the effect that these interpretations have for their treatment in the legal system. The differential treatment of male and female homicide defendants has had profound consequences for female defendants. Women who attempt to gain access to defences such as provocation or self-defence encounter problems with male-oriented definitions of what constitutes a provoking event. Conversely, those who enter a plea of diminished responsibility risk being stereotyped as mad, and their crimes are viewed by the criminal justice system as irrational. Given the unsatisfactory conditions in which women defendants have attempted to articulate their crimes, feminist campaigners and writers have called for changes to current defences to homicide which are more inclusive of women’s experiences of murder. In this chapter, I examine some of the legal reforms which have been suggested by legal commentators and feminist campaigners. First, I assess the various proposals for changes to legal defences to homicide. Second, I examine the feminist critique of law reform. Having examined these differing programmes of action, I conclude that despite the many difficulties associated with progressive law reform, it is, in fact, both possible and desirable.