The Geopolitics of “Rape Kit” Protocols

IF 0.9 3区 哲学 Q2 HISTORY & PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Osiris Pub Date : 2021-01-01 DOI:10.1086/713425
Jaimie Morse
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引用次数: 2

Abstract

This article contributes to historiographies of forensic medicine by examining late twentieth-century women’s rights activism for new clinical standards on medical forensic exams for sexual assault (commonly known as “rape kits”). I argue that three features of these exams distinguish new standards of care from older practices in forensic medicine: the addition of specialized medical care to evidence-collection routines; attention to psychological trauma; and the creation of specific protocols to standardize, professionalize, and guide routine administration of the exam. To illustrate this shift, I follow “rape kit” protocols that emerged within nursing in the United States beginning in the 1970s, to their uptake and codification in international guidelines, to more recent attempts to adapt them for use in conflict zones. New clinical guidelines transformed the “rape kit” into an assemblage of instruments, medical routines, and new ways of thinking about sexual assault. The rape kit assemblage simultaneously became a traveling technology of care and a technology of governance and law. In practice, however, as new standards were implemented more widely, tensions between medical care and evidence collection emerged. At the intersection of law and medicine, distinct logics and assumptions came together, positioning not only medical and legal professionals, but also patients, in the unenviable liminal zone in which care and justice met and produced friction. This comes across clearly from an analysis of their use in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo, where mass rape had taken place. In this context, political turmoil and war conditioned the delivery of health care and, by extension, the liminal zone between medicine and law that standards for post-rape care occupy. Investigations of mass rape threatened to contravene confidentiality of medical records and expose health workers and patients to retaliation from suspects, renewing controversies surrounding the feasibility of aligning the institutional logics of medicine and law in this way.
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“强奸工具包”协议的地缘政治
本文通过研究20世纪晚期妇女权利运动对性侵犯医学法医检查的新临床标准(通常称为“强奸工具包”)的贡献,有助于法医学的历史编纂。我认为,这些考试的三个特点将新的护理标准与法医学的旧做法区分开来:在证据收集程序中增加了专门的医疗护理;关注心理创伤;并制定具体方案,使考试的日常管理规范化、专业化和指导性。为了说明这种转变,我跟踪了20世纪70年代开始在美国护理领域出现的“强奸工具包”协议,以及它们在国际准则中的吸收和编纂,以及最近对它们进行调整以用于冲突地区的尝试。新的临床指南将“强奸工具包”转变为一系列仪器、医疗程序和对性侵犯的新思考方式。强奸工具包同时成为一种旅行的护理技术和一种管理和法律的技术。然而,在实践中,随着新标准得到更广泛的实施,医疗保健和证据收集之间出现了紧张关系。在法律和医学的交汇处,不同的逻辑和假设汇集在一起,不仅将医疗和法律专业人员,而且将患者置于令人羡慕的界限地带,在这个界限地带,护理和正义相遇并产生摩擦。对它们在刚果民主共和国东部地区使用情况的分析清楚地说明了这一点,那里发生了大规模强奸。在这种情况下,政治动荡和战争制约了保健服务的提供,进而也制约了强奸后护理标准所处的医学和法律之间的界限。对大规模强奸案的调查有可能违反医疗记录的机密性,并使保健工作者和病人受到嫌疑人的报复,从而重新引发围绕以这种方式使医学和法律的体制逻辑相一致的可行性的争议。
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来源期刊
Osiris
Osiris 管理科学-科学史与科学哲学
CiteScore
1.10
自引率
0.00%
发文量
18
审稿时长
>12 weeks
期刊介绍: Founded in 1936 by George Sarton, and relaunched by the History of Science Society in 1985, Osiris is an annual thematic journal that highlights research on significant themes in the history of science. Recent volumes have included Scientific Masculinities, History of Science and the Emotions, and Data Histories.
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Front and Back Matter Notes on the Contributors Acknowledgments Statecraft by Algorithms Introduction
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