Objecting to protection: gender, race and youth oppression in failure to protect legislation

Reka Fox

Chapter 3 in Research Handbook on Gender, Violence and Law, 2026, pp 43-59 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: In this chapter, I draw upon insights from anti-carceral, decolonial feminist and youth liberationist lenses to explore the discursive contours of ‘failure to protect’ offences in the Anglo-Welsh criminal law. Examining the discursive categories of ‘child’, ‘adult’, ‘parent’ and ‘family’ which structure and legitimate failure to protect offences, I argue that the criminalization of parental ‘failure’ relies on binary distinctions between adult/child and in/vulnerability, preventing recognition of both the vulnerabilities of marginalized adults and the autonomy of children. Finally, I argue for a consideration of childhood as a sociolegal construction which articulates and naturalizes discursive and legal investments in hierarchical formations of race, gender, sexuality, class, neoliberal precarity, and national un/belonging.

Keywords: Domestic Violence; Children; Feminism; Decolonial; Youth Liberation; Failure to Protect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035319398
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