Violence and gender

Political paradoxes, conceptual shifts1

Maria Filomena Gregori2

As if it were a convention, conviction or even karma, we believe that Brazilian

citizens confront an intricate paradox: our Constitution is one of the most
advanced in the world, bringing together different themes, social segments
and rights in an undoubtedly progressive way. It also brings together a set
of governmental institutions, civil society organizations and social move-
ments. And yet, we continue to live out a persistent social inequality when it
comes to access to justice. Thoughts: according to current definitions, the
State is not purely a state apparatus, but also and above all a set of social rela-
tions that brings order to a given territory. “Such an order is neither egalitar-
ian nor socially impartial; both in capitalism and bureaucratic socialism, it
sustains and helps reproduce power relations that are systematically asym-
metrical.” (O’Donnell 1993:125). The legal system constitutes this order and
guarantees that social relations, even asymmetrical ones, can follow a course
of mutual acquiescence and compromise. This system is based on laws,
which, in the case of contemporary democracies, are debated and approved
by Congress, and expressed and resolved by the Judiciary. These two instanc-
es provide the wider organizational framework, which presupposes the social
effectiveness of the law.

1 This article is a revised and modified version of “Deslocamentos semânticos e hibridismos: sobre
os usos da noção de violência contra a mulher”, (Revista Brasileira de Ciências Criminais, Vol. 48, maio-
junho 2004, PP. 246-260)
2 Department of Anthropology, State University of Campinas (Unicamp) and research associate,
Pagu – Nucleus for Gender Studies (Unicamp)

216 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

 Even so, such effectiveness cannot be evaluated by looking only at the
formal and restricted content of the law and how it is supposedly applied. As
O’Donnell has remarked, “citizenship is not restricted to the limits of the po-
litical (strictly defined as they are in the greater part of contemporary litera-
ture). Citizenship is at stake, for example, when, after entering a contractual
relationship, one party, believing that he or she has a legitimate complaint,
may or may not appeal to a legally appropriate public organization seen as
just in order that it might judge the question.” (Ibid.: 127). Equality before
the law has not been achieved anywhere (in Scandinavia a certain ideal is al-
most reached) but, in certain countries, noticeable social, gender and racial
inequalities traverse the entire territory society.
This seems to be the problem that assails us: according to O’Donnell,
countries like Brazil suffer from chronic and accentuated inequality because
of a deep crisis within the state – “a state defined as a set of bureaucracies
that are able to fulfill their obligations with reasonable efficiency; in the ef-
fectiveness of the law; and in the plausibility of the affirmation that the or-
gans of the state generally take their decisions according to some notion of
the public good” (Ibid. ibidem). This is the paradoxical situation in which
the state combines authoritarianism and democracy: while political rights
are respected, “the peasants, the slum dwellers, the Indians and women etc.
cannot receive fair treatment in the courts, nor have access to public services
they have a right to, nor be saved from police violence. (Idem.: 134) This ar-
rangement leads to a kind of reduction in the total exercise of citizenship
that has been well described as “contradictory citizenship” (Santos, 1999).
There is therefore a need for detailed research on the concrete workings and
the systematic relations that constitute the field of public authority, where
rights are guaranteed by law yet not entirely realized in practice. Thus, the
aim of this text is to discuss the complex web of questions, implications and
demands related to minority rights, particularly women’s rights, when the
notion of violence against women is used.
Over two decades of research into this question, I have been asking my-
self how best to describe relations of violence within interpersonal relations
characterized by power inequalities. Do such relationships belong to the
concept of violence against women (this notion was created by the feminist
movement in the 1960s), conjugal violence (another notion that specifies vio-
lence against women in the context of conjugality), domestic violence (here

maria filomena gregori 217

one includes violence between other members of the domestic group that
began to be discussed in the 1990s and has been incorporated into the “Maria
da Penha” 3 law, family violence (this notion is presently used in judicial ter-
minology) or gender violence (a concept used by feminists such as myself
who do not wish to be accused of essentialism)? Irony apart, I find myself
wondering about the implications of each of these notions, their analytical
power as well as the limitations and paradoxes they engender. So part of my
concern is to reflect on the semantic shifts that have taken place in the no-
tion of violence against women. In addition, I wish to point to the limits of
this notion as well as to its substitution by the concept of gender violence. In
regards to this new concept, I ask about its validity and utility.

Violence against women as expressed in notions used

by the actors in political and judicial institutions.

The definition of violence against women developed from an innovative po-

litical experience during the 1980s. As well as consciousness-raising among
themselves, feminist activists also created organizations such as SOS-Mulher
(SOS-Women) to work on behalf of women who had suffered violence.4 The
ideas behind these organizations grew from an understanding of the oppres-
sion suffered by women under patriarchalism, a term very much present in
feminist discussions worldwide. The concept of gender was absent and the
female condition was defined according to universalistic premises that sup-
posed that all women share oppression because of their sex, independently
of the historical or cultural context. A decade later this interpretation was to
suffer critical revision. While it could be said that the 1960s had a definitive
effect on the political history of the West and that the changes brought about
depended on the intense participation of libertarian movements, among

3 Federal Law 11,340, sanctioned by the President of Brazil on 8/7/2006 and passed on 9/22/2006. It
was named the Maria da Penha”Law by sectors of the feminist movement in honor of Maria da Penha,
a victim of domestic violence whose case was significantly neglected by the legal authorities. In 2001,
the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights condemned the Brazilian government for such
disregard. This is the first law in Brazil addressing specifically domestic and familial violence against
women.
4 The São Paulo SOS-Mulher was the first such organization to be founded in October 1980 by a
number of feminist groups to care for women who were the victims of violence. For three years, the
organization attended to the women, referred them to judicial and psychological counseling and orga-
nized campaigns to raise awareness of the gravity of the problem. (Pontes 1986; Gregori 1993)

218 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

them feminism, the second half of the 1980s and the 1990s saw the introduc-
tion of new paradigms that emerged from the academic debate that ques-
tioned previous theories.5
Even though universalistic and somewhat essentialist, the feminist
movement brought to public attention an approach that related conflict and
violence between men and women to structures of domination. This inter-
pretation only entered juridical theory and practice with the enactment of
the Maria da Penha law in 2006.6 Although the question of power inequalities
implied in gender relations is present in the Constitution and in the princi-
ples of this law, it meets enormous resistance in the practices and knowledge
that make up the field in which these laws are applied.
Even if we consider the importance of the creation in 1985 of the special
police stations for the defense of women (DDMs)7 we have to remember that
the legislation behind them did not mention violence against women. The
juridical culture that underpinned the work of the special police stations
defined their duties as investigating crimes on the basis of the “principle of
legality” according to which there is no crime without a previous law that
defines it and that there is no punishment without previous legal determina-
tion (Santos, 1999). The police stations operated therefore on the basis of ex-
isting laws. Because violence against women (family, domestic or gender) did
not exist as a specific legal entity, everything depended on the way in which
the police officers interpreted the victims’ complaints. The greater number
of ethnographic studies of these police stations carried out in the 1980s and
1990s show that, in the absence of a legal definition of the complexity of the
dynamics of interpersonal conflicts where the victims are women, the way

5 In the vast bibliography on this topic, some of the more significant interventions that influenced
the discussion in Brazil are to be found in Scott (1988), de Lauretis (1997), Butler (1990), and Moore
(1994). For a discussion on the impact of this literature on studies in Brazil, see Heilborn and Sorj
(1999), Gregori (1999) and Piscitelli (1997).
6 Before this the 2002 law no. 10.455 made it possible for judges to remove agressors from the home
in the case of domestic violence as a precautionary measure. In 2004, Law no. 10.886 increased the pun-
ishment for bodily harm to a minimum three month jail sentence when the accused was a relative or
partner of the victim.
7 The first Police station for the defense of women was created in 1985 on the initiative of the São
Paulo State Council for the Feminine Condition and by the then São Paulo State Secretary for Security,
Michel Temer. Among studies on these police stations, of particular significance are Blay and Olveira
(1986), Brandão (1997), Brocksom (2006), Carrara et. al. (2002), Debert and Gregori (2002), Gurgel do
Amaral et. al. (2001), Machado and Magalhães (1999), Moraes (2006), Muniz (1996), Nelson (1996), Oliveira
(2006), Rifiotis (2003), Santos (1999), Soares (1999), Suarez and Bandeira (1999) and Taube (2002).

maria filomena gregori 219

in which cases were classified depended on chance or the whims of the po-
lice officers. The officers tended to restrict the feminist notions of violence
against women to ordinary crimes that happened to occur between spouses
in domestic situations, excepting, of course, rape or sexual violence commit-
ted by outsiders.
Another important point emphasized by the specialist literature on ju-
dicial procedures during this period was that all of the information on con-
jugal conflict was based on the complaints of the victims. Santos (1999) and
Brandão (1997) drew attention to this aspect: conjugal violence in which
the victim was the woman seems to have become the paradigmatic case for
describing violence against women in general and, later, what came to be
called gender violence. Those who studied the work of SOS-Mulher based
their analyses mainly on the narratives of the clients, i.e. the battered women
themselves. The majority of cases were of women of a particular social class
who complained about the behavior of their husbands or partners within
the home. Paradoxically the object of study was defined on the basis of the
women’
immediate demands. Furthermore, cases such as sexual violence in
marital relations, sexual discrimination, or even psychological violence had
no place in existing institutional arrangements.
Ethnographic research inside police stations showed that the women
who sought them out described the conflicts without using the category vio-
lence.8 In the majority of cases, the women referred to “the playfulness” or
“the ignorance” of their husbands as excessive and unacceptable, showing no
awareness of the effects of their attitudes in bringing about more egalitarian
relationships in the future. As I suggested in an earlier study (Gregori 1993),
analyses based on the “logic of the complaint”, run the risk of merely mag-
nifying the process of victimization, making it all the more difficult for the
actors involved to perceive more profound motives behind their conflicts, let
alone their positions as citizens with rights.9

8 The same was true for the narratives of the women Who sought out the SOS-Mulher. See Gregori
(1993).
9 One of the aspectsI drew attention to in my study on SOS-Mulher was the fact that all of the depo-
sitions were based on complaints: the kind of narrative that tends to reduce the situations of conflict
and abuse which is experienced in the daily life of interpersonal relations marked by gender to a static
and polarized opposition between victim and executioner. Less than true investigation, followed by
the due punishment of those responsible for the violence in question, these complaints confined the

220 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

 In 1996, a new law passed in the state of São Paulo (Decree no. 40.693/96)
widened the scope of the São Paulo specialized police stations allowing them
to investigate crimes against children and adolescents. With the support of
the coordination of the police stations and the signature of governor Mario
Covas, this law aimed to cover all crimes committed within the family. The
basic argument behind the new law was to make the DDMs responsible for
family violence (and not just violence against women) and to leave to regular
police stations other crimes associated with urban violence. From the point
of view of the police, this solution was supposed to correct a possible distor-
tion in the specialized police stations.
Even so, the new law left a few loopholes so far as the eradication of gen-
der violence is concerned. Feminist demands—incorporated by government
in the form of specialized police stations—were based on the premise that
there is a particular form of violence that springs from the power inequalities
that characterize gender relations. It is not a case of ignoring the fact that
much of this violence occurs in the context of familial relationships, but it
must be emphasized that violence also occurs outside the domestic sphere.
On the other hand, this change also represented an attempt to increase
the protection of the family which is quite a long way away from the feminist
view on the role of gender asymmetry in family configurations. Organizing
ways of eliminating gender violence implies finding new ways of conceiving
the family. More than correcting excesses and abuses committed by heads
of family—this is what seems to be indicated in the decree in question—to
eradicate this type of violence implies questioning power inequalities within
the family and making any attitude that affronts the fundamental rights of
those involved absolutely inadmissible.
As recent ethnographic studies show (Debert and Gregori 2002; Debert
et. al. 2006) the tendency of the police stations is to treat family violence as
a dysfunction of unstructured families with low educational levels or of ru-
ral traditional origin. Brandão (1999), Soares (1999, 2002) and Izumino (2003)
suggest that the police stations ended up providing symbolic resources for
the women who sought them out to file their complaints to negotiate their
family relationships.

women into a position that could hardly lead to emancipation since it tended to reiterate the position
of women as victims. (Gregori 1993: 185-186)

maria filomena gregori 221

 It is therefore important to widen the scope of reflection on what one un-
derstands by the eradication of family violence, of violence against women,
of domestic violence or even of gender violence. While it is true that negotiat-
ing this way implies fighting for what is considered to be their rights, these
women may act or operate with notions of rights which are a long way from
those based on citizenship. The judiciary, for its part, ends up hostage to the
immediate demands of the complainants because it has no clear definition or
diagnosis of the complex dynamics of such violence. It is thus unable to de-
velop new parameters and new procedures that might effectively put an end
to these crimes.
In 1995 another law (no. 9099), created what were called Special Criminal
Courts (Juizados Especiais Criminais - Jecrins), which brought about significant
change in the judicial system. This law aims to enhance access to justice and
to promote a more rapid and effective response.10 With an emphasis on rec-
onciliation, these courts judge cases of contravention and lesser crimes that
carry a maximum penalty of two years prison sentence. The principles of
economy and informality mean that there is no need for formal police enqui-
ries. Instead, a description of the facts and a characterization of the parties
involved can be sent quite quickly to the court.
The effect of this law on the DDMs was extraordinary, above all because
the majority of cases they had dealt with were defined as minor (minor bodily
harm and threats) and were now subject to the new courts. In a study of
the 1,036 cases brought before the Forum of Itaquera in São Paulo in 2002,
we found that 76.6% of the victims were women and that 80% of these were
women who had been harmed or threatened by their husbands or partners.
More recent studies have drawn attention to this “feminization” of the clients
of the special courts and, in particular, the high proportion of domestic con-
flict among the cases brought before them. Our research showed that many
of these cases had originated in the women’
police stations.
One of the most severe criticisms of the women’s police stations had been
the large number of formal complaints that never entered the legal system.

10 For information on these courts see Amorin (2003), Azevedo (2000 e 2001), Beraldo de Oliveira
(2006), Burgos (2001), Campos (2002 e 2003) Cardoso, (1996), Cunha, (2001), Debert e Beraldo de Oliveira
(2007), Faisting, (1999), Kant de Lima et al. (2001 e 2003), Sadek (2001) e Werneck Vianna et al. (1999). On
similar courts in the US see Cardoso de Oliveira (1989).

222 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

With the creation of the special courts, cases of minor wounds and threats,
which form the vast majority of cases, were sent quickly to the courts, and
the interested parties could be called before the judge in less than a week.
The police working in the women’s police stations reacted in different
ways. Some felt that not much had changed except for the speeding up of the
judicial system. On the other hand, a few heads of police stations lamented
the fact that the law restricted the coercive power of the police, thus chang-
ing the character of the women’s police stations. One of the law’s innovations
was to authorize alternative penalties such as community service. An effect
of this was that in cases of domestic violence and aggression on the part of
neighbors and parents, the most common penalty became the payment of e
“cesta básica”, (basket of basic foods). Beraldo de Olveira (2006) shows quite
clearly that the process of “informalization” of judicial procedure that had
the aim of increasing efficiency and access to justice, ended up making these
crimes invisible. On the basis of ethnographic observation and interviews
with people involved, the author claims that a new institutional arrangement
was created so that certain forms of violence against women ceased even to
be defined as crimes.
An analysis of interviews prior to preliminary hearings shows that pres-
sure was brought to bear to persuade women to delay so much that the cases
would automatically lapse.11 In addition, as Debert and Beraldo de Oliveira
have shown, the passage from the police stations to the courts involved a
greater change of emphasis that was originally imagined:

The victim is defined as a wife or partner while the aggressor is seen as husband
or partner. The crime is transformed into a social problem or a moral failing
on the part of the couple, which, in the eyes of the justice system, may be easily
corrected through enlightening the parties. In the more difficult cases it may
be compensated for with a small penalty. The logic behind the judges’ attempts
at reconciliation is to find a simple, informal and rapid solution for cases that
should not be taking up the time of the judiciary and its agents. (2007: 330-331)

A consideration of the changes that have taken place during the 20 years
of the special police stations reveals two concurrent processes. On the one

11 The 2002 study of the special courts of Itaquera shows that 36.4% of cases of domestic strife where
women were the victims lapsed while 40% were almost lapsed.

maria filomena gregori 223

side, we can see how violence between couples, previously seen as a domestic
problem, has been transformed into a public question since the police sta-
tions for the protection of women played an important role in making ex-
plicit the fact that such aggression was criminal. On the other hand, the cre-
ation of the special courts has led to an inversion of this process, since these
crimes have once again been “privatized”. The tendency is for these courts to
see this type of criminality as a minor issue to be dealt with through the good
offices of psychologists or social workers instead of upsetting the smooth
workings of the courts. Furthermore, the victims themselves are now sup-
posed to decide whether the aggression and threats they have suffered from
should, or should not be treated as crimes.
The Maria da Penha law was created to revert this situation, which, ac-
cording to its first Article, “creates Courts of Domestic and Family Violence
against women and establishes forms of assistance and protection for the
women who are victims of domestic and family violence.”
It is still too early to evaluate its impact and it is difficult to generalize
given the differences from one court to the other. Even so, the accent on
a new juridical entity—“domestic and family violence against women”—
suggests that the law will be applied exclusively to the cases that entered the
women’s police stations: women who suffer abuse within conjugal relations
or from their stable partners. Sexual violence within marital relations or sex-
ual harassment have no place in this law since gender violence is assumed to
be contained within the domestic and family arena.
The emphasis on abuses that occur within the domestic context and
in stable heterosexual relationships limits the scope of the law and can
lead to distortions such as the decision by the judge of one of the special
courts for domestic violence in Rio de Janeiro who denied protection for a
woman called Eliza Samudio a few months before she disappeared, prob-
ably kidnapped in Rio de Janeiro and taken to the state of Minas Gerais,
where she was supposedly tortured and kept locked up before being killed
and dismembered.  One of the people accused of the brutal murder is Bruno
Fernandes, the former Atlético Mineiro and Flamengo football team goal-
keeper, who had family and friends in Minas Gerais, where he was born. He
had been pressured by Samudio to recognize the paternity of her 4-year-old
child, after a short relationship.  The judge denied protection alleging that
Eliza could not benefit from the Maria da Penha law (which is designed to

224 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

protect the Brazilian family), because she was not in a stable relationship
with the goal-keeper.

The importance of a relational perspective

on the treatment of violence

It is now necessary to stress that the legal definition of certain abuses as “do-
mestic violence” contains a paradox: although the law claims to address the
issues of gender inequality and violence, in fact and in practice it can only be
applied within the domestic sphere, which in itself is not always clearly de-
fined. All forms of gender violence that take place outside the home, such
as sexual harassment, are not covered by the law, nor are those cases between
couples, which the law does not recognize as families, as we saw above in the
case of the Flamengo goalkeeper. Besides this, the most serious problem of
this law seems to be that it confuses violence and crime or that it allows the
former to be subsumed by the latter.
However laudable the intentions of those who formulated the Jecrins, and
however politically important the attempt to counter the invisibilization and
banality with which these courts treat crimes of this nature, it is nevertheless
necessary to perceive the limits of the judicial sphere so as to bring about the
day when those who suffer abuse in the name of the preservation of normative
patterns related to gender inequalities will find justice and due compensation.
Without any pretention of offering concrete alternatives, but in the hope
of adding to the debate, I propose a strategic distinction between crime and
violence. Crime implies typifying abuses, defining the circumstances in
which conflicts occur and resolving them in the judicial arena. Violence, a
term very much open to theoretical debate and disputes over its meaning,
implies the social—not just legal—recognition that certain acts constitute
abuse, which must be understood in terms of the unequal power positions
between those involved. Violence evokes a relational dimension, which, ac-
cording to Foucault, cannot be solved within the judicial sphere, because
even if its objective is justice for all, inequalities tend to be produced and
reproduced socially. I am not suggesting that the judicial system does not
furnish important instruments for organizing and defining patterns of com-
pensation and conflict resolution. On the contrary, it provides a politically
relevant arena for dispute.

maria filomena gregori 225

 What I am saying is not just that equality before the law has never been
achieved anywhere, but also that the definition of fairness and access to jus-
tice is a process which is open to dispute due to the unequal powers of the
social actors involved. Foucault also suggests that the apparatus of power
regimes in societies like our own are organized in such a way as to hide the
way they are embedded in the social body. The notion of an egalitarian justice
based on universal principles or values conceals that it produces those whom
it excludes or doesn’t even recognize. It would be something of a feat of the
imagination to posit the existence of a sphere of society where total neutral-
ity existed, given the best of intentions and procedures. What it is important
to stress is that the idea of justice should not remain a fantasy; rather it is an
idea that should become reality. This may be achieved by deciphering the
complexity of relations of violence and then making the necessary alterations
to law and legal procedures.
Examining the articulations between violence and gender allows us to
extend the analysis of the dynamic which configures positions, negotiations
and abuses of power in social relations, in order to confront the difficulties I
have mentioned. Writing critically on the specialized literature on this theme
in Brazil in the 1980s, I observed (Gregori 1993) the clear predominance of the
tendency to reinforce or even reproduce the asymmetric plot that constitutes
relations of violence. I developed a critique that drew attention to a series
of explanatory and descriptive conventions present in the political and aca-
demic treatment of the issue of violence against women: the emphasis fell on
situations where women were the direct victims, while other manifestations
of violence (against children, between women, or against partners) were seen
as acts of resistance, reaction or reproduction of patterns of behavior to be
internalized by women on the basis of rules that were repeatedly applied by
custom and tradition. In fact the woman appeared as passive agents, victim-
ized by a situation already determined by the structure of domination.
Violent relationships were described as typical on the basis of the major-
ity of profiles of actors and their relations—no analysis was made of variables
such as socioeconomic status ethnicity, age or variations in the developmen-
tal cycle of the family, such as the number of children etc. Also, the narrative
construction of this typical relation was made up of the following steps: all
kinds of abuse that were described started with disrespect and humiliation
and were followed by beating or even murder. The men act; the women feel.

226 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

And so we affirm a kind of emotional passivity and fear for shame and for
feelings of guilt.12
Another feature of these analyses was that violence was seen as what
men do against women instead of understanding that the social hierarchies
brought into play in these relations are related to attributes of masculinity
and femininity and the various characteristics associated with each of these
terms. In fact sex is related to gender so as to create rigid pairs in opposition,
the one to the other. Contrast and conflict characterize the relationship be-
tween the two poles (men and women). Sharing and cohabitation were con-
ceived and explained starting from the idea of an ideological system denomi-
nated machismo where ideology is understood as falsification.
In my book Cenas e queixas, I discussed the problems and limitations of a
point of view that emphasizes and reaffirms the duality between victim and
aggressor rather than questioning it. I also questioned another dichotomy,
that between traditional and modern women´s representations. These dichot-
omies are inadequate analytical tools because they presuppose coherence in
each term of the opposition, which is not present in actual practice.
This critical perspective is in accord with the debate that has been pro-
posed by some contemporary feminist theoreticians who question a mono-
lithic understanding of violence and its relations to gender. Recent bibliogra-
phy has attempted to overcome a certain diffuse “neutrality” when it comes
to the problem of the difference between the sexes. 13 These authors position
themselves against any argument that doesn’t understand violence as engen-
dered (that is, shot through by gender and sexual asymmetry).14 The concept

12 For a related comment see Zaluar (2009)

13 Henrietta Moore (1994) builds her approach on violence upon a psychological notion, according
to which an individual assumes an identity position in accordance with the degree of investment re-
quired. The degree of investment is understood as a process through which an individual confronts his
/her emotional needs and interests. Violence occurs as a result of the inability to sustain a position of
gender identity, which results in crisis, real or imaginary, of the self-image and the public image the in-
dividual desires. It can also result from contradictions born in the individual’s exposure to a multiplic-
ity of identity positions. Many cases of violence are, according to the author, the result of the inability
to control the sexual behavior of another person-behavior which threatens self-image. The problem
with this kind of argument is the difficulty of perceiving the moment when frustrations in relation
to self-image-surely very frequent in the biography of each individual-come about, leading to acts of
violence. Another weakness is the fact that the analysis is far too much focused on individual dynamics
and not-as we believe it should be-in relations established by individuals. And these relations are in the
majority of cases ones of power asymmetry.
14 The polemic over the complex relations between sex and gender and related conceptual

maria filomena gregori 227

of gender, which I use in this article is the one proposed by Judith Butler
(2004), because I find it the most vigorous in relation to violence. Butler takes
a foucauldian position: gender rules are organized in a power apparatus in
such a way that the production and normalization of masculine and feminine
arise from various sources, such as hormones or chromosomes. 15 Such an ap-
paratus institutes constraints but it does not lead to a definitive stability. It
should be seen then as a set of apparatus, which create inequalities of power
and yet are simultaneously open to transformation. As Butler rightly points
out, gender is the practice of improvisation in a scenario of constraints.
Furthermore there is no risk of succumbing to modern temptations, which
lead to substantialization and to essencializations: nobody makes gender on
their own, it is made within relationships; sociality.16
This way of studying violence does not focus only on the pre-figuration
of individual behaviors but discusses critically the expansion of the concept
of violence in the direction of those aspects which constitute social practices,
following the tendency of post-structural studies influenced by Foucault.
However, these new theories criticize the general way in which this philoso-
pher deals with the symmetries and inequalities of power in the context of
sexual differences. According to Butler (2004), Foucault sees gender as one
among many dimensions of the regulation of power. For Butler, the regulat-
ing apparatus governing gender creates its own “disciplinary” regime. Such a
position, however, should not lead us into the trap of constructing a frontier
isolating gender from other markers of difference (such as class, race, ethnic-
ity, age, etc.), which are also axes of inequality. What is important is to un-
derstand the delicate regulatory operations through a methodological proce-
dure that establishes an intersection between the different axes and markers.
Another author who is critical of Foucault is Teresa de Lauretis (1997). She

implications is extensive. The concept of gender as formulated by Robert Stoler back in the 1970s was
seen as a cultural process (variable and not essentialized) which operates upon sex differences. In the
1980s, the polarity between sex--as something relating to the body in its biological sense--and gender-
-as an active and creative force of culture--was questioned. Both Lauretis and Moore make the same
criticisms from the 1980s onwards. When they referr to the concept of gender they presuppose a non-
polarized relation with the concept of sex. For more on this discussion, see Scott (1988), Butler (1990),
Heilborn and Sorj (1999), Gregori (1999) and Piscitelli (1997).
15 It is important to note that such normatizations correspond to a set of arrangements through
which the basic biological matter of sex and procreation is modeled through human intervention.
16 The apparatus of gender does not act upon an individual understood as a pré-existing subjct, but
acts and produces this subject (Butler 2004: 42)

228 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

specifically discusses his concept of violence (and in particular its relation to
disciplinary power and sexual technologies), which doesn’t take into account
the asymmetrical patterns configured in a relation of force in which one of the
poles is unequal to the other. What really matters in this case is the inequality
in the relationship between femininity and masculinity. This means that, in
the limit, men may also be violated, their bodies being treated as if they were
feminine. In this sense it is not sufficient to treat the problem of violence as if
it were something relative only to the couple, taking our gaze away from the
power relations within and among those involved. Lauretis is right to affirm
that Foucault is wrong because his circular analysis results in a neutralizing
political position. The author starts from the ideas that appear in History of
Sexuality I (Foucault, 1976) and in particular his argument on the power of the
state to normalize our love life. By starting from the notion that sexuality is
produced through discourse (institutionally) by power and that power is pro-
duced institutionally (discursively) by sexual technologies, Foucault leaves
no room for the concrete formulation of a counter discourse or a contrary
position. To illustrate the paradoxical effect of this general idea, Lauretis re-
members Foucault’s position with regard to rape: to neutralize the power of
the state over sexuality Foucault argues that it would be better to treat rape
as aggression and not as an act of sexual violence. Lauretis takes the opposite
position, suggesting that rape cannot be understood apart from notion of the
technology of gender, or, more precisely from understanding the techniques
and strategies through which gender is constructed and violence engendered.
Some of these propositions make the links between the concept of vio-
lence and the concept of gender more complex for they suggest that the
identities of those involved in a relationship of violence are created within
a movement of mirroring and contrasts and which has no end. There is no
generic or essential category that can define a priori the profile of such iden-
tities (Gregori, 1993). And as Lauretis so well puts it, it is important to stress
that the dynamics of these relations are constituted by inequality, by an
asymmetry which leads to violence.
To think about the paradoxes of all violent relations through an approach
that does not abandon the concrete experience, I adopt a point of view which
posits the coexistence of various nuclei of meaning which become mixed up
and are permanently in conflict. In the situation of family relations for ex-
ample conceptions of sexuality, education, living together and the dignity of

maria filomena gregori 229

each one are all involved. Also present are other markers that imply distinct
positions of power: generation, age, and race as well as class and social mo-
bility. To hold a position is to act in function of a number of these concep-
tions, positions and markers brought together even when they are in conflict.
So then it is important to stress that when we talk about gender positions we
should remember that there are socially legitimate patterns, which are im-
portant to the definition of identities and conduct. Because of all this i such
positions should be seen as constructs, images, references that are brought
into action in a complex way that is neither fixed nor linear.
Thinking in relational terms also implies not reifying asymmetries based
on markers of gender or defining them as determinant. That doesn’t mean
to say that gender markers, as categories of differentiation which make up
hierarchical maps are not fundamental. But it is worthwhile asking whether
these markers should not be articulated with others which are also funda-
mental, such as class, race or sexual choice and orientation, even if they don’t
seem to be all that evident when you look closer at the scripts which describe
violent relationships. In the light of such complexity we see the problems
raised for political action, specifically that kind of political action that de-
mands easy explanation and the construction of essential and permanent
enemies. From our point of view, women, blacks, Indians, homosexuals,
transgendered people (as well as those people who practice the transgres-
sion of sexual norms without desiring a new identity) live in the midst of
relationships in which identities are being created in a permanent process
of mirroring and contrast. We must ask ourselves whether from the political
point of view it would be relevant to be suspicious of previously given cat-
egories, looking first for an alliance between movements that aim to destroy
the bases of intolerance and prejudice in concrete daily relationships, where
inequalities and political asymmetries are negotiated, maintained or, maybe,
transformed. This means guaranteeing public (and private) recognition that
we live in a disputed arena, made up of various objects and power positions.
While the relationship itself and the contrast and polar “naming” of subject
and object should be questioned-the object of discussion in future articles-,
my aim in this text was to lend support to those theoretical and political po-
sitions in the contemporary debate which point in the direction of consoli-
dating the social and political recognition of subjects who fight to constitute
new scenarios and innovative instruments of power.

230 vibrant v.7 n.2 violence and gender

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