Browsing by Author "Khadija Bawa"
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- ItemFrom Self to citizenry: an exploration of the construction and destruction of trust when a police officer rapes(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2021-03) Khadija Bawa; Du Toit, Louise; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Philosophy.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The aim of this thesis is to develop a feminist account of the erosion of trust brought about by acts of police rape at personal, interpersonal and institutional levels. The study explores the role that trust plays in the cultivation and destruction of relationships where police officers abuse the women and children they should serve to protect. The study commences in chapters one and two with a documentation of the South African Police Service (SAPS) history of (sexual) violence and goes on to describe three recent cases of police rape perpetrated against two women and a girl, namely the cases of K, F and Rebecca Mosepele. The study lays out the facts and circumstances of the rapes and assaults committed in N K v Minister of Safety and Security 2005 (6) SA 419 (CC), F v Minister of Safety and Security 2012 (1) SA 536 (CC) and Mosepele v Mokgethi and Another 2018 SA 66 (ZAWHC). Statistical research collated by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) is used to contextualise these individual cases and to justify some of the generalisations made from the analysis. Attention is also paid to court findings on vicarious liability when police officers rape the people they are supposed to protect. Chapter three presents the theoretical basis for the philosophical dimension of the study, which focuses on relations of trust – how they are constructed, and how they are undermined or completely destroyed. Following Trudy Govier’s and Niklas Luhmann’s analyses, the defining characteristics of trust are identified as involving positive expectations (premised on the trustor’s appraisal of the competence and intentions of the trustee), risk (which can be exacerbated by systemic vulnerabilities experienced by certain groups), meaningful communication (which involves expectation of sincerity and transparency) and a temporal dimension (which allows us to extrapolate past outcomes to future expectations). The specific forms of trust that are investigated are interpersonal trust (which includes both thick and thin relations with others), self-trust (which is dependent on our self-assessment of our competencies, intentions, and ability to make sound judgements) and institutional trust (which necessitates that institutions are viewed as legitimate, and which – it is argued – is necessary to also reinforce the legitimacy of the state as such, especially in young democracies). These different forms of trust are interwoven and form a living and dynamic network of trust, which is drawn upon when trust judgements are made. In chapter four the theoretical framework of trust is applied to the case studies laid out in chapter two. The main conclusions drawn from this analysis include that trust should be viewed as an interconnected network of trust and that the assault committed by police officers violates this network in different ways, such as jeopardizing the victim’s ability to form future trusting judgements and relationships. In the application of institutional trust to the cases, it is shown that the harms experienced as a result of institutional trust violations are compounded when there are insufficient levels of institutional oversight (for example by the IPID) and accountability in the aftermath of such violations. This institutional breach of trust constitutes a further injustice suffered by the victims of police rape and ultimately undermines the trustworthiness of the state itself, in relation to its most vulnerable citizens.