Citizen Participation in Urban Domestic Violence: Reports in Bogotá

Abstract

The article analyzes reports on domestic violence in Bogotá, based on sources from Offices for Family Services during the first quarter of 2014. The report is considered an expression of civic participation; to file a report is an act of exercising citizenship and democracy. It also has a key role in constructing subjects of rights, enforcing such rights, raising awareness about them, and defending them. A qualitative research was developed with a focus on rights and gender; the questions guiding the development of the study focused on understanding how domestic violence affected reports, and whether the report as an act of citizenship has effects on domestic violence. They also aimed to identify the individual and collective implications of filing a report as an expression of citizen participation against such violence.