Catharine A. MacKinnon’s scientific contributions

... Some victims, namely White women abused by strangers, have been empowered to sue offenders civilly since the early 1900s under tort law (i.e., law remedying wrongdoing resulting in harm against individuals). 4 Given legal limitations, civil sexual violence lawsuits remained rare until remedies expanded due to the passage of civil rights protections for women in schools and workplaces, which defined sexual violence as a form of sex discrimination given its potential to hinder academic and professional success (Cahill 2001;MacKinnon 1979;Saguy 2003;Uggen and Blackstone 2004). Civil rights legislation enabled victims to bring sexual violence actions against some organizations, rather than against individual offenders. ...

Reference:

Civil-criminal hybridization: sexual violence plaintiffs’ attorneys’ efforts to blur the boundaries between civil and criminal law