Ignacio Elpidio Domínguez Ruiz’s research while affiliated with University of Santiago de Compostela and other places

Queer studies, starting from an approach mostly focused on literary and cultural studies, have had a sometimes complicated relation with empirical and quantitative research. Despite a trajectory of suspicion, several recent proposals have argued for the complementarity and the need for queer studies that draw from the production of empirical data, and particularly from mixed methods. This historical relation of suspicion or doubts may be made even more visible in the case of official statistics and surveys, due to a track record of oppressive practices and oblivion. Starting from this context, this article presents the case of the methodological design for a queer victimisation survey for a public administration. This design benefited from methods complementarity, particularly from exploratory interviews, to make a quantitative data tool adapt as much as possible to the needs of public administrations and social organisations. This case study is presented as an opportunity to reflect on the potential of mixed methods for developing a queer social science that builds bridges between queer studies and the production of quantitative data.

Victim support police work involves a wide range of relations within a police force, including expectations that set this occupation as a hybrid or liminal position, between what’s commonly considered classic policing and social work. Between victims’ and other police officers’ expectations, their experience is dramatically affected by liminality, with deep effects regarding group identity, satisfaction, and wellbeing. Drawing from qualitative research among victim support officers from Catalonia’s Mossos d’Esquadra corps, this article analyses how victim support officers find themselves between specific police fields and expectations, and how this defines them as liminars or subjects of liminal positions, roles, and actions. This, in turn, we argue, makes them an uneasy object and subject for victims, other officers, and for their institutions.

Las diferentes experiencias de victimización y las condiciones de vida de las personas LGBTI —lesbianas, gais, bisexuales, trans e intersexuales—, lejos de ser homogéneas, varían en el plano geográfico. Las desiguales vivencias se relacionan y comparan en distintos países, pero también regiones o municipios, algo que no ha escapado de la atención académica y mediática. A partir de datos para España de una encuesta en la Unión Europea, este artículo explora la relación de dependencia entre las respuestas sobre victimización y condiciones de vida con el lugar de residencia de las personas participantes, sobre el continuo rural-urbano. El test chicuadrado de independencia y los residuos estandarizados permiten rechazar la homogeneidad de las vivencias de las personas LGBTI, así como distinguir las problemáticas concretas para cada categoría de participantes.

The victims of anti-LGBT hate crimes may have particularly negative experiences which affect their mental health and wellbeing. These incidents affect the victims' self-esteem, dignity and identity, and they also affect indirect victims in similar ways. As opposed to retributive justice, restorative justice may offer a more satisfactory justice experience for those affected, by addressing the harm caused to them. This is due to the fact that restorative processes require flexibility, adequacy and tailor-made design. Drawing on findings from a multi-site qualitative study conducted in six European countries, this article discusses the perceptions and experiences of key professionals regarding the potential of restorative justice to provide for victims of anti-LGBT hate crimes, particularly in relation to repairing the individual and collective harm caused by such crimes.

The wide range of victimization experiences and life conditions of LGBTI individuals (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex), far from being homogeneous, shows a significant geographical variation. Within countries and global regions, but even within provinces and smaller territories, unequal experiences have caught both academic and media attention, providing key concepts and insights. The disparities between European Union member states, for instance, have fuelled comparisons between Western and Eastern countries. Drawing from Spanish survey data on victimization experiences and life conditions of LGBTI individuals, this paper explores how said experiences relate to the respondents’ place of residence, within a rural–urban continuum. The chi-squared test of independence and the use of standardized residuals allows us to reject the apparent homogeneity of experiences among LGBTI individuals, as well as to distinguish between the specificities of each participant category along the spatial continuum. This paper argues for a nuanced perspective that prioritizes disparities and inequalities rather than commonalities, while also considering the shared system of oppression that informs said differences.

Providing face-to-face support to victims entails one the most intense stress- and trauma-laden exchanges of law enforcement tasks, which frequently triggers long lasting negative effects on police officer’s psychological wellbeing. When exploring this phenomenon, police resilience is often interpreted as police officers’ and organization’s capacity to react and recover from negative experiences and impediments, and as such it may be perceived as both a trait and a trainable and promotable skill. Yet, in very recent times, police resilience has faced new or transformed challenges due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as victims, citizens, and public institutions have encountered new needs and situations. Drawing from a unique qualitative, in-depth research with police officers that provide support to victims of gender-based and domestic violence, this paper analyzes officers’ needs and challenges regarding their interactions with victims, colleagues, superiors, and other occupational demands, as they interplay into stress and trauma that may lead to burnout and compassion fatigue. Illustrated with the empirical findings of the case study of the Catalonia’s Mossos d’Esquadra police corps, the paper explores how officers negotiate individuals’ expectations, needs, and procedures signals towards potential challenges and threats to their psychological wellbeing with implications for police forces and other public and private institutions. The specific needs and demands of the participants’ policing, related to support to gender-based and domestic violence, presents an in-depth analysis of how stress and trauma are understood and experienced from the police officers’ perspectives.