Maybe he didn’t intend to rape her: a critical discourse analysis of the district courts conceptualization of the defendant in rape verdicts.

Abstract: Previous research show, people interpret others through their pre-understanding and stereotypical beliefs. Rape crimes are periodically debated in the Swedish media. The debates often elucidate laws incapability to manage the complexity of rape, focusing on the women as the injured party. The purpose of this study is to highlight the Swedish district court’s conceptualization of the defendant in rape verdicts. This study illuminates if and how the district court argue about the characteristics of the defendant, and if there are any differences in the district court’s conceptualization in regards of the defendant’s background and social position. Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis is used in order to examine the rape verdicts. The identified discourses of the 46 analysed rape verdicts, settled by the district court of Malmö and the district court of Helsingborg, have been analysed through Bourdieu’s concepts of social class, symbolic violence and symbolic capital. Furthermore, the content of the discourses has been highlighted through theories of masculine domination and feminist legal theory. Foucault argues, discourses produced by institutions maintain inequalities in society, in line with this, Bourdieu claim that the state exercise symbolic violence. In the light of this, discourses, produced and reproduced by the district courts, have the power to uphold inequalities in society. The results of this study indicate that the district courts reproduce masculine domination and male identities. The district courts assessments are influenced by stereotypical beliefs of both male and female behaviour.