Laws in action or action without laws? : understanding the legal and policy responses to hate crimes based on sexual orientation in Poland

• Main Author: Godzisz, Piotr
• Published: University College London (University of London) 2018
• Online Access: https://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.756226

Between 2005 and 2015 the Polish government stepped up efforts to counter violence based on sexual orientation, but the legal framework remained unchanged: Unlike in the case of racist violence, the homophobic motivation of a crime does not attract a higher penalty. Recognizing sexual orientation hate crime in some areas (e.g. police training) but refusing to legislate is unique in Europe, yet has not, so far, been an object of academic interest. For this reason, this dissertation seeks to understand why the passage of legislation providing higher penalties for sexual orientation hate crimes in Poland proved more difficult than for other forms of bias crimes. The thesis finds that the joint efforts of nongovernmental and international organizations resulted in the improvements in the handling and monitoring of hate crime. These actors, however, were too weak to garner the political support for a change in the law. The key reasons for this include weak external conditioning, suboptimal advocacy strategies, illiberal politicians, and the historicism of laws. The study uses a multi-method approach, with Poland selected as the key case study and additional insights gained through a quantitative comparative analysis of Council of Europe states. Data sources include legal and policy texts, interviews and observation. The findings are interpreted through a combination of social movement outcome theories in the context of Europeanization.