“TEM MULHER QUE VOLTA, TEM MULHER QUE SOME”: A ATUAÇÃO DA CASA DA MULHER MARANHENSE NO COMBATE À VIOLÊNCIA DOMÉSTICA

Abstract

This research is part of the debate on public policies to combat domestic violence against women and the tensions between their normative promises and concrete implementation in state services. By investigating the Maranhense Women's House in Imperatriz, Maranhão, it asks whether and how this service promotes women's human rights and contributes to breaking the cycle of violence, considering the obstacles of an unequal socioeconomic context and a justice system that often revictimizes its users. The objective of the study is to understand the institutional dynamics that shape the House's activities, based on gender, race, and class divisions. The research adopts an ethnographic method, combined with documentary analysis, focusing on the psychosocial sector's service records for the year 2023. The findings reveal that, although the House is a strategic space for reception and referral, its operation is hampered by structural gaps, bureaucratic routines, and barriers to access. The theoretical and practical implications point to the need to reconfigure public policies based on situated and intersectional listening. The theoretical contribution is based on Saffioti (2015), Federici (2017), and Gonzalez (2020), who understand violence as a structural phenomenon, functional to patriarchy and capitalism. In addition, Crenshaw (2002) and Collins (2016) are mobilized as fundamental references for understanding intersectionality as an analytical lens that highlights inequality in access to rights. Dialogues with Gago (2020) and Pasinato (2011) allow us to problematize the effects of the institutionalization of the feminist agenda in care practices. This is an original study that contributes to the field of sociological, feminist, and public policy studies by shedding light on the impasses and potential of a state service in combating domestic violence against women in a city marked by inequalities.