US Military Sexual Assault: How Media, Public Opinion and Interest Groups Affected Congressional Oversight

Abstract

It has been more than 30 years since the first sexual assault in the US military scandal; thousands of sexual assault survivors as well as numerous legislative regulations have not been able to address effectively the situation. In 2022, the Military Justice Improvement and Increasing Prevention Act (MJIIPA) finally passed. The article addresses what changed to allow the passage of this legislation and if it will be enough to fix the problem. The research questions are: What changed during Congressional Oversight to achieve the passage of MJIIPA? Media, Public Opinion and Interest Groups (IG) have played what role to achieve the changes in Congress? By making the changes to the COC what is to be expected? Will it be enough to address the issue? This article uses the case study method. The results of this examination demonstrate that neither media, public opinion nor interest groups provided the influence expected. It was elite cues and those committed to reforming the system as a continuous process, not an ad hoc procedure that pushed forward the reforms. Received: 11 November 2023 / Accepted: 23 April 2024 / Published: 5 May 2024