What Can We Achieve by 2030? Rights for Victims of Crime in the Era of Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract

In recognition of disturbing rates of violence and lack of rights for victims in 1985, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the magna carta for victims where the governments of the world agreed to focus on the prevention of victimization and rights for victims of crime. Unfortunately, the world did little and is now faced with a public health crisis of half a million people murdered in 2018, one billion children as victims of violence and one in three women as victims of gender related violence. This chapter outlines key ways for Victimologists to address this challenge. It highlights the accumulated knowledge and the pathfinder successes with sources. It explains the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to which every government is committed, which include significant and measurable reductions in violence against women in what is known as SDG 5, and, in homicide, violent crime, and violence against children in SDG 16. Victimologists have an important responsibility to advocate for transformations from governments by understanding the SDG process and promoting awareness of the usefulness of victimology, including using modern social media.