Attacks on Otherness – A Criminal Law Analysis of Identity-Based Crimes

• Applicant: Dr. Leonie Steinl
• Subject Area: Criminal Law
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 528535035

Crimes against persons based on certain identity characteristics, such as sexual orientation, ethnicity, or religion, are not a new phenomenon. However, they are gaining increasing public awareness and have also attracted heightened attention from criminal legislators in recent years. These crimes have so far been subsumed under the term hate crime. Yet, this term raises numerous unanswered questions from a functional, conceptual and criminal law dogmatic perspective. The research project intends to re-evaluate and model the relationships between identity, violence, hate, and criminal law on the basis of an examination of these deficits. The aim of the project is to develop a theoretical concept of identity-based crimes in order to better grasp the phenomenon from a criminological and criminal law dogmatic perspective. On the basis of this concept, criminal law reform issues will be identified and corresponding proposals will be developed.

• DFG Programme: Independent Junior Research Groups