Contested Spaces: Neoliberalism and Psychology in the Feminist Anti-Violence Movement in Ontario from the 1970s to Today

This thesis examines how the co-evolving projects of Psychology and neoliberalism have influenced the feminist anti-violence movement since the early 1970s and attends specifically to the extent to which this movement has been depoliticized over time through the use of trauma as a concept applied to the area of domestic violence research and intervention. A critical feminist and historical lens is used to analyze Toronto Interval House and the Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Homes as institutionalized sites of the feminist movement from 1973 to today. I conclude the institutionalized movement, represented through shelters and state policies, has contorted itself to meet the demands of neoliberalism in Ontario, resulting in functional rather than truly emancipatory forms of feminism enduring across the province and within the women’s shelter system. This project contributes a historical, theoretical, and critical perspective on moving forward feminist theorizing and organizing by reconceptualizing violence and trauma.