JUDICIAL APPROVAL OF CONCILIATION AGREEMENTS IN FAMILY OR DOMESTIC VIOLENCE CASES: SCOPE AND LIMITS IN RELATION TO EFFECTIVE JUDICIAL PROTECTION AND THE GENDER PERSPECTIVE AT THE CRIMINAL SENTENCING COURT FOR VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN No. 16 OF COCHABAMBA (2

Abstract

This research examines the judicial approval of conciliation agreements in cases of domestic and family violence from the perspective of effective judicial protection and the reinforced protection of women’s rights. The study is conducted in the context of the Criminal Sentencing Court for Violence against Women No. 16 in the city of Cochabamba during the period 2023–2024, within the framework of the exceptional application of Article 46 of Law No. 348, the Comprehensive Law to Guarantee Women a Life Free of Violence. The main objective is to determine how the judicial homologation of conciliation agreements affects the guarantee of effective judicial protection in cases of domestic violence. The guiding hypothesis holds that such homologation, when it fails to incorporate a rigorous assessment of power asymmetries and the real conditions of the victim’s voluntariness, negatively affects women’s effective judicial protection by contributing to the invisibilization of violence and the weakening of the State’s response. The research adopts a qualitative approach of a legal and socio-legal nature, based on documentary analysis of six judicial case files in which conciliation agreements were submitted for judicial approval. Through a structured analytical matrix, categories related to the exceptional nature of conciliation, the victim’s voluntariness, structural power asymmetries, judicial reasoning, and the exercise of conventionality control were examined. The results reveal that the judicial practice analyzed is predominantly oriented toward the formal verification of legal requirements, without sufficiently developing a substantive assessment of the real conditions of voluntariness or the structural inequalities that characterize gender-based violence. The constitutional and conventional analysis identified an argumentative deficit in judicial reasoning and a limited incorporation of a gender perspective and conventionality control in the decisions approving conciliation agreements. Consequently, the study concludes that judicial approval of conciliation agreements, when it fails to incorporate a rigorous assessment of the victim’s real autonomy and structural power asymmetries, may negatively affect women’s effective judicial protection and weaken the State’s response to gender-based violence. Finally, the research proposes the adoption of strengthened judicial criteria that incorporate the constitutional bloc and international human rights protection standards.