Målsägande eller offer? En kritisk diskursanalys av hur offerskap konstrueras i fall av cyberstalking

Sammanfattning: This bachelor’s thesis focuses on the construction of victimization in interrogations with the claimants in cases of cyberstalking. There has been a big evolvement in the field of technology and use of social media in the last decade, which has resulted in new ways of committing crimes. Stalking per se is an old phenomenon but the new possibilities that the development in technology brings leads to new challenges in fighting crime. There has been a change in the view of victims in the Swedish society since the 90’s and the redemption of the victims has taken a big place in the public debate. Therefore, it is pertinent to investigate how the victim-perspective is managed in the preliminary investigations. The study has been conducted through data collection in terms of preliminary investigation reports from the Swedish police authority. These have been analyzed through a critical discourse analysis together with former international research about cyberstalking and theories from the field of social sciences. This resulted in a conclusion that states that the construction of the victim in cases of cyberstalking in Sweden tends to reduce the legitimacy of the victim through an unconscious process of victim-blaming. This results in certain implications, for instance, power relationships arise through prevailing ideological assumptions which reifies the way things are handled.