Researching intimate partner violence. Gender, intersectionality, and policymaking

ABSTRACT

Despite decades of activism, research, theory development, and policymaking, the problem of intimate partner violence remains a major societal and health problem. While, in ‘normal’ times, one in three women experience physical or sexual violence during their lifetime by their partners, emergencies and epidemics serve as catalysts for violence against women, resulting in two- or even threefold increases in the number of reported cases. [...]factors such as age, ability, displacement, and immigrant status induce additional risks and vulnerabilities for victims of violence (UN Women Headquarters, 2020). [...]the recent Group of experts (GREVIO) evaluation report on the implementation of the Istanbul Convention in the Netherlands (Council of Europe, 2020) highlighted that such individualised approaches fail to recognise the gendered power dynamics and inequalities maintained and enhanced by this type of violence. In the article ‘Economic Abuse Amongst Dutch Women (Formerly) Victimised by Intimate Partner Violence and Abuse’, Van Gelder, Ligthart, Astro and Oertelt-Prigione make use of a mixed method approach to investigate how economic abuse operates as ‘a silent but distinct form’ of IPV.