An Evaluation of the Protection afforded to women n and vulnerable adults against domestic abuse

 

Introduction

Domestic violence can be found in most cultures throughout the world. During the late 20th century, cultures that allowed male domination had most cases of domestic abuse and violence. Women were expected to suffer without complaining. Hostility and criticism was directed at feminists and women movements for challenging this abuse and governments at various points in history permitted the vice. The nature of the domestic violence for long has been associated with coercive behavior, threatening traits sexual or financial abuse. But all these has changed. In today's world, women and other vulnerable groups have a voice. There are various ways   today's society utilize to ensure their protection. The government has come up with institutions whose sole responsibilities are to report, investigate, rehabilitate and confirm domestic violence is contained or reduced significantly. Modern ways of raising awareness such as free counseling and advice have helped to protect women and other vulnerable groups. Laws have been passed to penalize all people who commit the crime. Women are more likely to be domestically abused if they do not speak up or raise the alarm for fear of being intimidated or threatened with death. Safer legal recording procedures have emerged to protect the anonymity of victims. Men can also be vulnerable to domestic violence. Domestic violence can also happen in same-sex marriages (Europe, and Hilary p123).

 

 

Aims and objectives

This research should fulfill the following purposes:

To examine the measures taken to protect women and vulnerable adults against domestic abuse.

.To Examine How Authorities respond to victims of domestic violence in the UK.

Laws put in place to protect women and vulnerable groups from domestic violence.

To study the measures taken while monitoring and evaluating

To recommend ways that can assist I the protest of women and vulnerable adults against

To safeguard the rights of women and vulnerable adults

To define the responsibilities of the different government institutions

 

 

Literature review

Domestic abuse   is socially constructed, has developed over the years and usually reflect prevailing insights, interest and authority distribution. Feminists' understanding influenced  by personal experiences or witnessing other abused women, have supported evidence-based researchers which have assisted  in expanding concepts around domestic violence as  physically  damaging  through  highlighting  the interrelating ranges of domestic violence, coercion, controlling traits causing psychological, sexual and physical harm to the victims .However, researchers have not given enough attention to sexual, mental and other effects of domestic violence. Some issues about terminologies remain hotly contested, such as whether domestic abuse is a gender-specific or neutral reference or includes all other forms and instances of violence in each and every category of intimate relationships (Europe, and Hilary p120).

In the context of criminal justice, there are no legal or shared definitions of house hold abuse utilized by the UK criminal justice agencies and other relevant institutions. This implies comparing research and surveillance data and coordinating policy creation and activities. The government was forced to come up with a standard definition which is in line with other definitions used by the justice system institutions (Europe, and Hilary p102).

 

Definitions

The present UK criminal justice functioning definitions try addressing common knowledge and responsibilities, operation discussions among other crisis. All definitions cover a broader spectrum including abusive traits recorded in the Home office descriptions: ‘any abuse between current and former partners in an intimate relationship’, wherever and whenever the assault takes place. ‘Some of the institutions including particular police services, incorporate violence in other close relationships into their definition terms. Law enforcement department definitions limit their scope to violence toward a grown-up family member which is in line with value performance indicator description. On the other probation and CPS definitions have included abuse of a child. PS limits its meaning to criminal offenses only. The standard definition of domestic violence refers to violence perpetrated toward a family member or and an intimate in an adult relationship.

A standard definition helps officials to focus on the actual crime and the key concerns. Domestic abuse under the standard definition has the following characteristics can be derived from it: controlling, threatening and coercive behaviors p116).

After finding the conventional definition of domestic abuse, other words associated with it can also be defined to give the definition a proper context. Incident can be defined as anywhere, and it is not just limited to a home of the victim or member of a family. Family members may include a mother, a father, son or daughter or any other directly or indirectly related person. An intimate partner implies that there must have been a stable relationship for s period. The relationship should also be considered to have had a logical or sexual angle to it, for instance, between a wife and husband or any other types of couples, (same-sex couples are included).A serial perpetrator is an individual with a criminal record of domestic abuse against two or more people. Coercive behavior refers to an act of assaulting, threatening, humiliating or other forms of punishment meant to harm or scare n individual (Europe, and Hilary p67).

Honor-based type of violence refers to a group of practices meant to establish control over the behavior of individual people. A family or other social groups can control the behavior. These types of violence can occur when the perpetrator perceives that another manner of the extended family has shamed the family and needs to be punished so that the honor of the family can be restored. Honor killings can be distinguished from other kinds of violence due to the amount of approval it receives from other members of the family or the society. It is not easy prosecuting these type of domestic violence. They do not easily come out of the public domain. Family members can easily hide evidence and make it appear as though their own was murdered. Some government and laws support honor   violence within their societies making it to stop it worldwide. This can be compared female genital mutilation which is suppose in some African communities (Harne and Jill p77).

There is a fine line that can be drawn between a forced, marriage and arranged marriages. In an arranged marriage, the families on both sides, take a participating role in arranging the marriage but the ultimate choice remains with the couple (Harne and Jill p132).

In Forced marriage, either one or both of the individuals do not agree with the arrangement of the union. In some cases, some adults are incapable of making their own decisions due to an inability hence their relatives or close guardians make the choices on their behalf. Also, some factors of duress may play a role in a forced marriage such as physical financial or emotional pressure. Forced marriages are a domestic abuse that violates the human rights of other people. Anyone who is under the age of 18 is considered a child under the law hence forced marriage can be a type of child abuse (Buzawa and Carl p 115). A child forced into marriage can suffer from immense harm which can be either physical, sexual or emotional. Forced marriages have a profoundly damaging impact on a child. It affects both health and development of a child. And can lead to sexual; violence such as rape. When a child is forced into marriage, he or she may be taken to a faraway land for an extended period which amounts to child abduction. In addition to this, such a child's education would be affected due to absenteeism from school. Thus, a child in a forced marriage would miss out on education opportunities. Even if the child is not taken to a faraway country, they are more likely to miss out on school. A child who attends a school they are more likely to tell their predicament to their peers (Harne and Jill p143).

Female Genital Mutilation is a common terminology for procedures that cut off part of or the entire external female genitals due to culture purposes or other reasons they deem as reasonable. The exercise is not essential at all, it is painful, and the health consequences are disastrous. Both long and short-term effects start immediately after the procedure is carried out. It is performed on females aged between 4 and 13 years of age. In rare cases, it is carried out on infants or young ladies before they are married off to their soon to be husbands. Female Genital Mutilation is the crime under the laws of United Kingdom. Under the Female Genital Mutilation Act of 2003, replaced the Act passed in 1985.This Act makes it illegal for any resident of UK  carry out the practice or to facilitate it in any way (Harne and Jill p127).

The care Act of 2014 and Support Statutory Guidance of the year 2014 stipulates that a lot of individuals perceive domestic violence as a crime committed by an intimate partner, but the abuse may not have been perpetrated by a partner or former partner but members of the person's family (Harne and Jill p113).

 

Responsibilities of various groups

Division heads and managers must do their best to ensure the safety of all their staff members. This can be done by educating them on their roles and responsibilities about policies that protect them from domestic violence. Also, they need to be made aware of necessary steps they need to take incase domestic abuse occurs within the work environment (Harne and Jill p103).

 

Workers

Every employee must support any victim of domestic abuse. The primary responsibility the principal responsibility for such this support system will rely on the individual with the primary responsibility for taking care of domestic violence victims (Cook, p 34). The staff members are responsible for seeking advice, guidance whenever they are not sure about the application procedures or aspects of the policies that protect them from domestic violence (Harne and Jill p72).

 

 

 

General support to every victim of violence and abuse

Most of the institutions support the efforts made by the government to protect its citizen n from any form of domestic violence and abusive relationships. The government portrays domestic violence as the act that betrays trust and goes to the right of every citizen to feel safe both their houses and in their intimate relationships. This law is stipulated in the Department of Health passed in the year 2005.Hence trust can be used to ensure that any form of domestic violence or abuse is easily identified and service utilizers and staff members are provided with necessary data and a support system to reduce the risk. The government plays various roles to ensure domestic violence and abuse is decreased significantly among citizens living within the United Kingdom. The have various institutions that raise awareness on any issue on domestic abuse and violence. Ensuring that their institutions and staff abide by the rule of law; enable them to provide assistance and supportive measures to all the victims and patients. If an adult is at risk of domestic violence then, their children are also at risk of the abuse. The government recognizes that domestic violence is not only wrong but a punishable criminal offense. Government implements measures necessary to stop domestic violence and abuse. These measures provide platforms for victims or either people who have witnessed the crimes to report the case (Kelly and Julia p 431).

 

 

Safeguarding procedures for victims of domestic abuse and violence

The attending officer has the sole responsibility of ensuring victims of domestic abuse are protected and secured from their perpetrators until investigations into the matter are passed to the concerned authorities (Radford and Lynne p 129). The fooling lists elaborate on the tactics used by various institutions to ensure they protect and security of women and other vulnerable people: Flag any address for a quicker response to calls for help from the address. Crime prevention officers forward the addresses for the victims to schools or their places of work and other public places frequented by the individual. The information the public of dangerous areas or places they can avoid. These officers advice or give extra attention to victims by answering their calls and taking necessary steps to ensure the victim is attended to immediately they make the distress call. They email other authorities (Kelly and Julia p 230).

Research methodology

This research will focus on a socio-legal method (Kelly and Julia p 201).

 

Justification of the chosen methodology

This type of methods helps or relate the relationship between the law and the society. Connecting the community with thaw legal factors will answer the research questions above. The primary research focus is the protection of women and vulnerable adult adults. Therefore socio-legal research enables me to find out best ways to implement laws that will help the society change their attitude toward domestic violence (Kelly and Julia p 258).

 

Feasibility analysis

This research topic is feasible due to its constant relevance in different parts of the world hence data will be readily available for assessment. Socio-legal methodology recognizes the need to incorporate various ways of studying law and other legal phenomena that will assist to create protection policies for women and other vulnerable groups. Combining the advantages of this methodology and my experience in legal research studies will bring out my competence. I will source for research material from various online library platforms. However, I can have access to scholarly articles by other means such as the SFX system located at the UWS library or through the SCONUL systems (Cefrey, p 97). I can also use the alternative but extensive databases available via UWS and EBSCO database. A part of this databases, I can inquire information through the interlibrary loan systems (Kelly and Julia p 101).

This research is not expensive to conduct; it entirely relies on data from the library information which has been gathered from previously related investigations. Movement is not required since a collection of information is done in place, and that is from the library (McCue, p 171). The only cost incurred will be regarding accessing online libraries and other types of data (Kelly and Julia p 57).

Regarding time allocation, I am supposed to have completed the work I have chosen to conduct this research for the legal research module in the second trimester of my third year of study at UWS.Hence the regulations of the course have to be satisfactorily meant. I have only twelve weeks, which is equal to one academic term. I am confident that the work can be finished within the required time and still maintain its quality (Kelly and Julia p 89).

I also acknowledged the fact  that work done on this project  is slightly limited  because of certain perspectives that I may choose to observe such as type of information I chose to include in the research  and relevance of  various  sources to my research. All aspects of the research cannot be exhausted elaborately due to the limited time I have. Therefore future researchers will have more in-depth evaluation of policies used to protect women and adult vulnerable groups, analysis of the origin of domestic abuse and an examination from a more ethical angle than the legal angle (Kelly and Julia p 32).

 

 

 

Ethical considerations

These considerations are very crucial when carrying out researches. Ethics refer to the norms or standards that helps to distinguish between right or wrong. They determine the contrast between what is acceptable and what not acceptable (Finley, p123) is. Therefore they are very vital in any research. First of all, the prevention against any falsification of information and hence promote the pursuit of academic knowledge and truth which is the primary objective of any research. Ethical standards also initiate collaborative work as it motivates and creates an atmosphere of trust, accountability, and transparency while conducting an investigation. This occurs due to issues such as I formation sharing, citations, and confidentiality among many other things. These set standards of coed and policies provide a guideline that helps an individual make right decisions while conducting their researches to avoid cases of misconduct (Kelly and Julia p 323).

One of the primary ethical considerations has to do with the utilization of human subjects. To address such concerns, most firms and companies have come to an institutional review board. The board plays a role in ensuring that human subjects are protected and not violated by any researcher (Kelly and Julia p 98).

They review every research format methodology to the content development of, research proposals to make sure every ethical standard is adhered to. The institution also safeguards the interests of the researcher and the institution against potential legal effects form any behavior that may be deemed as unethical or against the common good of the society. Examples of issues that some of the things that a may be considered unethical are: voluntary presentation or participating and informed consent. These standards are followed to ensure that all individual subjects have not be coerced into joining into the research but they have done it out of their free will and they are all aware of the underlying procedures that entail the analysis (Sanderson, p98). Ethical standards protect the anonymity and confidentiality of the individuals that might take part in the research (Kelly and Julia p 267).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works cited

Buzawa, Eva S, and Carl G. Buzawa. Domestic Violence: The Criminal Justice Response. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications, 2003

Cefrey, Holly. Domestic Violence. New York, NY: Rosen Pub. Group, 2009.

Cook, Philip W. Abused Men: The Hidden Side of Domestic Violence. Westport, Conn: Praeger, 2009

Europe, Council, and Hilary Brown. Violence against Vulnerable Groups. Strasbourg Cedex: Council of Europe, 2004

Finley, Laura L. Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault in Popular Culture. , 2016

Harne, Lynne, and Jill Radford. Tackling Domestic Violence: Theories, Policies and Practice. Maidenhead: Open University Press, 2007

Kelly, Sanja, and Julia Breslin. Women's Rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Progress Amid Resistance. New York: Freedom House, 2010

McCue, Margi L. Domestic Violence: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO, 2008.

Radford, Jill, and Lynne Harne. Tackling Domestic Violence: Theories, Policies and Practice. Maidenhead: McGraw-Hill Education, 2008

Sanderson, Chrissie. Counselling Survivors of Domestic Abuse. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2008.