Raising awareness, improving victim safety : exploring the efficacy of proactive domestic and family violence prevention measures

Domestic and family violence (DFV) remains an issue of major concern for contemporary societies. DFV has been a focus of academic, political and social discourse since the initial contribution of feminist researchers, academics and activists, such as Erin Pizzey (1974, 1975), Carol Smart (1976) and Dobash and Dobash (1979), who raised the profile of DFV during the 1970s. However, DFV is now recognised as a heterogeneous social problem in which both women and men are victims (Hamel, 2005; Archer, 2006; Graham-Devan & Archer, 2008; Ireland & Birch, 2013). Preventing DFV has been at the forefront of international efforts led by global agencies such as the United Nation’s World Health Organization (WHO), as well as national governments and local police forces. This chapter therefore, adopts a gender and sexuality inclusive approach in order to examine DFV prevention approaches with a focus on proactive measures. The chapter first contexualises the problem of DFV before exploring a range of DFV proactive prevention measures, including new and innovative techniques such as infotainment. This chapter advocates that proactive prevention can be used to not only extend the practice of victim safety, but to act as an early intervention strategy through raising awareness of this form of violence.