SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The current chapter discusses the relationship between wartime and intimate partner violence, focusing on women’s perspectives and experiences of the effects of war on their partners and the family context. The review engaged with studies drawn primarily from North America, Africa, Latin America, the Levant and South Asia and examined intimate partner violence within military populations, civilian populations affected by war and among refugee and displaced populations. The evidence points to a multi-dimensional mechanism that connects political violence to intimate partner violence, such as through mental health trauma and behaviour change among victims and perpetrators, socio-cultural parameters contributing to the further abuse of war survivors, or the breakdown of support systems and community solidarity that would be otherwise available in peace-time. Individuals affected by conflict tend to continue to face trauma-related consequences for many years after, which are defined within wider normative frameworks and material realities, as well as individual histories of trauma. Responses to conflict-related intimate partner violence must consider how political violence may intersect with pre-existing individual trauma and seek to support affected groups in ways that can prevent further abuse in domestic and communal life. Such efforts need to be contextualised in communities’ religio-cultural beliefs systems. Having read this chapter, you should be able to understand: ● The relationship between wartime violence and intimate partner violence ● Explanatory theories, prevalence rates and risk factors ● Women’s perceptions and experiences of intimate partner violence and their responses to it in conflict and post-conflict time and in displaced contexts ● How interventions may be designed to respond to partner abuse in conflict and post-conflict time