Abstract
Leigh Goodmark’s latest book, Decriminalizing Domestic Violence: A Balanced Policy Approach to Intimate Partner Violence, is especially relevant to social workers who bring a unique, holistic skill set to prevention, intervention, and advocacy efforts related to intimate partner violence (IPV). Despite its controversial title, Decriminalizing Domestic Violence is not about scrapping decades of hard-fought battles to get legal and criminal justice recourses for people subjected to abuse. Rather, Goodmark urges that we use legal and criminal justice responses as a last resort within a much more holistic, ecological (and social work–friendly) approach to IPV prevention and intervention. Further, her analysis of the intersectionalities of IPV and other social justice issues aligns exceptionally well with feminist and social work perspectives.
Goodmark offers strong statistical support against relying primarily on criminal justice and legal responses to IPV, giving critical attention to the ways in which doing so harms people subjected to abuse, especially people of color, of low socioeconomic status, and women. Goodmark reminds readers that anti-violence advocates fought long and hard to get criminal justice and legal systems to intervene in IPV. She anticipates readers’ counterarguments, acknowledges the worthwhile feminist goals behind them, and subsequently breaks down why criminal justice and legal responses are not serving feminist and/or anti-violence goals. Among other examples, Goodmark notes how mandatory and dual-arrest policies punish people subjected to abuse who may use physical means to defend themselves against their offenders.
Goodmark argues that economic, public health, community-based, human rights, and balanced policy perspectives together form effective deterrents and interventions for IPV. The book is brimming with large- and small-scale examples that may seem feeble independent of one another but together address IPV as a multifaceted problem. For instance, working with policy makers, communities, and individual landlords to ensure access to stable, affordable housing not only serves as a primary prevention measure against IPV but also removes an enormous barrier to safety, centers on the needs of people subject to abuse, and reinforces community supports.
In addition to an abundance of concrete examples, a major strength of the book is its attention to social justice and the impacts of political and economic structures, such as neoliberalism, in perpetuating IPV on a macro level. Admittedly speaking from my own privilege, I thought Goodmark’s attention to race and other forms of diversity enriched the text beyond other works that may only mention intersectionalities, at best. From the introduction, Goodmark addresses (1) same-sex and transgender relationships and (2) impacts on communities of color and marginalized communities. She does not shy away from addressing structural issues related to criminal justice responses that people in communities of color anticipated before criminal justice responses became predominant. Goodmark highlights the fact that people in communities of color are less likely than whites to report IPV after an event of police brutality, for instance. Moreover, she underscores how criminal justice and legal responses to IPV exacerbate mass incarceration that particularly targets people of color. These examples further support the need for other kinds of IPV responses.
My greatest wish—perhaps for a second edition—would be for Goodmark to include an additional chapter on the intersection of IPV and child welfare. Goodmark references children rarely, and when she does, there is little to no mention of how people (women in particular) subjected to abuse are often revictimized through the child protection system and “failure to protect” paradigms. Such practices have huge implications for children, families, and communities at large. A chapter on child welfare responses would certainly fit a holistic approach to IPV prevention, intervention, and advocacy.
Ultimately, Goodmark’s Decriminalizing Domestic Violence is a well-rounded, evidence-supported proposal to adopt holistic policy responses to IPV on multiple levels. She meets arguments against her (to some) controversial recommendations with gentle urgings to consider the worthiness of widening our responses to IPV, given the grave limitations of current responses in the United States. She reminds us that expanding our perspectives of what interventions could look like are “worth exploring” at a minimum (p. 134). Readers will likely take away a great deal from this book, but at the very least, they will close the book with an expanded sense of what may be possible.