How Do Practitioners and Program Managers Working with Male Perpetrators View IPV? A Quebec Study

Abstract

To document the viewpoints on intimate partner violence (IPV) of Québec practitioners working with violent partners and of program managers of batterer intervention programs (BIPs). Based on Loseke’s (2003) theory of the construction of social problems, a qualitative study was carried out with 25 practitioners working with violent partners and with18 program managers of BIPs so as to explore their conceptions of IPV and their representations of perpetrators and victims. Study participants primarily defined IPV as a way of taking control, while nonetheless noting other motivations. They also insisted on the diversity of contexts of IPV and its numerous manifestations. For them, IPV was a complex, multifactorial problem, involving individual risk factors for the most part, though also including contextual and social ones. Not only did they not see a single type of IPV, but they also saw no single perpetrator or victim profile. They saw both perpetrators and victims as accountable for their choices, even though they posed some limitations on this general principle of accountability. Complexity and diversity seemed to characterize their conceptions of IPV and their representations of perpetrators and victims. Findings are discussed in the light of current debates about IPV, of implications for BIPs, and of contexts that may influence IPV conceptions.