Contact: Rosa LOGAR (Director)

Address: Austria

1060 Vienna

Amerlingstrasse 1/6

Phone: 00431 / 585 32 88

e-mail: office(AT)interventionsstelle-wien.at 

http://www.interventionsstelle-wien.at/ 

We are an program on domestic violence aiming at creating an integrated response to interpersonal violence by establishing effective intervention systems. Our work is based on the Domestic Violence Bill, a new law introduced in may 1997.

Part of our work are perpetrator related interventions. Together with them man’s counselling centre in Vienna we carry out a program for violent men. The program consists of social training groups for violent men, support for the victims and the co-ordination of all interventions. It’s a pro-feminist program putting safety of the victims highest on the agenda.

More information see attaches files.

2. Titles of texts on the subject on national or international level:

I have published several articles on the program in German language.

I also include an article about the whole program

I published together with two collegues a book on working with violent men:

Rosa Logar

Ute Rösemann

Urs Zürcher

Gewalttätige Männer ändern (sich)

Rahmenbedingungen und Handbuch für ein soziales Trainingsprogramm

Haupt Verlag Zürich/Stuttgart/Wien 2002

ISBN 3-258-06395-8 
____________________________________

Short Abstract by Rosa Logar

If the safety and protection victim’s of domestic violence are to be safeguarded, it is not enough just to work with the victim. Intervention is necessary to put an effective and immediate stop to further abuse. Such measures are referred to as “perpetrator-related intervention”. One of the intervention centre’s functions is to initiate or carry out perpetrator-related interventions with the victim’s assent. These measures include:

· Requesting the police to issue expulsion orders in cases of imminent violence

· Applying for an injunction

· Co-operating with the State Prosecutor’s Office and the courts to implement measures to prevent violence

· Consulting the child welfare authorities on ways to protect the children

· Establishing contact and co-operation with all the agencies involved

· Confronting the abuser and putting him in touch with councelling and training facilities

· Organising social training programs for perpetrators

While the process of working with perpetrators generally does not start until a later stage, perpetrator-related intervention seeks to confront the abuser with his actions at the earliest possible juncture after violence has been committed and to terminate the violence immediately. The latter goal can be achieved only if various agencies initiate wide-ranging but co-ordinated interventions to make the abuser realise his behaviour is not tolerated and will entail consequences. Perpetrator-related intervention is also important as a means of assessing the danger and the perpetrator’s willingness to co-operate.

The Vienna intervention centre’s is also co-operating with the men’s center in Vienna and carrying out social training programmes for perpetrators. Studies indicate, that the important factors contributing to the termination of violent behaviour are co-ordinated interventions, but not isolated perpetrator programmes (cf. Gondolf 1997, Rosenfeld 1992, Tolman & Bennet 1990, cited in: Jasinski/Williams 1998; Gondolf 2002).

Multi-Agency Work

Recent developments in violence prevention include multi-agency work. This approach has its origins in the perception that violence against women can be effectively combated only through concerted and co-ordinated action on the part of all the social agencies concerned. There are various approaches to the structural organisation of multi-agency work. They range from institution-based projects like the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project in Duluth, Minnesota, one of the first of its kind, to the more or less formal network structures such as the Domestic Violence Fora in Britain and integrated intervention projects working with victims and perpetrators on violence prevention (cf. Pence/Paymar 1993, Hague/Malos/Dear 1996, Burton/Regan/Kelly 1998). In recent years similar intervention projects have been established in the German-speaking countries – in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Multi-agency co-operation is part of the work of the intervention centres objective is to enhance the effectiveness of violence prevention measures and to gauge them more accurately to the victims’ needs. Far from being a simple strategy, it is extremely complex and sets its sights very high. It involves a range of widely differing agencies, attitudes and standpoints. Certain conditions need to be fulfilled if it is to succeed (cf. Hague/Malos/Dear 1996, Action Committee of Autonomous Austrian Women’s Shelters 1998).

References:

Burton, Sheila / Regan, Linda / Kelly, Liz: Supporting Women and Challenging Men. Lessons from the Domestic Violence Intervention Project, Bristol 1998

Gondolf, W. Edward: Batterer Intervention Systems. Issues, Outcomes and Recommendations, Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi 2002

Hague, Gill / Malos, Ellen / Dear, Wendy: Multi-agency work and domestic violence, Bristol 1996

Jasinski, L. Jana / Williams, M. Linda: Partner Violence. A Comprehensive Review of 20 Years of Research, Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi 1998

Pence, Ellen / Paymar, Michael: Educational Groups for Men who Batter. The Duluth Model, New York 1993
________________________________

Updated March 2002

by Rosa Logar

Violence against women is not only committed in the public sphere, but predominantly in the private sphere. Tens of thousands of women and children throughout Europe are permanently fleeing violence on the part of husbands, partners, fathers or other male members of the family. Their homes, where they ought to feel safest, have become places in which they are at risk. Approximately 170 million women and girls currently live in the countries of the European Union. Empirical studies of the extent of violence perpetrated against them, although few and far between, suggest that between one quarter and one third of them are subjected to male violence (cf. Heiskanen / Piispa 1998; Schweizerische Konferenz der Gleichstellungsbeauftragten 1997). This would mean that, within the EU, approximately 42-56 million women and girls are exposed to male violence at any given time. Most acts of violence against women are committed in the family. Children are always affected by this violence, either directly or as eye-witnesses of violence against their mothers.

Such figures attest to the fact that domestic violence against women, far from being a secondary issue, is in fact a grave social problem that causes massive psychological but also economic and social damage. A study carried out in the Netherlands estimates that the costs entailed by domestic violence against women amount to more than 200 ECU per annum: Swiss experts estimate that violence against women costs the federal, cantonal and municipal authorities approximately 400 million Swiss francs a year (cf. Korf 1997; Godenzi / Yodanis 1998).

In 1972 the first women’s shelter was opened in London, and stood at the beginning of an ongoing and still not finished process. Currently there are approximately 1500 women’s shelters in Europe, and women in Eastern European countries also have started to create women’s services over the past 10 years. However, the women’s movement against violence did not restrict its work to social measures for affected women, but also sees itself as a political movement against violence on women, with the aim to make the connection between individual violence against women and patriarchal societal structures evident. The feminist analysis, that shows violence against women as a controlling and dominating instrument towards women, has – after years of activism at national and international level – been included in documents and definitions of international organizations. The Platform for Action, the final document of the Fourth United Nations World Conference on Women, states:

“Violence against women is a manifestation of the historically unequal power relations between men and women, which have led to domination over and discrimination against women by men and to the prevention of women’s full advancement.” (p. 75) (United Nations 1996)

“The term ‘violence against women’ means any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in , physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life” (pp. 73f.)

I should like to sketch in the social context of the measures against violence detailed below by providing a few facts and figures about Austria: The Austrian population totals 7,991,000 (Austrian Central Statistical Office, 1993). Women and girls account for 51.6% of the population. In 1991 the female employment rate came to 62.7%. The average income of dependently employed women is 30% lower than that of dependently employed men.

Austria’s first women’s shelter was opened in Vienna in 1978. More then two decades years on there are now twenty two shelters and four non-resident women’s counselling centres providing protection and assistance for women and children who have suffered violence. Women’s shelters in Austria are financed primarily by the public sector, and their funding falls within the responsibility of the federal province concerned. In 1987 the European Parliament’s Commission on Women’s Rights recommended that one shelter place be available per 10,000 residents. In Austria, this would mean 700 shelter places. At present, there is room for only about 350 women and children in shelters. A Council of Europe Group of Specialists drew up an extensive report and action plan for combating violence against women in 1997. In it they proposed making one shelter place available per 7,500 residents (cf. Council of Europe/Group of Specialists for Combating Violence against Women 1997).

In 1998 the Austrian Women’s Shelter Network was founded as an affiliation of all women working in the feminist women’s shelters and counselling centres. The Network establish the Information Centre Against Violence in Vienna, which works in the field of violence prevention (violence against women, domestic violence, and sexual abuse of children). The centre provides information and training for different target groups (victims, neighbours, journalists, pupils, students, teachers, institutions, politicians etc.) and runs a 24-hour helpline for women. Further tasks of the centre are: public relations, networking, research, developing new strategies, and international co-operation.

The Austrian Women’s Shelter Network is a founding member of the European network WAVE – Women Against Violence Europe. WAVE is a network of European non-governmental organisations working in the field of violence against women and children. The network was founded during the Fourth UN World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995.

Measures to Combat Domestic Violence in Austria

In Austria – as in many other countries – the issue of violence against women has been kept in the forefront of public debate, although interest in it has tended to ebb and flow. The principal factor here was and still is the unflagging public relations work and lobbying carried out by the feminist movement.

The first major upsurge of interest came in the late seventies with the founding of the first women’s shelters in Austria. For most of the eighties their staff were largely occupied with establishing the facilities and developing practical approaches to the tasks at hand. Towards the end of the eighties another process of questioning set in (cf. Brückner 1996). In the seventies the feminist movement considered it an achievement in itself to have created shelters as refuges for women and children – as safe havens within the patriarchal ocean, as it were. Over the years, however, it became increasingly apparent that these safe havens more closely resembled prisons. Important though it was for the mental fortification and empowerment of the women concerned that they could find refuge in shelters, it proved to have a large number of drawbacks. They forfeited their social environment, their child care facilities, in many cases even their jobs. As soon as the pioneers of the women’s shelters in Austria got through the trials and tribulations of the initial phase and had time to sit down and think, they realised that they were no longer happy with what they had achieved to date. They recalled that their original objective had been to eliminate violence and in the long term to make women’s shelters redundant. How was this goal to be reached? The numbers of women and children taking refuge in more and more shelters gradually came to epitomise injustice and the state’s failure to redress it. The international feminist movement for women’s human rights served in Austria as an important trigger for thinking ahead and evolving new strategies. The definition of violence in both public and private life as a violation of women’s human rights at the Human Right Conference of the United Nations in Vienna in 1993 was a landmark achievement in this respect (cf. Bunch/Reilly 1994).

Women in Austria began to voice their dissatisfaction with the prevailing situation. This process came to a head in the early nineties with the launching of a number of initiatives aimed primarily at amending the existing legislation. The feminist movement now directed the thrust of its activities at the law as the key regulative in the running of the state. It was a fact that perpetrators of violence against women were seldom prosecuted or punished and that the law afforded the victims little or no protection (cf. Egger et al. 1995). The feminist movement issued a challenge to the constitutional state’s rule of law. Women were no longer content to take refuge in safe havens: they demanded safety for themselves and their children everywhere in society, also in their own homes. The social and legal consequences should be born by the perpetrators, not by the victims. This process of rethinking may be seen as a shift in the objectives of the women’s shelter movement, away from the periphery towards the centre – the mainstreaming of feminist goals.

Whereas the patriarchal state at the beginning was considered by the feminist movement as „part of the problem“ of women, this perspective changed in the nineties. Feminists started to claim to the state and state instititutions to take on responsibility for the protection of women and to stop male violence. Similar developments were also observed in other countries (cf. Roggenband / Verloo 1999).

In the last decade several important measures to combat violence against women have been implemented in Austria. These include the introduction of mandatory training programmes for the police, the emergence of a platform against domestic violence, and the compilation of information resources and training strategies (cf. Action Committee of Autonomous Austrian Women’s Shelters 1998). Among the most significant achievements of recent years have been the Protection from Violence Act, which came into force in 1997, and the creation of Intervention Centres.

The Protection from Violence Act

“Women wrote the law,” said Judge Robert Campbell in his lecture delivered to the international special conference “Test the West” held in Vienna in November 1992. He was reporting on the comprehensive and effective laws on protection from violence in families in Duluth, Minnesota (see Bundesministerin für Frauenangelegenheiten 1993). In Austria we might say: “Women initiated and wrote the law”. At the instigation of the former Federal Minister for Women’s Affairs and the Federal Minister of Justice, a work group for the improvement of protection against violence was set up in 1993. Feminist lawyers and representatives of the autonomous Austrian women’s shelters belonged to this work group from the outset. In June 1994 the Federal Government officially entrusted the work group with formulating a new law on protection from violence, the unanimous opinion being that the old law failed to afford victims sufficient protection. Not only the contents of the new law were new, but also the approach to drafting it. Work on the bill took place in work groups consisting of four enforcement agencies (the police, the civil and criminal judiciary, and the Intervention Centres). The autonomous Austrian women’s shelters were represented on all the work groups to ensure that the plight and needs of afflicted women remained the focus of discussion.

It soon become clear that criminal law was not going to be an apt instrument for achieving the declared goals. There were various reasons for this, one decisive factor being that criminal law was too cumbersome and did not therefore lend itself to affording protection in a crisis. Moreover, it soon became apparent to the work group on criminal law that the will to implement change and reform in this area was lacking. “Justice is an elephant, and you can’t teach an elephant to ride a bicycle,” was the reaction of a leading district attorney and senior official to the women’s demands. The feminist endeavours to teach the judicial “elephant” to ride a bicycle were of no avail. Work in the groups on civil law, the police and the Intervention Centres was, however, very successful.

Resistance

The introduction of the new law in Austria hit a sensitive patriarchal “nerve”. It prompted foreseeable opposition. Above all, the expulsion of a perpetrator of violence from his home was consistently depicted as an infringement of his constitutional rights. Interestingly enough, the same people who set themselves up as the upholders of constitutional rights (for men) have for years kept silent while thousands of women and children have had to flee from violence. The usual argument was that they didn’t have to go but did so voluntarily. They could always opt to stay … and get beaten.

Time and again the upholders of constitutional rights referred to Article 8 of the European Human Rights Convention, although they shrewdly cited only the first paragraph: “Everyone has a right to respect of his/her private and family life, his home and correspondence” (EHRC article 8, paragraph 1). Dogged women’s rights activists also consulted the laws, however, and concluded that one section of the population could not be permitted exercise its constitutional rights at the expense of others. Those who sought to implement effective measures against domestic violence cited the second paragraph of article 8: “The engagement of a public agency in the execution of this right is permissible only if it is legitimate and represents measures necessary to the maintenance of national security, public order, the economic well-being of the country, the safeguarding of order and the prevention of criminal acts, or the protection of the rights and freedom of others” (EHRC article 8, paragraph 2).

The objections lodged by the guardians of male constitutional rights in Austria failed to obstruct the passage of the new laws on protection from violence, which must rank as a significant step towards the achievement of gender democracy in Austria. Even the Federal Constitutional Agency (Verfassungsdienst) ruled that the expulsion of perpetrators of violence from their homes was fully reconcilable with constitutional rights.

Key Aspects of the New Law

The most important provision of the new legislation is that which empowers the police to expel perpetrators from the dwelling. This right is enshrined in the Police Security Law (SPG), which relates to police jurisdiction in Austria. Paragraph 38a states:

“If a serious assault on a person’s life, health or freedom appears likely to occur, notably in the light of a preceding assault, the authorities are empowered to expel an individual posing such a threat from the dwelling in which an endangered person lives and from its immediate vicinity. They must make it abundantly clear to which domestic area this applies, the designated area depending on the requirements of effective preventive protection.” (Paragraph 38a, section 1)

This law protects all the individuals living in a home, regardless of whether they are related to one another. A landlord, for instance, who commits acts of violence against his subtenant can be expelled from his home. Ownership is not relevant. The expulsion and the ensuing ban against returning are effective for a term of seven days. After two days the local authorities must examine the expediency of the measures taken. It has the option to withdraw them if the requirements are not met. The ban on returning cannot be withdrawn at the victim’s request unless it has been established that the conditions leading to the imposition of the ban – the imminent danger of an assault on a person’s life, health or freedom – no longer apply.

The police expulsion or the ban on returning are effective for a maximum of ten days. If a woman under threat of violence wishes this protection to be extended, she must apply for a temporary injunction through the district court within these ten days. The injunction can cover different areas.

The most important passages in the new law state:

“A person who threatens a close relative with bodily harm or behaves in a manner that considerably jeopardises mental health must, subsequent upon the relative’s petition, be made to

1. leave the home and its immediate vicinity, and

2. be barred from returning to the home and its immediate vicinity

if the home has priority in satisfying the residential requirements of the person petitioning.” (paragraph 382b, section 1 EO)

“Furthermore, the court has the option to bar a violent person from

1. residing in significant areas and

2. meeting or contacting the petitioner

unless this substantially jeopardises the interests of the aforementioned perpetrator” (paragraph 382b, section 2 EO).

This temporary injunction lasts for 3 months. The term of the temporary injunction may be extended if by the end of 3 months a divorce petition or, in the case of common-law partners, a petition for eviction or sole usage has been lodged. In this case the temporary injunction remains in force until the suit is closed.

The injunction can be enforced immediately. Before the new legislation was enacted, women exposed to violence often had to wait many months before the perpetrator was expelled from the home. Now the expulsion can be ordered by the court immediately – and if necessary by the police. The important thing is that protection from violence is not restricted to the home but also enforced in other specific areas.

Shortfalls

Even active lobbying failed to secure enactment of certain important legal provisions. The term of validity for the temporary injunction was slashed from 6 months in the initial draft to 3 months. This entails drawbacks for certain groups of women: for example older women for whom a divorce would involve disadvantages, and especially for women migrants entitled to residence in Austria on the strength of their family visas who would forfeit this entitlement through a divorce.

Of course the protection afforded by the new law also extends to migrants too, although the tightening of migration regulations in Austria over the past few years means that it is often not possible for them to leave a man who commits acts of violence against them. Especially for migrants, it is necessary to take measures to safeguard an independent livelihood – for instance, the right to work.

Domestic Abuse Intervention Centers

In Austria the initiative for establishing Intervention Centres came from feminists, developed out of work done in women’s shelters. The original concept for Intervention Centres was put forward by representatives of the Autonomous Austrian Women’s Shelters and was modelled on the North American Domestic Abuse Intervention Projects (DAIP) in Duluth, Minnesota. It was presented in March 1994 in the ministerial work groups.

Regrettably, after the assessment of the first draft, the bill on the creation of Intervention Centres was dismissed. This would have been an important and necessary step, since the status and the rights of victims of violence in the Austrian legal system are distinctly weak. These measures fell prey to economic cutbacks and to the fact that the country’s judicial system does not (yet) feel responsible for supporting women and children exposed to violence. But the Federal Minister for Internal Affairs and the Federal Minister for Women’s Affairs did feel responsible. The Federal Minister for Internal Affairs stated that, according to police regulations, the police also have the task of preventing domestic violence and assisting the victims. On the basis of these regulations, a budget was established jointly with the Federal Ministry of Women’s Affairs for the creation of Intervention Centres.

Nine so called Intervention Centers have been established to date, one in each of the provinces of Austria. Their goal is on the one hand to assist victims in enforcing their rights (individual advocacy) and on the other hand to improve methods of intervention and inter-agency co-operation (institutional advocacy). The new government in Austria unfortunately abolished the post of the minister for women in February 2000. Now the intervention centers are financed by the ministry for the interior (police) and the ministry for social security and generations.

Pro-active approach

When the new domestic violence bill was drafted it was already clear that a law would not be enough to protect the victims of violence but that they would need a service to support them. The question in the beginning was how to reach at least some of these women. The feminists decided to take police intervention as the starting-point. When the police are called in to deal with cases of domestic violence, then the violence has generally taken on threatening dimensions. It has come to the public attention. It will entail various – usually legal – consequences, depending on the specifics of the situation. Social intervention measures are seldom implemented and are often confined to providing information on aid facilities or, if children are involved, notifying the child welfare authorities. If the victim does not contact an aid facility of her own accord, there is the danger that no further intervention will occur until the next outbreak of violence. The police are called in each time, but society fails to respond. If this cycle of violence is to be interrupted, we need a new intervention strategy, the so-called pro-active approach. This approach to combating violence against women has also been adopted in other countries (cf. Pence/Paymar 1993, Burton/Regan/Kelly 1998).

The pro-active approach necessitated the amendment of Austrian legislation. Hitherto data protection regulations had prevented the police from passing information to private victim welfare bodies. The new law made this possible. In cases of domestic violence the police notify the intervention centres about expulsion orders, and the intervention centres get in touch with the victims.

Experience to date has shown that it is often necessary to adopt various approaches in enlisting the victims’ co-operation and establishing contact with them. It is simply not expedient to wait until someone who has been exposed to violence takes the initiative and gets in touch with aid facilities. Violence can paralyse its victims, leaving them lacking the energy needed or too afraid to take steps on their own (see Wiener Interventionsstelle 1999).

The pro-active approach also requires follow-up contacts at regular intervals. The target group here consists of women who are in the process of separating from their partners or who have decided to remain with them. It is important to continue providing these women with assistance and to stay in touch with them as a means of preventing violence from becoming a “private matter” again. In the initial stages the intervention centre staff, unused to handling such situations, were somewhat apprehensive about getting in touch with victims. One of the questions we had to resolve was: What would we do if the perpetrator picked up the phone? In time, though, as we gained a measure of self-confidence, we came to realise that it is important the perpetrator is aware somebody is intervening. This undermines a strategy many perpetrators use of preventing their victims from seeking help. The evaluation of an intervention project in London (cf. Burton/Regan/Kelly 1998) prompted us to extend this pro-active approach. The evaluation showed that the women welcomed being contacted repeatedly.

Perpetrator-Related Intervention

If the victim’s safety and protection are to be safeguarded, it is not enough just to work with the victim. Intervention is necessary to put an effective and immediate stop to further abuse. Such measures are referred to as “perpetrator-related intervention”. One of the intervention centre’s functions is to initiate or carry out perpetrator-related interventions with the victim’s assent. These measures include:

· Requesting the police to issue expulsion orders in cases of imminent violence

· Applying for an injunction

· Co-operating with the State Prosecutor’s Office and the courts to implement measures to prevent violence

· Consulting the child welfare authorities on ways to protect the children

· Confronting the abuser

· Establishing contact and co-operation with all the agencies involved

· Putting the perpetrator in touch with councelling and training facilities

· Organizing a social training for perpetrators

While the process of working with perpetrators generally does not start until a later stage, perpetrator-related intervention seeks to confront the abuser with his actions at the earliest possible juncture after violence has been committed and to terminate the violence immediately. The latter goal can be achieved only if various agencies initiate wide-ranging but co-ordinated interventions to make the abuser realise his behaviour is not tolerated and will entail consequences. Perpetrator-related intervention is also important as a means of assessing the danger and the perpetrator’s willingness to co-operate.

The Vienna intervention centre’s is also co-operating with the men’s center in Vienna and organizing social training programmes for perpetrators. The experience so far has been that only very few perpetrators are willing to undergo treatment voluntarely. The drop-out rate is high, and thus the effectiveness of the treatment is dubious. This is not only the case in Austria. Studies also indicate, that the important factors contributing to the termination of violent behaviour are co-ordinated interventions, but not isolated perpetrator programmes (cf. Gondolf 1997, Rosenfeld 1992, Tolman & Bennet 1990, cited in: Jasinski/Williams 1998, Gondolf 2002).

Multi-Agency Work

Recent developments in violence prevention include multi-agency work. This approach has its origins in the perception that violence against women can be effectively combated only through concerted and co-ordinated action on the part of all the social agencies concerned. There are various approaches to the structural organisation of multi-agency work. They range from institution-based projects like the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project in Duluth, Minnesota, one of the first of its kind, to the more or less formal network structures such as the Domestic Violence Fora in Britain and integrated intervention projects working with victims and perpetrators on violence prevention (cf. Pence/Paymar 1993, Hague/Malos/Dear 1996, Burton/Regan/Kelly 1998). In recent years similar intervention projects have been established in the German-speaking countries – in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Multi-agency co-operation is part of the intervention projects in Austria. Its objective is to enhance the effectiveness of violence prevention measures and to gauge them more accurately to the victims’ needs. Far from being a simple strategy, it is extremely complex and sets its sights very high. It involves a range of widely differing agencies, attitudes and standpoints. For instance, women’s organisations come face to face with the (still very much male-dominated) police force, sexist and racist attitudes with feminist and human rights-oriented approaches. The process of networking keeps running up against the obstacles posed by social power structures – as exemplified by the judicial system, which often appears reluctant to co-operate. Multi-agency work to combat violence against women is certainly an apt strategy for the future. But certain conditions need to be fulfilled if it is to succeed (cf. Hague/Malos/Dear 1996, Action Committee of Autonomous Austrian Women’s Shelters 1998).

Experiences with the new law

In the first three year after the Protection from Violence Act came into force, from May 1997 to December 2001 the police expelled perpetrators of violence from their dwellings in 13. 835 cases. The number of police expulsions is permanently increasing: in 1997 it amounted to 1.449, in 1998 there were 2.673 expulsions, 1999 3.076, in the year 2000 already 3.354 and in the year 2001 3. 283.

Considerable opposition had been expected in the implementation of the new law, and the above numbers are higher than projected. The number of infringements of expulsion orders is surprisingly small (in total 1.121, about 10%). It would appear that perpetrators take this measure seriously, not least because an infringement entails further punitive sanctions – even police detention. Thus, experience to date shows expulsion orders to be an effective measure. Moreover, they also involve palpable social consequences: an act of violence incurs a kind of “disqualification”, like the soccer referee’s Red Card that signifies being sent off the field. In both cases, unacceptable behaviour leads to the culprit being barred. The public relations work that accompanied the introduction of the new legislation used the slogan “Red Card for Violence”.

In Austria there was never really any question of pursuing a pro-arrest policy of the kind practised in every state in the USA. The main reason is that there would be substantial social opposition to such a policy: the trend is to reduce the number of detentions, not to increase them. Furthermore, the use of arrest as a sanction would have entailed an amendment to criminal law which would not have passed Parliament.

Experience to date suggests that expulsion from the dwelling is a good solution; possibly better than police detention, since it has palpable social consequences but avoids the stigma of arrest. In their first study, Shermann & Berk showed that arrest has a deterrent effect on perpetrators of violence (cf. Shermann/Berk, cited in Barnett/Miller-Perrin/Perrin 1997). Subsequent studies have not always corroborated this view: the deterrent effect of arrest tended to be confined to perpetrators who had a job (cf. Jasinski/Williams 1998).

The new legislation is inadequate to deal with cases of extreme violence, as was illustrated by the tragic murder of a woman shortly after the new laws came into force. The husband had severely battered his wife and threatened her several times. He possessed a number of weapons. The police and the court were informed of the situation, but the man was nevertheless not taken into custody. In the case of highly dangerous perpetrators of violence, only detention combined with comprehensive security precautions on behalf of the victim can ensure that the conflict does not end lethally. In the prevention of violence, criteria for risk assessment and their consistent application are a key factor (cf. Campbell 1995).

It is still too early to make any final assessment of the new violence prevention legislation in Austria, but some comments can be given already. In the first year a research project to evaluate the first phase was started. In their conclusion the researchers comment on the efficiency of the legislation as follows: “The goal of the Family Violence Protection Law, to interrupt the circle of violence through the police expulsion of the perpetrator and to support the victim of violence through advise and help by especially established intervention-projects, could be achieved in most cases. The new legal regulations are an efficient instrument for the improved protection from domestic violence and they are an important socio-political signal.” (cf. Haller et. al. 1999, S. 39)

Bibliography

Action Committee of Autonomous Austrian Women’s Shelters / Information Centre Against Violence: Annual Report 1997, Vienna 1998

Bunch, Charlotte / Reilly, Niamh: Demanding Accountability. The Global Campaign and Vienna Tribunal for Women’s Rights, New York 1994

Bundesministerin für Frauenangelegenheiten – Bundeskanzleramt (Hg.) : Test the West. Geschlechterdemokratie und Gewalt, Vienna 1993

Burton, Sheila / Regan, Linda / Kelly, Liz: Supporting Women and Challenging Men. Lessons from the Domestic Violence Intervention Project, Bristol 1998

Council of Europe/Group of Specialists for Combating Violence against Women (EG-S-VL): Final Report of Activities of the EG-S-VL including a Plan of Action for combating violence against women, Strasbourg, June 1997

Dearing, Albin / Haller, Birgitt (Ed.): Das österreichische Gewaltschutzgesetz, Wien 2000

Egger, Renate / Fröschl, Elfriede / Lercher, Lisa / Logar, Rosa / Sieder, Hermine: Gewalt gegen Frauen in der Familie, Vienna 1997

European Parliament – Committee on Women’s Rights: Report on the need to establish a European Union-wide campaign for zero tolerance of violence against women, July 16, 1997

Godenzi, Alberto / Yodanis, Carrie: Erster Bericht zu den ökonomischen Kosten der Gewalt gegen Frauen, Universität Freiburg, Switzerland 1998

Gondolf, W. Edward: Batterer Intervention Systems. Issues, Outcomes and Recommendations, Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi 2002

Hague, Gill / Malos, Ellen / Dear, Wendy: Multi-agency work and domestic violence, Bristol 1996

Heiskanen, Markku / Piispa, Minna: Faith, Hope, Battering. A Survey of Men’s Violence against Women in Finland, Helsinki 1998

Haller, Birgitt u.a.: Gewalt in der Familie. Eine Evaluierung der Umsetzung des österreichischen Gewaltschutzgesetzes; unveröffentlichte Studie im Auftrag des Bundesministeriums für Inneres, Wien 1999

Jasinski, L. Jana / Williams, M. Linda: Partner Violence. A Comprehensive Review of 20 Years of Research, Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi 1998

Klein, C.A., Renate (Ed.): Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Family Violence, London 1998

Korf, Dick u.a.: Economic Costs of Domestic Violence against Women. Utrecht 1997

Pence, Ellen / Paymar, Michael: Educational Groups for Men who Batter. The Duluth Model, New York 1993

Roggenband, Conny / Verloo, Mieke: Global Sisterhood and Political Change: the Unhappy “Marriage” of Women’s Movements and Nation States, Amsterdam 1999

Schweizerische Konferenz der Gleichstellungsbeauftragten (Hg.): Beziehung mit Schlagseite. Gewalt in Ehe und Partnerschaft, 1997

United Nations: The Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action, Fourth World Conference on Women Beijing, China 4-15 September 1995, New York 1996

United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women:

Concluding Observations of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women: Austria. 15/06/2000. CEDAW/C/2000/II/Add.1. (Concluding Observations/Comments), New York 2000

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Author:

Rosa Logar (1958) is one of the founders of the first Austrian women’s shelter (1978), national and international women’s human rights activist, co-ordinator of the Austrian Women’s Shelter Network; co-initiator of the WAVE-Network (Women Against Violence Europe); she teaches at three schools for social work and at the police academy in Vienna; further fields of work: prevention, training courses for judges and other professionals, research; she is the director of the 1998 founded Domestic Violence Intervention Project in Vienna (1998); she has written numerous articles and information and training material and is the co-author of two books on violence against women and children.

Address:

Domestic Abuse Intervention Center Vienna

A – 1060 Vienna, Amerlingstr. 1/6

Tel. 0043 / 1/ 585 32 88

Fax: 0043 / 1 / 585 32 88 – 20