Sex, Gender, Becoming - PULP

Seven / Domestic violence in south
africa: a restorative justice
response
Jean D Triegaardt
Mike Batley
1. Introduction
In a society which historically has experienced deep-seated conditions
of inequality, violence towards women forms an integral aspect of the
inequality and power differentials. Domestic violence is considered to
be ‘imbalanced power that is maintained by a pattern of coercive
tactics of control carried out by actual or threatened physical, sexual,
psychological, economic or verbal abuse, which places an individual
with whom there is a past or present intimate relationship, in fear’. 1
The phenomenon of domestic violence is a reflection of the deepseated
structural problems of poverty and inequality, and
unemployment. Empirical evidence suggests that domestic violence is
higly gendered because it is characterised by an overwhelming
predominance of female ‘victims’ and male offenders. 2 Providing
statistics on the extent of domestic violence is difficult because
domestic affairs have been viewed as a private domain within a
patriarchal context, and thus cases of domestic violence are often
unreported. Police statistics reflect only reported crimes.
Nevertheless, domestic violence is on the increase in South Africa. 3
In spite of efforts to intervene in these domestic violence situations,
there have not been satisfactory resolutions for the victim, and
perhaps so too, for the offender. 4 The South African criminal justice
system is premised on a philosophy of retribution in an adversarial
context. The primary objective of retribution is to deter the offender
from future crimes and citizens from committing crimes, and thus in
taking this stance, an adversarial role is adopted with the intention of
controlling the populace. The needs of victims become peripheral
under such a system. In response to escalating crime, and the inability
of a punitive justice system to deal effectively with the rehabilitation
1 GP De Vasto ‘Victims of domestic violence’ in JM Sgarzi & J McDevitt (eds)
Victimology. A study of crime victims and their roles (2003) 117 123.
2 J Goodey Victims and victimology. Research, policy and practice (2005) 84.
3 T Angless & T Shefer ‘Survivors of woman abuse: A support group experience’
(1995) 31 Social Work/Maatskaplike Werk 305.
4 Angless & Shefer (n 3 above) 305.
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