Batterers As Fathers: Rethinking and Reconceptualizing Policy and Practice

The author asks and addresses a series of questions about holding batterers accountable for their behavior by utilizing existing legal and social work processes, making recommendations about systems change that may best enhance the safety of battered women and their children.

Questions posed include:

• Are we working towards making batterers more responsible and accountable for the well-being and safety of& children in their family?
• Are we utilizing existing legal and social work processes to hold batterers accountable for their behavior?
• Are we teaching child protection and welfare workers how to talk to batterers who are fathers about the damage the violence does to their children?
• Are we providing child protection personnel with the support, training and guidance they need to successfully and safely work with batterers?
• Do our policies and practices follow the most comfortable, familiar path to child safety: through the mother?
• Are we creating community-based options for primary, secondary and tertiary prevention directed at the perpetration of battering?
• Are we willing to work with batterers to help them become better fathers?