Framed to fit? Challenging the domestic abuse ‘story’ in child protection

The current framing of domestic violence generates profound problems for those concerned with supporting change for all involved. In particular, the stress on the ‘equal vulnerability’ of all women to domestic abuse, irrespective of economic or social circumstances, is out of line with a developing evidence base and deprives policymakers and practitioners of the conceptual tools that are needed to situate actual identities, choices and challenges with differing implications for women as well as men. In this article, we note the relative lack of attention in the UK to the work of international researchers on how gendered inequalities intersect with those arising from a range of others, crucially, class and ‘race’. This body of work also draws attention to the importance of understanding the impact of state interventions on marginalised communities, an area also neglected in the UK.