Intersectionality is a way to think about and act upon social inequality and discrimination. It offers a promising approach to these issues within public policy and within public health. This briefing note briefly explains intersectionality and explores the potential of an intersectional approach to reducing health inequalities.
In this article, we explore intimate partner violence (IPV) from an intersectional, feminist perspective. We describe how an updated feminist view guides us to a perspective on IPV that is more strongly grounded in an anti-oppressive, non-violent, socially just feminist stance than a second-wave gender-essential feminist stance that suggests that patriarchy is the cause of IPV. At the time we began to work together it seemed that a researcher had to be identified as a "family violence" researcher or a "feminist" researcher of violence against women, and that it wasn't possible to be a feminist researcher who looked beyond patriarchy as the cause of IPV. We advocate critically thinking about essentialist practices in clinical work so that we can maintain an anti-oppressive, socially just, non-violent approach to working with clients who experience IPV.
This toolkit has been separated into different topic areas so that you can view the section(s) that are most relevant for you.
The topics in this toolkit reflect some of the suggestions and discussions that took place during the intersectionality workshops, including applying an intersectional perspective to policies, services and programs, research and community education. This toolkit is not designed to be a critical reflection piece. This toolkit is designed to be practical and to be accessible to many non profit organizations with varying missions and mandates. To learn more about the history and philosophy regarding intersectionality, we recommend reading some of the resources listed in the Resource section.
Although intersectionality can be hard to apply given limitations with staff, volunteer and financial resources that many non-profit groups experience, this resource is intended to offer concrete and practical suggestions and tools for organizations that are interested in opening their doors wider to the communities they serve.
The Canadian Domestic Homicide Prevention Initiative with Vulnerable Populations (CDHPIVP) defines safety planning as strategies to protect the woman and individuals close to her (e.g. children). Strategies may include educating women about their level of risk; changing residence, planning a method of escape and relocating elsewhere, an alarm for a higher priority police response, a different work arrangement, and/or readily accessible items needed to leave the home in an emergency including contact information about local/ closest domestic violence resources.
Given the extent to which Canada and the global community have embraced education as a means to increasing gender equality this would suggest that progress on economic and political empowerment should follow such high levels of educational equality. However, this is not the case. Canada's score for economic participation and opportunity is well below its 'A+' for health and education.
The onset of long-term physical or psychological disabilities has substantial impacts on everyday life for individuals across the social determinants of health. In addition, access to ongoing health care and economic and social support may pose specific challenges for individuals dealing with a disability. Disability support in Ontario has been the focus of recent health and policy research. As discussions surface about prospective changes to public or private sources of disability support, there is value in learning from people with lived experiences of an illness or injury that prevents them from working.
Until relatively recently, health and social services professionals, researchers, policymakers, and the general public considered animal cruelty as a stand-alone issue, important to animals' well-being but of only marginal significance to individual and community health and safety.
This marginalization, based upon cultural themes that animals are merely property, that animal abuse is a normal occurrence among children and adolescents, and that human welfare priorities supersede animals' interests, is somewhat ironic. Other themes deeply embedded in Western philosophy express concern that children who abuse animals may grow up to exhibit escalating and dangerous interpersonal violence and antisocial behaviors.
In recent years there has been renewed interest in an idea dating back centuries — that acts of cruelty against animals can be a sentinel indicator – and often a predictor – of other forms of family and community violence. Research has documented relationships between childhood histories of animal cruelty and patterns of chronic interpersonal aggression. Animals often become victims in the battles of power and control that typically mark domestic violence. Animal abuse and neglect often indicate situations of elders needing assistance. We call the areas where child maltreatment, domestic violence, elder abuse and animal cruelty intersect "The Link."
Violence against animals and violence against people are not distinct and separate problems. Rather, they are part of a larger paterrn of violent crimes that often co-exist. Research shows a significant correlation between animal cruelty and domestic violence, the physical and sexual abuse of childrenm sexual assualt and other violent crimes. This relationship between violence against animals and people is commonly known as the violence link, and it emcompasses a range of prevention and intervention practices that aim to reduce vulnerability in animals and human beings.
What is the link?
Accumulating evidence is demonstrating strong links between animal cruelty and other crimes, including interpersonal, family and community violence. Researchers have learned:
• Children's witnessing or participation in animal cruelty is a significant marker for their developing aggressive and anti-social behavior and a predictor of future domestic violence.
• Batterers often kill and abuse pets to orchestrate fear, violence and retribution in homes marked by domestic violence.
• Severe animal neglect in the form of hoarding often indicates elders needing social services or mental health assistance.