The evolution of domestic violence in Greece during the last five years: Spatial distribution

• In Event: Gender, Crime and Justice Working Group Panel 9: Developments in understanding and responding to GBV

Abstract

The purpose of this presentation is the study of the phenomenon of domestic violence in Greece within the last five years, taking into account the spatial distribution of its districts, , thus concluding, in this way, the existence of a relationship between incidents and population density. It is important to be mentioned that the research was carried out during the course of the master’s thesis with the significant contribution of my supervisor and also aims to find the existence of a probably change in the number of incidents as a consequence of the pandemic, while an attempt is also made to highlight a possible typology of perpetrators, victims and acts, through the comparison of the two main statistical sources (Police and General Secretariat for Equality and Human Rights), even if the methodological difficulties, mainly resulting from the different recording, making this task impossible for all the studied factors. The findings from the data comparison of the given years (five) show the ascendancy of such cases in mostly urban environments while the results for the temporal appearance of the influence of the pandemic on the two vectors are ambiguous. At the same time, specific characteristics of the parties involved in the phenomenon are also highlighted, capable of contributing to a targeted crime policy of prevention, reduction of the opportunities for crime and proper response. In conclusion, the aforementioned methodological difficulties of the comparison of the statistical data, due to the different recording, reveal the more general approach of the two services towards the phenomenon, but this does not negate the importance of their actions, nor of the data of the present research effort.

Author

• VASILIKI STATHOPOULOU, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences