Competing stories: How men under post-imprisonment supervision for intimate partner violence narrate the conviction process

• In Event: Gender & Offending

Abstract

Over the past decade, successive UK governments have produced a raft of legislation and policy that aims to ensure more convictions are obtained in cases of intimate partner violence (IPV). Despite this intensive policymaking, there is scarce qualitative research on how those who are convicted of IPV in the UK perceive the conviction process. To begin addressing this gap, this paper presents findings from a recent study in England, in which the author interviewed 23 men who had previously been imprisoned for IPV against women and were then under post-release supervision. It provides a novel, narrative criminological analysis of these men’s descriptions of being convicted of these offences. Many described the conviction process as having produced a distorted narrative of their relationship, provided their own counternarrative of that relationship, and told stories that contested the court’s ability to discern truth. Underlying these individual narratives were discourses about bad women and about the criminal justice system’s unfairness towards men charged with violence against women. Finally, this paper considers the implications of these findings for policymaking that aims to secure more convictions for IPV.

Author

• Sophie Philip, University of Cambridge