ctor when looking at how the state is helping to deal with violence. At the moment many of the safe houses for battered women are solely charity based. This means that if the money stops coming in from benefactors then the house has to close. There is a report due for release in spring 2000, which will hopefully tackle this problem. Within this review it is hoped that state funding will be released to help house victims as well as giving them the support they need to survive their ordeals. Finally addressing offending behavior is something we must touch upon. There has been an evaluation carried out on two courts ordered treatment programs for men who had been found guilty of violence against their female partners. (Change & Lothian Domestic Violence Probation Program). The evaluation compared treatment programs with either more traditional criminal justice sanctions. The research, though base on a small number of men, found that all criminal behavior justice interventions (fines, community service, prison) appeared to have positive effects on the behavior of the men convicted of violence against their female partner. However, the two Scottish re-education programs were the most successful in reducing violence and associated coercive behavior. The full report into this was published in 1996 (Research Evaluation of Programs of Violent Men). In conclusion to the barrage of information given in this essay I have come to see that pre 1980 society or the state did not see a problem with domestic violence. It was just something that happened within some marriages and was coped with. The police were not interested in getting involved in domestic disputes, the courts didnt really seem to have any set rules in how to deal with violent men and there was no outside help there for women who had to live with the threat of violence on a daily basis. Now there are Domestic Violence Units and officers in most of the countries police stations who have b...
