Chapter Eight. Conclusion: Rethinking The Problem Of Policing Marital Violence

Abstract

Reconceptualising the problem of policing marital violence necessitated a reworking of the concept of police culture by way of using Pierre Bourdieu's relational concepts of the 'field' and 'habitus', which illuminate the dynamic nature of the relationship that exists between police culture and structural conditions of policing in the production of an institutional practice. The operational policing of domestic violence in Singapore have an extended meaning and role. Yet the contribution of the reconceptualised understanding of police subculture is that, by depicting police institutional practice as a product of the relationship between culture and structure, it allows scope for reforming police culture if it is to be accompanied by changes in the structural conditions of policing. In the context of policing marital violence, this requires a rethinking on the problem of family violence and a rewriting of the official discourse on the limits of police role in 'family' violence.Keywords: marital violence; Pierre Bourdieu; police culture; Singapore