Abstract

The aim of the article is to examine if and how the welfare state regime typology translates into a violence regime typology in a European context. It builds on the concept of violence regimes (Strid et al. 2017; Hearn et al. 2020) to empirically examine whether the production of interpersonal violence constitutes distinct regimes, and how these correspond (or not) with welfare regimes, gender regimes, and with other comparative metrics on violence, gender equality and feminist mobilisation and transnational actors. Its main contribution is to operationalise the concept of violence regimes, thereby moving from theory to a first empirical measurement. By first constructing a new composite measure of violence, a Violence Regimes Index, based on secondary administrative and survey data covering the then 28 EU member states, countries are clustered along two axes of violence: ‘deadly’ violence and ‘damaging’ gender-based violence. This serves to examine if, and how, the production of gendered violence in different states constitutes distinct regimes, analogous to welfare state regimes, as well as to enable future research and further comparisons and contrasts, specifically related to violence and the welfare state. By providing an empirical measurement of violence regimes in the EU, the article then contributes further to the debates on welfare, welfare regimes, and violence. It specifically contributes with discussions on the extent to which there are different violence regimes, comparable to welfare regimes, and with discussions on the relevance of moving from thinking about violence as an institution within other inequality regimes, to thinking about violence as a macro-regime, a way of governing and ruling in its own right. The article concludes that the exclusion of violence from mainstream social theory and research has produced results that may not be valid, and offers an alternative classification using the concept of violence regimes, thereby demonstrating the usefulness of the concept.

Highlights

  • This article starts from two simple assumptions: violence matters, and violence is gendered

  • The perspective of violence has been left unaddressed within the welldeveloped literature on welfare state regimes, even though the field has been successfully shaped by feminist critiques that yielded insights into gender regimes

  • While our previous work developed the theoretical argument, this article develops a new Violence Regimes Index (VR-index) and compares it with a series of other indexes and unique data to empirically examine whether the production of interpersonal violence constitutes distinct regimes, and how these correspond with welfare regimes, gender regimes, and with other comparative metrics on violence, gender equality and feminist mobilisation

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Summary

Introduction

This article starts from two simple assumptions: violence matters, and violence is gendered. This article argues that any further development of the concept of welfare state regime must incorporate violence, to paraphrase Lewis’s (1992) 30-year-old statement in this journal. The article is the result of a collaborative research project on violence regimes (Strid et al 2017) and develops our previous work on the concept of violence regimes (Hearn et al 2020), by providing new empirical data and analyses. While our previous work developed the theoretical argument, this article develops a new Violence Regimes Index (VR-index) and compares it with a series of other indexes and unique data to empirically examine whether the production of interpersonal violence constitutes distinct regimes, and how these correspond with welfare regimes, gender regimes, and with other comparative metrics on violence, gender equality and feminist mobilisation

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