Dr. Nancy Ross, Assistant Professor, Social Work, Dalhousie University and Stephanie Zubriski, BSc., MSc., CPT. PhD in Health Student, Faculty of Health, Dalhousie University - and both honoured board members of Be the Peace Institute have co-authored this critically important call to action for the Federal Election Candidates to prioritize GBV in the coming election and beyond for The Conversation Canada. Read the full article here.
A Review of Pro-Arrest, Pro-Charge and Pro-Prosecution Policies: Redefining Responses to Domestic Violence
Dr. Nancy Ross and Cary Ryan from the School of Social Work at Dalhousie University have completed this report for the Weighing Justice project. Be the Peace Institute was a proud supporter and collaborator on this project.
“We welcome all readers to this review of pro-arrest, pro-charge and pro-prosecution policies in Canada, a review that highlights the need to define better responses to domestic violence. We publish this report during the COVID-19 global pandemic which has signaled both tragedy and possibility as well as an urgent call to action. During the first few months of the pandemic, the media posted news stories of the largest mass shooting in Canadian history, depicted images of global marches against anti-black racism, reported on an overdose crisis, and described marked increases in violence against women and children, all while social isolation or distancing measures were enforced. At the same time, invitations to re-imagine a different world have been ignited by calls to “defund police” and, in our province of Nova Scotia, redesign the justice system to respond to the systemic and structural failures of the carceral state. Domestic violence, referred to as a concurrent pandemic, has emerged in this time of social change as a central issue requiring urgent reform (Illingworth & Ferrara, 2020), thus highlighting the timeliness and significance of the research presented here.
With loss of employment, reduced income, social isolation, closure of schools and childcare facilities, and increased family tensions, all a result of restrictions of the pandemic, the risk of domestic violence has increased for many Canadians (Allen & Jaffary, 2020; Ilingworth & Ferrara, 2020). A Statistics Canada (2020) survey released in April 2020 describing the impacts of the pandemic indicates that one in ten women are very or extremely concerned about the possibility of violence in their homes due to the stress of confinement (Illingworth & Ferrrara, 2020). According to Wanda McGinnis, CEO of the Wheatland Crisis Society in rural Alberta, a pandemic does not signify the end of violence but rather makes experiences of violence silent (Ilingworth & Ferrara, 2020).
Our research contributes to a critical discourse related to the persistence of unacceptably high rates of gender-based violence and highlights the need for innovative response. Ultimately, this research demonstrates that a redesign of justice responses to domestic violence must become more flexible in order to be family- and human-centered and trauma-informed.
We hope our findings support a collective call to action and that you find this report useful in collective efforts to end gender-based violence.”
Nancy Ross Assistant Professor, MSW, PhD School of Social Work, Dalhousie University and Cary Ryan, MSW School of Social Work, Dalhousie University
To read the full report, click on the link.
Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics
Over thirty years ago, Kimberle Crenshaw coined the term ‘intersectionality’ in this article to describe how overlapping social and cultural identities can deepen inequalities.
A Peacebuilding Framework
Applying a Peacebuilding Framework to Gendered Partner Violence in Rural Canada
Nancy M. Ross, Dalhousie University
This article describes a case study into the perceptions of cultural and structural causes of gendered partner violence identified by research participants living rurally in one region of Eastern Canada. The research portrayed in this article is informed by a critical peacebuilding framework and feminist theory within a critical realist ontology. It explores the ways in which a peacebuilding framework may contribute to the study of genderbased violence by deepening and broadening an analysis of the causes of interpersonal violence.
Imagining a Non-Violent World: "The Be the Peace, Make the Change Project"
Imagining a Non-Violent World "The Be the Peace, Make a Change Project": A Rural Community Peacebuilding Initiative to End Gender-Based Violence
Nancy M. Ross, Dalhousie University
This article will profile the innovative community engagement process initiated by the "Be the Peace, Make a Change" project to end gender-based violence in Lunenburg County, Nova Scotia, and conclude with lessons learned. These lessons were summarized as "headlines" to imagine a future with new narratives for interpersonal relationships. This project was a three-year grassroots initiative of Second Story Women’s Centre, funded by Status of Women Canada. It engaged the rural communities of Lunenburg County to develop a coordinated response to violence against women and girls. It focused on the engagement of all genders, youth, and adults in exploring and implementing the visions, hopes and actions identified as priorities by the community within a peacebuilding framework. Community was broadly defined to include: survivors of relationship violence; professional service providers in healthcare, community services, policing and justice; municipal and provincial government; community-based services; educators and schools; clergy; and any interested citizens. The need to alter the cultural and social roots that sustain violence was recognized. A focus on building trusting partnerships both locally and provincially, inclusion of men and boys, engaging schools and youth and the justice systems, as well as survivors were hallmarks of the project.