Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements of the Degree of Master of Technology in Public Administration- Peace Studies, Durban University of Technology, 2017. / South Africa has many issues around domestic violence resulting from culture, patriarchy and historical prejudices. It has been suggested that intimate partner violence is mainly perpetrated by men against women, and is an effort by men in a patriarchal society to dominate women. The purpose of this research is to build the capacity of young Zulu men to be non-violent intimate partners. The study utilised the Social Learning Theory and Feminist Theory. The study adopts an Action Research design, the goal of which is to solve concrete community problems by engaging community participants in the inquiry process. A mixed research methodology will be adopted for the study and will involve the use of both qualitative and quantitative data. 50 questionnaires will be administered to 50 Zulu young men between the ages of 18-35 in the Oakford Verulam area, while qualitative data will be obtained through focus group discussions, divided into three groups consisting of nonviolent, previously violent and currently violent men. The findings of this research suggest that there are several factors attributed to cause violence in an intimate relationship and these factors are deeply rooted in the background and upbringing of these men. The findings also suggest that in order to curb violence in the communities one would have to first address the underlying issues and for men to unlearn certain behaviours and traits they learnt during childhood. / M

This thesis analyzes rape coverage in a Grahamstown newspaper, Grocott’s Mail. Critical discourse analysis is used to discuss and analyze articles about rape that appear in Grocott’s Mail between October 14th 2008 and October 29th 2009. Drawing on existing literature on ‘rape myths’ in media coverage of rape, this thesis argues that Grocott’s Mail perpetuates racial and gender stereotypes through the way in which it reports on rape. While not all of the articles included in the analysis use rape myths, most use one or more when discussing rape incidents. Specifically, Grocott’s Mail tends to use rape myths that blame the victim for the rape and de-emphasize the role of the perpetrator in the rape. This is problematic as it sustains existing racial and gender inequalities.

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The current study investigated characteristics and case variables of sexually abused male children, and how those variables affect the outcome of cases investigated by Child Protective Services. Data was obtained from the RIverside County Department of Social Services, Child Welfare System/Case Management System. It was found that the largest percentages of perpetrators were the siblings of the victims.

This study was designed to differentiate the significant demographic and familial factors found in families when reunification is successful versus when reunification fails in cases of child removal due to physical abuse and domestic violence. The purpose of this study was to identify which, if any of these factors, lead to successful reunification. Content analysis of adjudicated cases of child abuse in San Bernardino County was used to transform qualitative information into quantitative data.

America's growing elder population affects every segment of the social, political and economic landscape. This population has generated public concern and debate reagarding the problems faced by this often-vulnerable group, including the issue of elder abuse. This research project examined associations between dementia and elder abuse in domestic settings utilizing secondary data obtained from Adult Protective Services of San Bernardino County.

Despite South Africa’s constitution being demonstrably one of the most progressive in the world, there remains a divide between legislation and women’s lived experiences of violence and inequality. In this context, marginalised women, in particular, are often wrongly perceived of as lacking in power and agency. In an attempt to understand how marginalised women articulate their agency under conditions of direct and structural violence, the aim of my study is to examine how women perform everyday resistance to violence at and between different sites, including the home, community and state-controlled institutions, and to examine the process of undertaking this research, using a critical reflexive approach. My research is structured around four studies. In Study I, I examine how a group of marginalised women perform everyday resistance in relation to state-controlled institutions. In Study II, I consider how a group of marginalised women do everyday resistance in relation to constructions of home. Study III offers an analysis of how the Thembelihle Women’s Forum functions as an invented space of resistance, and everyday resistance is a relational practice. Finally, in Study IV, I do a critical reflexive reading of psychosocial accompaniment as method, elucidating the complexities, tensions and trade-offs inherent to the method. When considered against my study’s broader theoretical framework (i.e., liberation psychology, feminist geopolitics and affective economies), the findings of these four studies present a complex examination of the enactment of everyday resistance. Each of the studies demonstrates a number of strategies for everyday resistance, including becoming a willful subject, refusal and withdrawal, quiet encroachment, collective storytelling, affective reimagining, collective conscientisation, de-ideologizing reality, social solidarity, coping mechanisms, tactics of survival and acts of reclamation. Methodologically, I demonstrate the messiness inherent to how power dynamics are reproduced and resisted during the research process. My research seeks to deepen our understandings of the flow of power within the research process, and the dynamic and shifting imperatives of our research practice. / Psychology / D. Phil. (Psychology)

La Guinée, depuis son accession à l’indépendance en 1958, a été dirigée par des régimes autoritaires successifs et a traversé des périodes marquées par de graves victimisations dont les plus remarquables se sont produites entre 1958 et 1984, sous le règne d’Ahmed Sékou Touré, puis dernièrement en 2009, sous le règne du Capitaine Moussa Dadis Camara. Ces crimes contre l’humanité ont eu des impacts directs et indirects sur la vie des victimes, leurs familles, et proches. Ils ont causé des milliers de morts, provoqué l’exil d’innombrables individus et occasionné le viol de centaines de femmes (Human Rights Watch, 2011). Bien que l’État guinéen ait entrepris de nombreuses actions visant ostentatoirement à faire justice aux victimes de ces faits, ces dernières demeurent insatisfaites et persistent dans leur quête de justice. Ceci nous conduit à des questionnements : qu’est-ce que la justice pour les victimes de crimes contre l’humanité en Guinée ? Comment les victimes arrivent-elles à ce sentiment de justice ? Dans cette thèse, nous explorons le sentiment de justice de 31 victimes de crimes contre l’humanité commis en Guinée. Plus précisément, nous utilisons, comme cadre théorique la théorie de la justice pour examiner les perceptions et expériences de victimes par rapport à la justice afin de promouvoir la réconciliation et la paix durable. Les résultats indiquent que la justice a plusieurs dimensions, à savoir la justice distributive, la justice procédurale et la justice interactionnelle. Bien que la justice distributive (punition et réparation) soit évoquée plus rapidement dans le discours des victimes, la justice procédurale (neutralité des autorités, constance, etc.) et la justice interactionnelle (respect, information, etc.) ont toutes aussi leur importance aux yeux des victimes. Il existe plusieurs similarités entre les deux groupes de victimes étudiés, entre celles de 1958-1984 et celles de 2009, quant aux violences commises, à leurs conséquences et à la définition de la justice. Mais, ces deux groupes diffèrent sous plusieurs autres coutures, notamment par rapport aux types de violences, à la durée de la commission des crimes, à la méthode utilisée pour les commettre, à l’interchangeabilité des rôles victimes-bourreaux, à la durée des conséquences des crimes et à l’importance des éléments compris dans la définition de la justice. Certains éléments de la définition de la justice seraient plus importants que d’autres pour chaque groupe de victimes compte tenu du temps passé depuis la commission des crimes, du décès de la plupart des bourreaux, et de l’interchangeabilité des rôles bourreaux victimes. Cela dit, la justice dans son ensemble est une condition à la réconciliation. Toutefois, le manque de justice vécue par les victimes remet en question la réconciliation en Guinée. / Since its independence in 1958, Guinea has been ruled by authoritarian regimes that caused many victims of serious violations, the most notable dating from 1958 to 1984 under the reign of Ahmed Sékou Touré and recently in 2009 under the reign of Moussa Dadis Camara. The crimes against humanity in Guinea had direct and indirect impacts on the lives of the victims, their families, and their loved ones. They have left thousands of dead, they resulted in the exile of countless individuals and the rape and abuse of hundreds of women (Human Rights Watch, 2011). While some efforts have been made to address this violence, victims nevertheless persist in their demand for justice. This raises many questions: what is justice for the victims of crimes against humanity in Guinea? How do victims come to the sense of justice? In this paper, we explore the perceptions of justice of 31 victims of crimes against humanity in Guinea. More specifically, we use justice as a theoretical framework to examine perceptions and experiences of victims in relation to justice in order to promote reconciliation and lasting peace. The results indicate that justice has several dimensions, namely distributive justice, procedural justice and interactional justice. Although distributive justice (punishment and reparation) comes more quickly in victims’ discourse, procedural justice (neutrality of authorities, constancy, etc.) and interactional justice (respect, information, etc.) are equally important in the eyes of the victims. There are several similarities between the two groups of victims (1958–1984 and 2009) as regards the violence committed, their consequences, and the definition of justice. However, there are differences as well, particularly regarding the types of violence, the duration of the crimes, the method used to commit the crimes, the interchangeability of victim-offender roles, the duration of the consequences of crimes and the importance of the elements included in the definition of justice. Some elements included in the definition of justice would be more important than others for each group of victims given the time that has passed since the commission of crimes, the death of most perpetrators, and the interchangeability of victims perpetrators’ roles. That said, justice as a whole is a condition for reconciliation. However, the lack of justice experienced by the victims calls into question reconciliation in Guinea.

"Although the United Nations (UN) has often been pivotal in forging the international response to serious human rights crimes in such settings, the justice gap in countries such as the Democratic Republic [of] Congo (DRC) (the focus of this study) underscores the need for more systematic UN efforts. The war in the DRC has resulted in one of the world's worst humanitarian crisis with over 3.4 million displaced persons scattered throughout the country. An estimated 3.5 million people have died as a result of the war. The armed conflict has been characterised by appalling widespread and systematic human rights violations, including mass killings, ethnic cleansing, rape and the destruction of property. The most pressing need to be addressed is the question of justice and accountability for these human rights atrocities in order to achieve a durable peace in the country and also in the Great Lakes region (Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Angola and the DRC, to name just a few). In this respect, this study will address the grave human rights violations committed in the DRC and the mechanisms for dealing with them. It is particularly true in post-conflict situations where justice systems have been either partially or completely destroyed, that national courts are not capapble of arriving at a uniform stance, or willing to provide justice for atrocities in the immediate future. As a result, international justice seems to be a crucial and last resort that must continue to be fortified against efforts to undermine it. ... Chapter one will set out the content of the research, identify the problem and outline the methodology. Chapter two will discuss the state obligations in international law to prosecute gross violations of human rights and gives a summary of the human rights violations situation during the Congolese war. Chapter three will discuss the available naitonal mechanisms for accountaiblity in the DRC. It will discuss if national courts and TRC are able to deal with these atrocities committed in the DRC. Chapter four will analyse the extent to which the ICC could deal with the Congolese case and challenges. Chapter five will discuss the trends towards accountability in the DRC and the way forward. Chapter six will draw a conclusion on how to break the cycle of impunity in the DRC." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2004. / Prepared under the supervision of Prof. Boukongou Jean Didier and Dr. Atangcho Akonumbo at the Catholic University of Central Africa, Yaounde, Cameroon / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM