The Role of Social Class in Domestic Violence

Domestic violence has been present in all societies around the world. It is only in the recent years with the increased awareness of human rights that concerns have been raised concerning the vise. Traditionally, domestic violence has been regarded as a private issue that can only be discussed and solved within the settings of the family, the clan or the community, and not beyond. In a male dominated society, this kind of violence was more often than not directed towards women. In the current state, however, the issue has become not just a serious criminal concern, but also a global issue. Current paper aims at exploring the thesis that people in the working class experience more domestic violence because of a lower social status.
Activists have created much awareness that has been successful in reducing the incidences of domestic violence among many of the communities around the world. However, it has been observed that the rates of domestic conflict leading to violence still remains high among isolated groups and classes. One of these groups is the low socioeconomic class. Most of the conflicts that result to violence in the family are among the people in the lower social class. There in America are the blacks, the poor, and the non-whites. This paper explores the role of the social class in the incidence of domestic violence. It aims at providing support to the thesis that people from low social class have a relatively higher rates of domestic violence that those from the upper social class. This exploration will involve a review of various researches and studies done on the topic.
The social and structural position of a person in the community is indicated by age, level of education, ethnicity, race, and socioeconomic status. These variables are the exact determinants of social status and social class. The relationship between social class and domestic violence is strong as has been shown from research. From the perspective of family violence researchers, the issue of socio-demographies results to an increased possibility for domestic violence. However, the feminist sociologists have a different view of domestic violence. They perceive it as deeply rooted not in the social status but in the gender, as it is culturally constructed, and in power.
Anderson explores the two viewpoints to give a connection between them. By exploring survey articles, he identifies that most suggest an equal engagement of men and women in domestic violence. This observation has raised conce
from among the feminist scholars who feel that the national surveys have completely ignored the context of violence and are thus biased. The research sociologists on the other hand appear to support the surveys and claim that the feminists are using a single variable analysis and ignoring the contribution of age, income, and employment in domestic violence. By using two approaches, resources, and masculinity, Anderson is able to bring out the relationship between the two points of view. First, the structural inequality is a result of the resources issues. Gender violence is more among the poor, the non-whites, young, and less educated. The same trend that is observable for low social class classification.
When looking at the aspect of masculinity, the cultural construction of gender in terms of division of roles and labor, control of resources and marriage structure are the contributors to domestic violence. In most contexts, men are the controllers of family and community resources, they marry down while women marry up and are the ones responsible for the family income sources. This is more likely to have an impact on the low social class families than in the upper class. This therefore links the two perspectives. There is therefore a strong connection between the social class and domestic violence.
The rates of domestic violence shows great variations among groups of people. These rates are higher among certain ages, races and social class. For instance, the non-whites in America have a higher rates of domestic violence than the white. Conwill explores the whole aspect that relates the black community with an increased tendency for violence. Firstly, he relates this tendency to the perceived oppression of these minorities by the economic and socio-scientific culture of the U.S. the popular culture in America links the lower class blacks with violence, they are considered as dangerous and violent. This makes them react to this social pressure by being just what they are thought to be. Secondly, the media has historically portrayed the black population as uncontrollable and exceedingly prone to violence. Conwill reviews results of a study, which indicated the lower-class blacks have a relatively higher tendency for domestic homicide, 8.4 times higher than the middle class whites. This is a direct indication that regardless of the fact that they are working class, the African-Americans have higher tendencies of domestic violence that the whites due to their social status.
From this article, Conwill builds on the perspective developed earlier by sociologists that link history and oppressive socioeconomic inequalities in America with the development of social hierarchies and classes. Although the article indicates a relationship between social class and domestic violence with reference to the black Americans, it views the problem as rooted from the social construction of hierarchies and the reaction to the social class stereotypes. The article goes further to evaluate possible approaches to this and cites professional development, community involvement, community empowerment, and advocacy as factors that can be included in the domestic counselling programs.
Shifting the focus to the context in other parts of the world, we find that the issue of the connection between class and domestic violence is also present. Susan Evans explores the Australian context on this issue and identifies that social class issues are often undermined in the discourse of domestic violence. In her article ‘Beyond gender: Class, poverty and domestic violence’, Susan Evans aims at giving a deeper insight into the aspect of class inequalities and poverty in the discussion concerning domestic violence. She explores the concept of social class, defining it from both material and non-material perspectives and reviewing its deep connection with the incidence of domestic violence. From the article, the situation in Australia is not any different from that in America observed by Conwill and Anderson. Low income, low education honor, and resources control are directly related to the incidence of domestic violence. In fact, poverty is a great contributor to relationship and intimate partners’ conflicts and violence. The family income level and the tendency of partner violence are so related that surveys have shown that the housewives of low income families are at a higher risk of injurious conflicts with their partners than are the middle and higher income housewives.
The perception and attitudes towards domestic violence and gender-based violence are consistent and vary among populations. People from different social classes have varying attitudes towards what really is the relationship between domestic violence and the family situation. The whites and the European-Americans have for long held a stereotype about the African-American males. They are considered violent and aggressive. Locke and Richman in their study of these variations in attitudes evidently point out that in all settings, the man is more likely to be blamed for violence than the woman, and that this blame and attitude towards the offender is influenced by ethnicity. The blacks were more blamed for violence than the whites, and observers were more likely to sympathize with the victim when the aggressor was white than when he was black. These differences in attitudes have been related to the stereotypes earlier mentioned by Conwill. This article supports a relationship between the race and by extension the social class and the incidence of domestic violence whether real or perceived.
Most feminist theorists still regard domestic violence as not so strongly attached to the issue of social class. Their argument is based on the theory of universal risk under which they consider all women to be at equal risk regardless of their socioeconomic status. Deverly, observes that their claim is that domestic violence is all about social constructs of gender, masculinity, and power and less about the social or economic class of the victim or the aggressor. However, their perspective is questionable because the light of the universal risk theory, we would expect that all domestic misunderstanding to result to violence in the same way. This is not the case because a common observation is that in the low socioeconomic class, there is a higher likelihood of violence resulting from disagreements than in the middle and the upper class. This leads us to a conclusion that there is if fact a direct impact of the social class on the risk for domestic violence. This is related to increased economic stress, social burdens, marital and social dissatisfaction, and frustrations that tend to characterize life in the lower class. The tendency for violence among people in the lower socioeconomic class is therefore more related to their psychological stress as a result of their living conditions.
Since social class is directly related to the cultural perception, it is unlikely that the role of social class in domestic conflicts will be adequately addressed without a consideration of the culture. Different cultures perceive domestic violence differently, lack of studies on the sociocultural context of domestic violence has for long limited the control measures. Most communities expect violence between couples to be a secret and private issue that can only be discussed by the partners. This makes the reporting rates of domestic violence low, thus giving misleading reports and conclusions. The relationship between culture and the social class is that the poor and those in low socioeconomic status tend to cling more to the culture than do the rich and the upper class families. Violence as perceived in the specific culture is therefore more likely to occur in the individuals with low social status and their families.

All these articles indicate a strong, unbiased relationship between the social status and domestic wrangles. There is documented high incidence of domestic violence among the families in low social class. This class in the American setting comprises of the minority groups, the blacks, and other non-whites. Their economic status is low and are perceived to be more prone to violence than the whites in the upper and middle class. The results presented here are consistent in that there exists a difference in the rates of domestic violence even among the same race people provided they are of different class. Although stereotypes still exist and affect the general attitudes towards the aggressors and the victims of domestic conflicts, studies still indicate an increased risk of injuries resulting from these conflicts in lower class families. Researchers have linked this tendency and increased risks to the psychological stress that is common in the lower class due to poverty and economic frustrations. Others have indicated a possible reactivity aspect among those who have been stereotyped as violent and uncontrollable. These reports show that the social status issue has a great role in the development and sustenance of domestic violence. Most African-Americans are in the working class, but their social staus is lower than that of their white colleagues. Conwill indicates a relationship between this and their tendency for increased domestic violence. Solutions should therefore be focused on dealing with the socioeconomic inequalities and disparities as a long-term measure in solving domestic violence cases.