The Federal Association for Perpetrator Work in Domestic Violence (BAG TäHG) e.V. is the profeminist umbrella organisation for perpetrator work facilities dealing with domestic violence in Germany. Our members are organisations that work with perpetrators and affected individuals, provide victim protection, and engage in violence prevention. They collaborate in inter-institutional cooperation alliances against domestic violence with the police, public prosecutors, courts, victim support organisations, probation services, youth welfare offices, and counselling centres.
BAG TäHG e.V. expresses its gratitude for the opportunity to contribute its expertise, particularly regarding directives for measures aimed at preventing domestic and sexual violence. We welcome the fact that gender-specific violence receives special consideration in sentencing.
Regarding Conditions and Directives, Section 56c, Paragraph 6 of the Draft Criminal Code
The Law to Strengthen Perpetrator Accountability stipulates that, under the conditions of Section 153a Paragraph 2 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the public prosecutor’s office may provisionally refrain from bringing public charges and simultaneously instruct an accused person to participate in a social training course. In the present draft bill, a therapy directive (Section 56c, Paragraph 6 of the Draft Criminal Code) is introduced in parallel. The standard for working with perpetrators in cases of domestic violence, developed by BAG TäHG e.V., specifically provides that social training courses are conducted by a gender-mixed team and involve case-specific cooperation with the institutions involved. The aspect of institutional cooperation (Article 9 of the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence, 2011) represents the highest possible protection for individuals affected by violence in their close social environment. The close interlinking of the individuals, institutions, and authorities involved, such as women’s support services, victim protection organisations, or youth welfare offices, as components of the intervention chain against domestic violence, requires an existing and well-functioning network. A functioning intervention chain helps to identify weaknesses and make improvements. The case-specific exchange among professionals necessitates transparent working practices and considers the needs of the entire family system affected by violence.
The content of the social training programme, according to the BAG TäHG e.V. standard, is predefined and supports the client in comprehensively addressing their own violent behaviour. A group setting supports this process and helps to uncover patterns of harmful behaviour. Perpetrator strategies enable perpetrators to maintain their structures of violence and power in their relationship with those affected by manipulating, deceiving, and instrumentalising the victims and their environment.
Recognising, uncovering, and confronting these behaviours requires specific expert knowledge of perpetrator strategies and a targeted focus on violent, transgressive behaviour, dynamics of violence in cases of domestic violence, as well as consideration of the experiences and impacts on affected (ex-)partners and co-affected children.
Furthermore, working with perpetrators of domestic violence requires qualified risk assessment and, as described, multi-institutional cooperation. We do not consider this to be a given in psychological psychotherapy and expressly advocate, as emphasised in the Istanbul Convention, for a directive or condition for perpetrators of domestic violence to attend a social training course to be stipulated in the draft law.
This also applies to cases of sexualised violence. For successful therapeutic work in the interest of victim protection, adequately qualified specialist therapists and standards for working with this clientele are first required.
For the Federal Association for Perpetrator Work in Domestic Violence e.V.
Isabella Spiesberger
