Creating and Maintaining Structural Hindrances to Criminal Justice Control – A Policy Analysis on the Normalisation of Parental Violence as a Crime in Finland
| Published date | 01 April 2022 |
| Author | Riikka Kotanen |
| Date | 01 April 2022 |
| DOI | 10.1177/09646639211020820 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Creating and Maintaining
Structural Hindrances
to Criminal Justice
Control – A Policy Analysis
on the Normalisation
of Parental Violence as
a Crime in Finland
Riikka Kotanen
City, University of London, UK
Abstract
In the context of home, violence remains more accepted when committed against
children than adults. Normalisation of parental violence has been documented in atti-
tudinal surveys, professional practices, and legal regulation. For example, in many
countries violent disciplining of children is the only legal form of interpersonal violence.
This study explores the societal invisibility and normalisation of parental violence as a
crime by analysing legislation and control policies regulating the division of labour and
involvement between social welfare and criminal justice authorities. An empirical case
study from Finland, where all forms of parental violence were legally prohibited in 1983,
is used to elucidate the divergence between (criminal) law and control policies. The
analysis demonstrates how normalisation operates at the policy-level where, within the
same system of control that criminalised these acts, structural hindrances are built to
prevent criminal justice interventions.
Keywords
Child protection, criminalisation, legislation, parental violence, physical punishment, pol-
icy analysis, violence against children, violent disciplining
Corresponding author:
Riikka Kotanen, Violence and Society Centre, City, University of London, Northampton Square, London EC1V
0HB, UK.
Email: riikka.kotanen@city.ac.uk
Social & Legal Studies
ªThe Author(s) 2021
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/09646639211020820
journals.sagepub.com/home/sls
2022, Vol. 31(2) 261–281
Introduction
Historically, violence against women and children in private have been legally and
socially condoned and morally justified by the unequal social positions and power
relations between the perpetrator and the victim (Freeman and Saunders, 2014). While
the societal understandings and regulation of such violence have changed, researchers
have pointed out that violence against children in the context of the home is still more
accepted than violence against adults (e.g. Fagerlund et al., 2014; Strauss et al., 2013).
And that the change in legislation and policies has been slower concerning parental
violence vis-`a-vis intimate partner violence (e.g. Durrant and Smith, 2010; Sebba,
2005). Furthermore, little attention has been given to physically less injurious, yet
often more frequent, acts of violence by parents, what Muncie (2015: 167) refers to
as the ‘routine of violence’. The legal regulation of violent disciplining is an emble-
matic example of the late realisation of, and accepting attitudes towards, habitual
forms of parental violence. For example, at the beginning of the millennium an explicit
legal prohibition of violent disciplining of children had been enacted in only 11 coun-
tries, whereas 20 years later 61 countries
1
have legislated such a ban. Nevertheless, in
numerous countries, such as England,
2
Canada, the US and many Asian countries,
physical violence by parents for disciplinary purposes (usually acts equivalent to
common assault or minor assault) is written into legislation as a rightful exemption
thereby avoid prosecution. Thus, in many countries violent disciplining remains the
only legal form of interpersonal violence. Unsurprisingly, it is globally the most
common form of violence against children affecting at least four out of five children
aged 2–14 years (UNICEF, 2014).
By analysing state-level policies regulating and controlling parental violence, this
article contributes to the wider discussions in social sciences concerning interpersonal
violence connected to structural inequalities and inflicted by the more powerful on the
less powerful (e.g. Walby, 2013). It expands the critical, feminist socio-legal examina-
tions of state’s actions and omissions in controlling private violence by exploring from a
generational perspective the macro-level societal processes hindering, or even prevent-
ing, control of such violence. Parental violence, and its habitual forms in particular, is a
good example of what Davies et al. (2014) have framed as invisible crimes and social
harms. In other words, acts that escape societal attention and disapprobation, legal
regulation and control as well as scholarly scrutiny. According to Davies et al., structural
power, embedded in broader historical, socio-legal, and spatial contexts and institutions
such as state, family, and home, commonly obfuscates and normalises such crimes and
harms. In practice, this relates to how invisible crimes and harms are perceived, defined,
and reacted to, and how resilient they are to challenge and to change. Denying, ignoring,
or downplaying these acts and the resistance to change is often indicative of a tendency
to preserve the prevailing social order and serve the interest of the powerful (Davies,
2014; Scraton, 2020).
In this study, the lack of control, and hindrances to intervene, are perceived as
indicators of the relative invisibility and normalisation of parental violence as a crime
(Davies et al., 2014; Jupp et al., 1999). This is elucidated through a policy analysis based
on empirical data collected from Finland, the second country to enact a legal prohibition
262 Social & Legal Studies 31(2)
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