What is Violence?

(p. 44). Russians who set about exploring and invaded the traditional territories of Alaska

Indigenous Peoples regarded them as “uncivilized native tribes” (Gustafson, 1994) and “savages”

(AlaskaWeb.org).

Decolonizing violence begins with an understanding that some groups claim that they are

exempt from the commission of violence while others are not. Societies throughout the world,

regardless of race, color, social class, religious beliefs, or geography, have throughout their

history, engaged in acts of interpersonal and structural violence – often bloody and brutal. In his

national bestseller, “War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning,” veteran war correspondent Chris

Hedges (2002) observes that, “Civil war, brutality, ideological intolerance, conspiracy, and

murderous repression are part of the human condition – indeed almost the daily fare for many

but a privileged minority” (p. 13).

What is violence?

Most of us know violence when we see or personally experience it. Even babies, little

children, and family pets whom we may regard as not having the conceptual intelligence to

understand violence, react in horror and fear when they see it occurring. Children cry, scream,

and freeze, while dogs bark and may attack; and cats…well they mostly just run and hide from

the situation. The online Oxford Living Dictionary defines violence as “Behaviour involving

physical force intended to hurt, damage, or kill someone or something.” The World Health

Organization defines violence as: The intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or

actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or

has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment or

deprivation. The WHO goes on to report that:

Each year, more than a million people lose their lives, and many more suffer non-fatal injuries, as a result of self-inflicted, interpersonal or collective violence. Overall, violence is among the leading causes of death worldwide for people

aged 15–44 years. Although precise estimates are difficult to obtain, the cost of violence translates into billions of US dollars in annual health care expenditures worldwide, and billions more for national economies in terms of days lost from work, law enforcement and lost investment.

In his book, BEHAVE, award-winning scientist, author, and neuroendocrinologist,

Professor Robert Sapolsky (2017), examines the biology of human behavior, including the

ubiquity and differentials of violence in human societies:

The experience of violence also various enormously by culture. Someone in Honduras is 450 times more likely to be murdered than someone in Singapore. 65 percent of women experience intimate-partner violence in Central Africa, 16 percent in East Asia. A South African woman is more than one hundred times more likely to be raped than one in Japan. Be a kid in Romania, Bulgaria, or Ukraine, and you’re about ten times more likely to be chronically bullied than a kid in Sweden, Iceland, or Denmark (p. 272).

Typologies of violence are helpful in understanding its scope. The government of

Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, identifies nine distinct forms of violence. A number of

these categories are relevant to what some of the projects report in regard to the type of violence

affecting their communities. This report only uses them only as guiding framework to show how

violence can be better identified, operationalized, and conceptualized:

Nine Types of Violence and Abuse

Physical Violence Sexual Violence Emotional Violence

Physical violence occurs when someone uses a part of their body or an object to control a person’s actions. Sexual violence occurs when Emotional violence occurs a person is forced to when someone says or does unwillingly take part in sexual something to make a person activity. feel stupid or worthless.

Psychological Violence Spiritual Violence Cultural Violence

Psychological violence occurs when someone uses threats and causes fear in an individual to gain control. Spiritual (or religious) violence occurs when someone uses an individual’s spiritual beliefs to manipulate, dominate or control that person. Cultural violence occurs when an individual is harmed as a result of practices that are part of her or his culture, religion or tradition.

Financial Abuse Verbal Abuse Neglect

Financial abuse occurs when Verbal abuse occurs when someone controls an Neglect occurs when someone someone uses language, individual’s financial has the responsibility to whether spoken or written, to resources without the person’s provide care or assistance for cause harm to an individual. consent or misuses those an individual but does not. resources.

Factors that predict Intimate Partner Violence

Drawing from an extensive research data base and literature, the Center for Disease

Control and Prevention (CDC) published a list of “certain risk factors” that are grouped

according to the risk associated with individuals, relationships between partners and within the

family, community, and society. Based upon observational and association research, these

characteristics are regarded as having predictive power of who is likely to become perpetrators or

victims of intimate partner violence (IPV). Rightly so, the agency says that these “risk factors

contribute to IPV but might not be direct causes. Not everyone who is identified as ‘at risk’

becomes involved in violence.” There are four categories that are associated with the risk of

becoming an IPV perpetrator or victim: Individual, Relationship, Community, and Societal.

Several of these factors have relevance to Alaska Native villages and on American Indian

reservations. A major risk factor missing in this framework within the Individual category is being

a Native woman. Some factors such as “low academic achievement and low verbal IQ” have

inherent race and cultural bias.

Intimate Partner Violence: Risk and Protective Factors for Perpetration

(https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/intimatepartnerviolence/riskprotectivefactors.html)

Individual Risk Factors

Low self-esteem Low income Low academic achievement/low verbal IQ Young age Aggressive or delinquent behavior as a youth Heavy alcohol and drug use Depression and suicide attempts Anger and hostility Lack of non-violent social problem-solving skills Antisocial personality traits and conduct problems Poor behavioral control/impulsiveness Borderline personality traits Prior history of being physically abusive Having few friends and being isolated from other people Unemployment Emotional dependence and insecurity Belief in strict gender roles (e.g., male dominance and aggression in relationships) Desire for power and control in relationships Hostility towards women Attitudes accepting or justifying IPV Being a victim of physical or psychological abuse (consistently one of the strongest predictors of perpetration) Witnessing IPV between parents as a child History of experiencing poor parenting as a child History of experiencing physical discipline as a child

Unplanned pregnancy

Relationship Factors

Marital conflict-fights, tension, and other struggles Jealousy, possessiveness, and negative emotion within an intimate relationship Marital instability-divorces or separations Dominance and control of the relationship by one partner over the other Economic stress Unhealthy family relationships and interactions Association with antisocial and aggressive peers Parents with less than a high-school education Social isolation/lack of social support

Community Factors

Poverty and associated factors (e.g., overcrowding, high unemployment rates) Low social capital-lack of institutions, relationships, and norms that shape a community’s social interactions Poor neighborhood support and cohesion Weak community sanctions against IPV (e.g., unwillingness of neighbors to intervene in situations where they witness violence) High alcohol outlet density

Societal Factors

Traditional gender norms and gender inequality (e.g., women should stay at home, not enter workforce, and be submissive; men support the family and make the decisions) Cultural norms that support aggression toward others Societal income inequality Weak health, educational, economic, and social policies/laws