Graduation Semester and Year
Spring 2024
Language
English
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy in Social Work
Department
Social Work
First Advisor
Rachel Voth Schrag
Second Advisor
Donna Schuman
Third Advisor
Rebecca Mauldin
Fourth Advisor
Ling Xu
Fifth Advisor
Beth Anne Shelton
Abstract
This dissertation is comprised of three papers on United States Military policies related to domestic violence and abuse. The Department of Defense recognizes domestic abuse as a serious problem that interferes with mission readiness and causes harm to individuals. Significant work has explored antecedents of abuse, rehabilitation programs for abusive Service Members, and the experiences of uniformed survivors. However, relatively few empirical studies have investigated the policies that circumscribe domestic abuse and violence and the military’s response thereto.
The first article is a mapping review that synthesizes the peer-reviewed and gray literature related to U.S. Military policies related to domestic abuse. The second paper presents the findings of a narrative policy framework analysis of testimonies given to Congress during hearings related to military-connected domestic violence. The third manuscript is a Transformational Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis of the Department of Defense Transitional Compensation for Abused Dependents Program, which provides limited financial support to a subset of divorced or maritally separated military-connected spouse abuse survivors. In aggregate, these three papers employed the theories of coercive control, narrative policy framework, and intersectionality in order to examine policies that frame the definition of domestic violence and abuse within a military context and impact the experience of survivorship, perpetration, and military command related to such abuses.
Keywords
U.S. Military policies, Military-Connected Domestic Abuse, Transitional Compensation
Disciplines
Social and Behavioral Sciences
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Highfill, Mary C., "UNITED STATES POLICIES RELATED TO MILITARY-CONNECTED DOMESTIC ABUSE: A REVIEW AND ANALYSIS" (2024). Social Work Dissertations. 1.
https://mavmatrix.uta.edu/socialwork_dissertations/1