ABSTRACT
This chapter argues for approaches to explaining domestic violence by men that are sufficiently nuanced for most men to be able to see both similarities and differences between themselves and other men who have perpetrated assaults on women. It begins by outlining the instrumentalist assumptions that continue to inform key feminist approaches to explaining perpetrator behaviour. The chapter then elaborates on how conceptual developments in the study of masculinities have challenged instrumentalist explanations without fully transcending the social determinism implicit in them. Structured action theory, for example, assumes that the propensity for violence is shaped by membership in structurally disadvantaged groups. As we show, psychological research in this area, although sometimes underengaged with the sociology of gender, provides evidence of the vulnerabilities felt by men who behave in ways that are physically domineering.
