ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the social and spatial parameters of violence against both women and men from known and unknown persons. On the focusing of violence, feminists have emphasised the gender dimensions of violence against women; that is, it is made that violence is perpetrated by men on women. In line with the apparent maleness of the phenomenon and lifestyle characteristics of the victims, violence is seen as a feature of public space, occurring in pubs, clubs and other places of entertainment. In the literature various positions can be identified on the focusing of violence. The chapter shows that the main points made by the new administrative criminologists, left realists, the family violence theorists and radical feminists. It delineates the overall level of violence, the social characteristics of victims and perpetrators and its location, in terms of public and private space. Violence between husbands and wives is seen as part of a pattern of violence occurring amongst all familial members.
