抄録
The Law on Prevention of Spousal Violence and Protection of Victims came into effect on October 13, 2001. Through this enactment domestic violence began to be firmly treated as a crime by a legal standpoint. Although some points are insufficient, the law provides definite support to the victims of violence. However, in the articles of the law almost no statement can be found regarding the recovery of abusers, which is an indispensable measure to effectively prevent domestic violence.
Realities of domestic violence, as well as the backgrounds of violent act and the batterer's rehabilitation programs from American and Japanese cases are emphasized in this paper.
Men's Resource Center in the United States provides various programs for recovery and prevention from abusive acts, not only for hetero -sexuals, but also for the gay batterers. In Japan, the development of such programs still lay far behind. For instance, many problems lie ahead on how to deal with an arrested batterer in prison. The major feature of Japanese programs is that of strongly emphasising
“Non -Violence” rather than “Batterer's Rehabilitation”.
On examining the American cases, it will be noted that the programs for the batterers are actually offered as one of the means to support the battered women suffering from domestic violence. When women are in danger of spousal violence, immediate procedures are taken to ensure their safety. After their security is well assured, then come the batterer's rehabilitation program. In addition, these programs are managed by two facilitators, male and female, taking equal roles with each other, which give an efficient example on how a desirable relation between man and woman should be.
Various trials and experiences must be considered and applied diligently, in order to improve the Japanese methods of batterer's rehabilitation programs. Education of participating staff is also an important subject, and certainly, gender equality concepts must be taken into account Moreover, it is desirable that batterer's rehabilitaion programs should be geared not only to domestic violence, but also focus on sexual harassment and child abuse.
