Rethinking the Problem of Policing Marital Violence: A Singapore Perspective

Abstract

This paper explores the police response to marital violence in Singapore. This investigation into police response is specifically located in a particular culture & historical context. It owes its origins to the reframing of questions about the problem of intimate violence & concomitantly, the purpose & function of the criminal justice system over issues of safety & protection to victims of such violence. Central to the research concern of the paper is the attempt to address the question of why almost half a decade of police reform in Singapore has not produced dramatic changes in the police response to marital violence. This paper documents the reform process & the resistance offered within the police organization to these reform efforts. It follows that any attempt to understand this process requires an examination of the everyday realities of policing as well as recognition of the political, social, & legal context in which these realities are situated & take shape.