Ensure coordination with other sectors as part of a multisectoral referral network

Promising Practice: Duluth Model of Public Intervention (United States)

The Duluth model, developed by the Domestic Abuse Intervention Programme during the 1980’s in Minnesota, is one of the most well-known and proven approaches to coordinated community response. The model has been adapted to various contexts globally and continues to develop its methods of collaboration. The community-based interven­tion involves domestic violence advocates working directly with law enforcement, criminal justice, shelter service providers and others in the community to strengthen survivor-centred responses and improve the safety of women experiencing abuse. The model aims to end violence in each case through several key areas of work: protection for victims of ongoing abuse; holding perpetrators and service providers accountable for women’s safety; offering offenders an opportunity to change (including through punishment if it enhances victim safety); and ensuring due process for offenders through the intervention.

The Duluth coordination mechanism is characterized by:

• clearly identifiable and largely shared assumptions and theories about the source of battering and the effective means to deter it;

• empirically tested intervention strategies that build safety and accountability into all elements of the case processing; and

• well-defined methods of inter-agency cooperation guided by advocacy programs.

 The Model is based around a framework where:

• The community and abusers themselves have the primary responsibility for controlling the abuse, rather than the victim.

• Battering is a form of domestic violence that entails a patterned use of coercion, intimidation, including violence and other related forms of abuse, whether legal or illegal (presented as the Power and Control Wheel). Initiatives must distinguish between and respond differently to cases of battering and other forms of domestic violence and adjust interventions accordingly.

• Interventions and the system must be tailored and flexible to respond to the distinct economic, cultural, and personal histories of abused women and girls.

• Both survivors and offenders should be treated with respect as community members, with recognition of the social factors affecting their personal circumstances.

Strategic principles of inter-agency intervention promoted by the model include:

• Change will be required within each agency involved in case processing. Service providers and other personnel must coordinate to enhance their capacity to protect survivors and comply fully with inter-agency agreements. Participating agencies must cooperate on examining, adjusting and standardizing practices in eight core areas related to coordinating staff actions on cases of abuse:

  • Identifying the agency's mission, purpose and specific function or task at each point of intervention in each case.

  • Crafting policies guiding each point of intervention.

  • Providing tools to guide practitioners in their duties (e.g. hotline-connected computer screens, specialized police report forms, domestic violence pre-sentence investigation forms; education/counselling curricula for abusers).

  • Creating a system to link practitioners so that each person’s actions on the case contribute to the subsequent interventions by other personnel.

  • Adopting inter-agency systems of accountability (e.g. tracking and information sharing; periodic evaluations; bi-monthly inter-agency meetings to identify and address case management problems; and accountability clauses in policies.

  • Establishing a cooperative fundraising plan to seek appropriate resources.

  • Agreeing on assumptions, theories and concepts used in policies and administrative practices.

  • Developing/delivering inter-agency training on policies, procedures and concepts.

• The overall strategy must be survivor-safety centred. Independent victim advocacy services play an important role in programming for offenders. Independent monitoring organizations should be set up to coordinate working groups, operate the tracking system, and help organize periodic evaluations and research. Advocacy organizations should be central in all aspects of designing interventions.

• Agencies must participate as collaborating partners. Each agency should agree to identify, analyze, and respond to any internal practices which might compromise the collective intervention goals. Small problem-solving groups, training committees, evaluations, and regular meetings can help coordinate interventions, via a single lead agency (as with the Duluth Abuse Intervention Project).

• Abusers must be consistently held accountable for their use of violence. Effective intervention requires a clear and consistent response by police and courts to all acts of abuse, including:

  • Mandatory arrest for primary aggressors

  • Emergency housing, education groups and advocacy for survivors

  • Evidence-based prosecution of cases

  • Jail sentences in which offenders receive increasingly harsh penalties for repeated acts of aggression

  • Court-ordered educational groups for batterers

  • Using a coordinating organization to track offenders, ensure that repeat offenders/ non-compliant perpetrators are held accountable and ensure victim-safety is central to the response

The Duluth model has been widely successful in offering greater victim protection and reducing repeat acts of violence in many different communities, and a variety of resources have been developed to support its replication and adaptation as follows:

Evaluations and research on the Duluth Model and more about the approach.

Guidance adapting the Model (Advocates for Human Rights-StopVAW)

Agency-specific guidance for implementing coordinated community responses focused around the criminal justice system: St. Paul Blueprint for Safety: An Interagency Response to Domestic Violence Crimes (Praxis International)

Sources: Domestic Abuse Intervention Program. “What is the Duluth model?”; and Praxis International. St. Paul Blueprint for Safety: An Interagency Response to Domestic Violence Crimes. Praxis International. St. Paul.