Research Webinar: Intimate Partner Violence and the Workplace

Presentation Abstract:

“Intimate partner violence (IPV), is a long-standing, serious, and widespread social issue that necessarily affects and is affected by the workplace. Despite recent and global societal focus on IPV and an explosion of concern about gendered aggression in the workplace (e.g. sexual harassment and the #metoo movement), scant attention has been paid in management and organization studies to organizational responsibilities and responses to IPV. Scholarship exploring the interconnectedness between IPV and the workplace is severely limited and lagging both social debate and workplace practice. It is therefore urgent that we not only take account of what is known in this burgeoning area of concern, but also explore what is not known and what should be known in this domain. Hence we undertake a systematic review and conceptual analysis of the current research at the intersection of IPV and the workplace. We do so using a feminist lens, as we hold that IPV is a deeply gendered phenomenon. Feminist theories and epistemologies provide analytic tools to both highlight gender and challenge the individual decontextualized focus that pervades current thinking. We thus identify both zones of silence (what we do not know) and potentials for engagement (what we should know and do) for future research and action.”