"Det är ett lotteri" - En intervjustudie om barnperspektivet i ärenden där barn upplevt våld i hemmet

Sammanfattning: Since the late 1990’s the child’s perspective in cases where children have experienced domestic violence has gained more attention in both research and Swedish law. Despite this attention, the child’s perspective might still get overlooked by social services in cases where domestic violence is present. Therefore, this study wishes to explore how social workers within family law and family safety units (familjefridsenheter) interpret and apply the child’s perspective in cases where children have experienced domestic violence. This was accomplished through semi-structured interviews with 3-5 representatives from each unit. The results show that the different units all share a similar view of what the child’s perspective implies and that differences in practice are more due to their organizational differences and focus. Differences in practice are exemplified through the units sometimes different views of parental ability and custody issues. The study applies Henning Bang’s (1988) theory of organizational cultures throughout its analysis. Our study shows that the attention to the child’s perspective often depend on the individual professional and their knowledge and attention to the child and the domestic violence. It is somewhat of a lottery.