Opening violence prevention centers stops women from being killed, but it also causes women to stop reporting crimes to the police.
April 2, 2026
Original Paper
Shielding Women from Violence: The Effects of Violence Prevention and Monitoring Centers on Intimate Partner Violence in Türkiye
SSRN · 6504456
The Takeaway
By studying a staggered rollout of centers in Turkey, researchers found that these institutions successfully reduced physical violence by 20%. However, they did so by shifting women toward social and support services and away from the legal system, suggesting that effective protection works by bypassing the courtroom rather than using it.
From the abstract
Intimate partner violence remains one of the most serious threats to women's safety worldwide, yet existing evidence on the effectiveness of large-scale institutional protection systems is limited and mixed. This paper evaluates the impact of Violence Prevention and Monitoring Centers on intimate partner violence (IPV) against women in Türkiye. Exploiting the staggered rollout of centers across provinces, we find that the opening of a center reduces female homicides, particularly those perp