The Shadow Pandemic: The Exacerbation of Social Harm During The Covid-19 Crisis

This thesis uses family violence in New Zealand as a case study to analyse how social harm is exacerbated during a pandemic. Traditionally social harm literature has focused on harms that are a result of state and corporate actors within capitalist economies, with little attention being given to gendered harms related to patriarchal forces within these economies. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with key workers from the family violence support sector based in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. Participants’ responses revealed that social harms such as poverty, lack of housing and lack of state funding for NGOs were exacerbated during the pandemic and that these harms were also related to a rise in family violence cases. In doing so, the thesis demonstrates that social harm thinking needs to be much more attentive to patriarchy and gendered power relations.