A perfect storm: Violence toward women in the Bakken oil patch

Abstract

Communities in the Bakken region of Montana and North Dakota that experienced a resource-based boom starting in the mid-2000s had significant increases in the volume and seriousness of violence toward women. We identify five community factors distinctive to these boomtowns that created a perfect storm where these crimes proliferated including: (a) precarious housing arrangements; (b) the social isolation of women; (c) lack of domestic violence shelters and other social supports for survivors; (d) a workplace culture in the oilfields supportive of substance abuse and hyper-masculinity, and; (e) the inability of boomtown justice systems to respond to these crimes in an effective or timely manner. Although this critical analysis describes the outcomes in a U.S. jurisdiction, the conditions in rapid growth communities are similar throughout the globe and we suggest these community factors be considered in the responses to domestic and intimate partner violence in these rural areas. Our goal in identifying these factors is to work toward the development of an intervention model for officials anticipating resource-based booms to mitigate this violence.