International, regional and national institutions have been paying increased attention to issues of domestic violence in recent years.  Many of the legal developments on domestic violence have taken place through the framework of the United Nations or within individual national legal systems.

The developments within the United Nations system—in particular, the drafting and signature of United Nations treaties and documents recognizing domestic violence as a human rights violation and the extraordinary work of the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Violence Against Women on the issue—have been critical to efforts to raise awareness about domestic violence, articulate state responsibility for domestic violence, and identify strategies to combat domestic violence. See, for example, the Special Rapporteur's 1996 report on violence against women which contains a framework for model legislation on domestic violence.  In 2008, a United Nations expert group developed a report entitled "Good practices in legislation on violence against women," [PDF, 76 pages] that also provides guidance in drafting domestic violence legislation. For the Russian version of the expert group recommendations, click here.

On the regional and national level, as well, significant advancements have been made through preparing recommendations, drafting and passing domestic violence laws and the creation of policies and protocols altering law enforcement, judicial, prosecutorial, or medical response to domestic violence. For example, the Council of Europe's Recommendation Rec (2002)5 contains recommendations on the protection of women against violence.  National laws and protocols, however, vary considerably; some domestic violence laws, for example, criminalize domestic assault, others create civil remedies, and still others do both. Despite their diversity, these laws can serve as useful models for new legislative and policy reform efforts. In addition, the successes and failures of these laws and protocols in other jurisdictions can be an invaluable resource in the effort to evaluate the appropriateness of adopting a particular policy or law and to anticipate any unintended negative effects the law or policy may have on victims of domestic violence.