161 © Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018 P. C. Kratcoski, M. Edelbacher (eds.), Perspectives on Elderly Crime and Victimization, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72682-3_9 Chapter 9 The Victim-Perpetrator Problem in Elder Abuse and Neglect Josef Hörl Introduction Maltreatment of older people is a social fact which can no longer be seriously called into question. By now, there is a rich corpus of international studies on the extent and the consequences of elder abuse the maltreatment of older people. Cooper et al. (2008, p. 151) conclude that “(e)lder abuse is associated with distress and increased mortality in older people and caregiver psychological morbidity.” Elder abuse is not only a social problem but also a major public health problem that results in serious health consequences for the victims as well as for overstressed caregivers. Any open-minded society must regard this state of affairs as a scandal which is just as atrocious as other forms of interpersonal violence. This realization pertains not only to the logical demand to put an end to the actual physical and/or mental suffering of the individual victims and to holding perpetrators responsible for such acts but also to counteracting this social epidemic at the overall societal level. Transgressions, maltreatment, and abuse are extremely disturbing not only to those affected but also to observers and may in the long run threaten the moral basis and cohesion of society; hence it is essential to take effective intervention and preven- tion measures. The phenomenon of interpersonal family violence emerged at frst in the cases of child abuse and abuse against women. These types of abuse were originally called baby battering and wife beating, respectively. Later, the problem of elder abuse emerged. The abuse of older people was frst described in British scientifc journals in the seventies and was initially called “granny battering” (Baker, 1975). Despite these efforts, elder abuse has not gained the same “reputation” that would promote it to an urgent social problem as other forms of family violence have achieved, primar- ily because for a long time no powerful lobbies have taken up this issue as its cause. J. Hörl (*) Department of Sociology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria e-mail: hoeri@univie.ac.at