If you build it, will they come? Explaining participation in family violence councils

Member participation in multidisciplinary collaborative efforts is a critical component of their effectiveness, yet fostering regular participation from key stakeholders can be challenging. While the literature on the factors that explain participation in collaborative efforts focuses mostly on member characteristics, characteristics of collaborative settings (e.g., councils) itself may also be important. Thus, the current study used a mixed-method approach to examine member participation in family violence councils with attention to member- and setting-level characteristics. Our findings suggest that a number of factors are related to participation at both member (e.g., members' community sector, years of experience) and council levels (e.g., engaging regional organization of the council, having fewer committees, securing greater breadth of council membership), perhaps because they affect members' capacity and desire to participate. These findings suggest a number of ways that councils can best structure limited resources in particular geographic spaces to facilitate participation.