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This paper uses cross-national data on child homicide to develop a societal-level model of child abuse. Analysis of hypotheses emerging from four perspectives on abuse suggests that a focus on economic stress is most useful in explaining cross-national variation in child homicide in developed countries. High levels of female labor-force participation, coupled with low levels of female status and welfare spending, result in high child-homicide rates. No perspective provides hypotheses able to explain cross-national variation in child homicide in less-developed countries. The limitations of the present study are noted and avenues for future empirical and theoretical work are discussed.