Programming to Address Violence Against Women: 10 Case Studies

This 106-page volume documents the experience of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with addressing many forms of violence against women. Intended primarily for development practitioners and others seeking to change attitudes and practices, it offers lessons that can help scale up responses and confront the problem on a wider scale. The lessons are gleaned from case studies of the following 10 countries: Bangladesh, Colombia, Ghana, Kenya, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Romania, Sierra Leone, and Turkey. The review is part of a series of explorations that UNFPA has undertaken over the past several years to look at the cultural dimensions of gender equality and reproductive health and rights.

Noting that violence against women remains pervasive and severe the world over - imperiling the health and violating the rights of millions of women and girls of every race, religion, ethnic group, and social class - UNFPA explores one effort to address it: the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). Adopted by the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in 1979, CEDAW includes provisions related to gender-based violence. As of August 2006, over 90% of UN member nations (184 countries) were party to the treaty and, according to UNFPA, civil society groups working at national and regional levels have engaged in CEDAW-guided advocacy to increase pressure on governments to "denaturalise" violence against women. These groups have worked with survivors, international organisations, and the media. This, together with increased academic research and growing interest in the problem by the arts community and the media, has spurred policy makers and others to take further action.

UNFPA's programming experience over the last four decades has shown that strategies that proved effective in one socio-economic-cultural context may not be equally effective in others. Thus governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and activists have adapted standards and strategies such as those articulated in CEDAW to the specific contexts within which they work. "Such adaptations ensured that local communities would participate in and finally 'own' programmes." UNFPA, with support from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), launched a review of 10 projects to identify what works in terms of programming to address violence against women, particularly in terms of community ownership and programme sustainability.

The review revealed that more resources must be allocated for programming that deals with prevention of violence against women - with some of these resources channelled to research, documentation, and analysis of the sociocultural and sometimes economic roots of violence. Despite the achievements being made in most of the countries covered by the review, the findings indicate that much of the work under way is not part of a coordinated national agenda to address human rights and gender equality. UNFPA identifies a need to establish stronger partnerships, collaboration, and coordination among various stakeholders, especially human rights and women's groups, to position violence against women high on national human rights agendas.

UNFPA also found that, in all 10 countries studied, the fight to combat violence against women has been spearheaded by women's groups, which have made the problem and its prevalence in society visible. However, if social and cultural behaviours are to be transformed, the engagement of men is crucial. Also, UNFPA asserts that involving the media as a partner and a collaborator in local or national campaigns has proved effective, both in making the incidence of violence more visible and in creating pressure on local and national governments and others to address the problem. The review demonstrated that, while appropriate legal and policy frameworks are a necessary prerequisite to fighting violence against women, establishing mechanisms to ensure that policy measures are implemented and that laws are enforced is also essential. Advocacy is usually required to achieve these goals, as well as training geared toward local governments, the judiciary, the police, and healthcare providers.

The review highlighted the fact that people can be critical of their own cultural practices once they are provided with "indigenous evidence" of the harm they cause to women, the family, and the community. One core strategy identified in the review is encouraging project designers and implementers to invest the time and effort required to deeply understand the local cultures in which they are working. This enables the identification of humane and positive values inherent to the culture that can be emphasised in sensitisation and advocacy efforts. "Such an approach is particularly effective since these values tend to resonate within the sociocultural context in which the projects are operating."

The review demonstrated that positioning violence against women as a public health priority is both a safe and an effective approach in addressing it. UNFPA also highlights the central role that local power structures, including faith-based organisations (FBOs), can play in facilitating acceptance and ownership of programmes addressing violence against women. The review reveals that disseminating the message of protecting human dignity can be an important entry point. Dialogue over the severe implications of violence for the individual and her family further engages local leaders as programming partners. In particular, the case studies of Bangladesh, Colombia, Kenya, and Morocco demonstrate the effectiveness of approaches that adopt a strategy of engagement, involvement, and partnership with these structures.

Finally, UNFPA stresses that creating a coalition across sectors and building its capacity to fight violence against women is a necessary condition for ensuring prevention in the long run. Such coalitions can help make visible the human rights implications of the phenomenon and empower a range of actors within government organisations, civil society groups, FBOs, academia, and the media to commit themselves, in a systematic way, to addressing violence against women.