Behind the Numbers: The PRB blog on population, health, and the environment

by Karin Ringheim, senior policy adviser, International Programs

“16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence” began on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (November 25th) and ended on International Human Rights Day (December 10th). The theme of this year’s campaign, “Commit, Act, Demand: We Can End Violence Against Women,” was well-addressed in an event that PRB and PATH, co-chairs of the Gender-based Violence Task Force of the Interagency Gender Working Group, organized on December 3rd. “Working with Men to Stop Violence,” featured several of the most prominent leaders in the field: Gary Barker, Director of Gender, Violence and Rights at the International Center for Research on Women; Pat McGann, Vice President for Communications for Men Can Stop Rape; Todd Minerson, Executive Director of the White Ribbon Campaign  and Dean Peacock, Co-Director of Sonke Gender Justice, based in South Africa. Each of these organizations works internationally on issues related to men and violence. Gary and Dean also co-chair the MenEngage Alliance, an international network of more than 400 groups promoting the positive engagement of men in reproductive health.  Gary’s presentation and others from this symposium are available on the IGWG website.

Gary Barker, Director of Gender, Violence, and Rights at the International Center for Research on Women, speaks at the PRB and PATH-organized event, “Working with Men to Stop Violence.”

Photo credit: Charlotte Feldman-Jacobs, PRB.

Why all the attention to violence against women? WHO’s 2005 Multi-Country Study on Women’s Health and Domestic Violence Against Women provided the first cross-cultural documentation that gender-based violence is pervasive and pernicious, affecting women in every social and economic strata and during every stage of their lives. The evidence that between 15 percent and 71 percent of women in 10 countries have ever experienced physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner has enabled a greater focus on gender-based violence and interventions to prevent it.

With gender-based violence more prominent on the development agenda than ever before, Gary Barker asked, “How do we take advantage of the interest in violence prevention?” Barker noted that early results from the new the International Men and Gender Equality Survey (IMAGES), which is documenting the extent of violence against women in at least nine countries, support the need for a “relational approach” to gender and gender-based violence, to counteract the expectations that men and women share and reinforce for one another, that men must be dominant and aggressive and that women must be submissive.

Men Can Stop Rape works with young men in middle school, high school and college to promote the concept of “healthy masculinity” as articulated in its slogan, “Our strength is not for hurting.” The curriculum of its “Strength” programs   helps raise awareness among young men that disrespectful treatment of women is a slippery slope that can easily escalate to physical violence. It aims to establish new social group norms that do not tolerate disrespectful behavior on the part of its members.

The White Ribbon Campaign urges men to pledge to “never commit, condone or remain silent about men’s violence against women.” In helping men understand “the disadvantages of the advantages of being a man,” Minerson quoted economist Paul Collier, “Positive social change happens at the intersection of compassion and enlightened self-interest.” He and others stressed that the success of transforming harmful male gender norms is predicated on the support of women’s rights groups. A transcript of Minerson’s Discuss Online is available on PRB’s website.

Sonke Gender Justice works at another intersection: that of HIV and gender-based violence. The association of gender-based violence with the explosion of HIV among young women in South Africa is corroborated by preliminary findings from the IMAGES survey: 28 percent of South African men surveyed admitted to having committed rape. In a county in which 30 percent of pregnant women are HIV- positive, Sonke holds the government accountable for policies to address these issues and enlists men and boys to stand up for gender equity and against violence.

Despite a plethora of interventions to reduce violence, panelists admitted that the generally small-scale efforts of the past have reached fewer than 1 percent of the population. All agreed that lasting social change must be supported by laws, policies and institutional/structural changes, e.g, affecting how men are rehabilitated in prison to zero tolerance for gender discrimination in educational systems. Working with social institutions such as the military is an important strategy to influence the attitudes and behaviors of a significant population of young men. At the end of the day it was clear that  it is no longer enough to “take a gender perspective.” True transformative changes involving both men and women are necessary if we are to outgrow the need for another 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence.

For more information, see PRB’s new brief on policy change, “Engaging Men for Gender Equity and Improved Reproductive Health.”

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.