Research into Gender Violence from 1960 - Essay Example

In what ways has research into gender violence developed from the 1960s to the present day? Until recently gender-based violence (GBV) was viewed mostly as a private or family matter. However, there has been a paradigm shift in thinking in the last few years about this topic and it is now viewed as both a public health problem and a human rights violation. Number of studies has been published that document the prevalence of GBV and its serious effects on women. From these studies one can safely say that that one out of every three women has experienced GBV (1). Women's groups have spoken out about GBV and have advocated for viewing GBV as a societal problem rather than as a private issue. On the other hand, legislators have been lobbied to enact and implement laws that criminalize GBV. Global conferences have passed resolutions condemning gender-based violence. Also, the United Nations has defined it and recognized it as a problem that effects individuals, families, communities and nations. Yet, with all the progress that has been made recently, what has been missing is a lack of co-ordinated services for the victims of GBV. Although women who go to health care facilities often have symptoms related to GBV, they are usually not asked about GBV in their lives. Thus, in reproductive health settings victims of GBV are often the women who are termed (and further stigmatized) as “difficult” clients. These victims are more or less considered “failures” because they often do not use the family planning methods prescribed to them, do not follow behavioral or health recommendations, fail to return for follow-up visits and fail to get treatment for their STDs (2). Their symptoms may worsen and/or they may carry on suffering from the same symptoms for years. But the real problem lies in the fact that these women don't get the help that they need for what often underlies their behavior and symptoms is undiagnosed GBV. Therefore GBV, if undetected and untreated, can reduce the effectiveness of women's health care programmes. There is no denying the fact that that even though health care providers often do not address GBV, many of their clients are GBV victims. Health care providers see clients suffering from the effects of the GBV on a daily routine basis with problems such as undiagnosable, escalating pain, repetitive episodes of STDs, and unintended pregnancies (3). Faced with such difficulties, staff may feel powerless, even feel like failures themselves because they do not know what to do. Staff may even come to know that the effects of the GBV are undermining the services they provide. But as they are not trained to recognize and address GBV as well as there is no institutional base to support them in this area, health care providers feel helpless to intervene. According to recent studies, what now needs to be done is to begin to address the effects of GBV on the victims. For example, in developing countries, a visit to a reproductive health facility may be the only health care visit that a woman makes. This visit thus becomes a very timely and unique opportunity to assess clients for GBV. Staff, especially those in women's health settings such as reproductive and sexual health, maternal child health and prenatal settings have a crucial al role to play when dealing with victims of GBV. However, in order for victims of GBV to talk about the violence in their lives they first need to trust their health care providers to understand and respond in a proper manner to this disclosure. Although there are many stereotypes about victims of gender-based violence (GBV), but in reality it can happen to any woman. Victims of GBV can be wealthy or as a matter of fact poor, educated or illiterate, and married, widowed or single. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) at least one in five women have experienced violence in their lives. Quite a number of conferences and conventions have addressed physical, mental and sexual violence against women as one of the emerging issues. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (CEDAW) sets the agenda for a proactive approach to women's empowerment and consists of specific recommendations to address violence against women. Also, General Recommendation No. 24, (A/54/38, May 1999) requires States to prevent and impose sanctions for violations of human rights, with particular attention to gender-based violence, including sexual abuse. The Programme of Action (PoA) adopted at the International Conference on Population and Development in 1994 defined that “human sexuality and gender relations are closely interrelated and together affect the ability of men and women to achieve and maintain sexual health and manage their reproductive lives.” (Para 7.34). The PoA went on to add: “Violence against women, particularly domestic violence and rape, is widespread, and rising numbers of women are at risk from AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases as a result of high-risk sexual behavior on the part of their partners.” (Para 7.35) In addition, the Special Session of the UN General Assembly on the Beijing+5 Review (2000) recognized gender-based violence as a crime and recommended specific actions to be taken inter alia within the judicial and health systems in paragraphs 103a-103i. A variety of reports have been published documenting and discussing GBV including the Programme Advisory Note on GBV, Reproductive Health Effects of GBV: Policy and Programme Implications published by UNFPA in 1998. In 2000, the UNFPA published the State of the World Population. Lives Together, Worlds Apart: Men and Women in a Time of Change terming GBV as both a public health concern and violation of human rights plus an impediment to women's reproductive health. Although there are not yet studies from as wide an array of countries as one would like the data has expanded awareness of this problem and has given the glimpses of the magnitude of the problem and the extent to which victims can be affected by GBV (4). Yet, there has been a tremendous gap in applying this information and using it to create programmes that address victims of GBV. In theory, what has been missing is the guidance that can help people apply this knowledge in a practical manner to help victims of GBV. Gender-based violence includes the word gender because majority of victims of interpersonal violence is women. Violence is directed against women just because they are female and has unequal power in relationships with men and low status in general in the world. This lack of power and status make women vulnerable to these acts of violence (5). According to United Nations Declaration on Violence Against Women, "Any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life.” The main goal of the perpetrator of GBV is to control and dominate. GBV generally involves a pattern of abuse. This is especially true when the perpetrator knows the victim, which has been documented to be true in the majority of the cases of GBV. Victims of GBV are of the view that the closer their relationship with the perpetrator, the more traumatic they have experienced the abuse to be. Therefore, the pattern of abuse can be episodic, recurrent or chronic (6). Perpetrators employ a number of tactics as part of the abuse and thus may abuse the victim not only sexually but also physically, psychologically and emotionally/verbally. This can lead to serious consequences for the victim, causing her physical injury, psychological pain and an on-going high level of fear. According to WHO, childhood sexual abuse is an abuse of power that encompasses many forms of sexual activity between a child or adolescent (most often a girl) and an older person, most often a man or older boy known to the girl. This routine may be physically forced, or accomplished through coercive tactics such as offers of money for school fees or threats of exposure. Sometimes, it may take the form of a breach of trust in which an individual, who has the confidence of the child, uses that trust to secure sexual favors. In addition, incest, sexual abuse occurring within the family, although most often perpetrated by a father, stepfather, grandfather, uncle or brother or other male in a position of family trust, may also come from a female relative. Incest takes on the added psychological scenario of betrayal by a family member who is supposed to care for and protect the child. Sexual abuse consist of fondling, masturbation, oral, vaginal or anal contact. It is not mandatory for sexual intercourse to occur for it to be considered sexual abuse. In addition, sexual abuse is also the use of the child for prostitution, pornography and exhibitionism. "A general unwillingness to acknowledge the extent of child sexual abuse exists in most of the societies. Attempts to downplay the prevalence and nature of child abuse more often than not blame the victim or the victim's mother for the violence. Accusations against the child include the idea that the child invites the abuse or as a matter of fact she imagines it. The mother may also be blamed for "causing" the abuse by refusing to have sex with the abuser, or for "colluding" by not realizing or reporting what was going on. Domestic violence on the other hand is the physical, verbal, emotional, psychological and/or sexual battering of a woman by her partner or spouse. This category of GBV can involve the use of threatening or intimidating words and acts, hitting, use of a weapon, rape, imprisonment, financial control, cruelty towards her or other people and things she cares about and abusive and/or demeaning language. Rape can be defined as the use of physical force, or threat of force or emotional coercion, to penetrate an adult woman's vaginal, oral or anal orifices without her consent. In most of the cases, the perpetrator is someone the woman knows. In theory, rape can be a one-time occurrence or it can be ongoing. It may also involve the use of alcohol as well as drugs therefore making the victim more vulnerable. Sexual Assault is a non-consensual sexual contact that does not include penetration. Until recently there has been a mere silence surrounding GBV and so victims of violence have not been able to put their pain into words. But the fact remains that body “speaks” even if the survivor cannot, and her body can tell her story even if her voice still can’t. Victims have, through their behavior, indirect ways of giving health care providers about their GBV experiences. Past or present day GBV can have an enormous bearing on behavior and interpersonal relationships. For example, women who were sexually abused as children often feel guilty and shameful about the abuse themselves. These negative feelings about themselves can cause women to take more sexual risks, which make them more prone to unplanned pregnancy, STDs (including HIV/AIDS) and infertility. Studies have clearly shown that these women are also more vulnerable to re-victimization as adolescents and as adults, compounding the level of trauma and health effects. Addressing GBV is the first pivotal step in getting victims of GBV the help that they need in order to begin to heal. There is no denying the fact that all women are vulnerable to GBV, asking all women who visit the health care facility about GBV is crucial. Most victims will not spontaneously say that they are victims of GBV. More often than not they will not told anyone about these experiences. Previous studies have shown that most victims are never asked about GBV by their providers. Yet, in studies that have asked women whether they would, for instance, disclose sexual assault to their provider if they were asked about it, 70% said "yes" but only six per cent of the women in this study said they had been asked. In addition, ninety per cent of the women said they felt their physicians could help them with problems they were experiencing because of the sexual assault. Victims say that although this disclosure would initially be difficult they would be willing to talk about this, in private, with a health care provider who asked them questions about GBV in a caring, non-judgmental manner. References: (1): Heise, Ellsberg, and Gottemoeller 1999. Cited in: UN Millennium Project 2005a, p. 113. (2): Rodriguez M, Quiroga SS, Bauer H. 1996. "Breaking the Silence: Battered Women's Perspectives on Medical Care." Archives of Family Medicine. 5:153-158. (3): Starrs, A., and P. Ten Hoope-Bender. 2004. “Dying for Life.” Pp. 78-81 in: Countdown 2015: Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights for All (4): United Nations. 1993. 48/104: Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women (A/RES/48/104); and United Nations. 1996. The Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action: Fourth World Conference on Women: Beijing, China: 4-15 September 1995 (DPI/1766/Wom), paras. 114-116. (5): Boender, C. et al 2004. The ‘So What’ Report: A Look at whether integrating A Gender Focus into Programs Makes a Difference to Outcomes. Interagency Gender Working Group Task Force Report. Washington, D.C.: Interagency Gender Working Group; Yinger, N. 1998. Unmet Need for Family Planning: Reflecting Women’s Perceptions, pp. 9, 14 and 17. (6): We the Children: End-decade Review of the Follow-up to the World Summit for Children: Report of the Secretary-General (A/S-27/3); UN Millennium Project. 2005. Who’s Got the Power: Transforming Health Systems for Women and Children, p. 76. Additional Sources: United Nations. 2000. Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly: 55/2: United Nations Millennium Declaration (A/RES/55.2), para. I.6. United Nations. 2005b. In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All: Report of the Secretary-General (A/59/2005), para. 15. Rehn, E., and E. Johnson Sirleaf. 2002. Progress of the World’s Women 2002, vol. 1: Women War Peace: The Independent Experts’ Assessment on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Women and Women’s Role in Peacekeeping, p. 54. New York: UNIFEM. UN Millennium Project. 2005d. Taking Action: Achieving Gender Equality and Empowering Women, p. 30. Task Force on Education and Gender Equality Carlson, Bonnie E. (1984). Children's observations of interpersonal violence. Pp. 147-167 in A.R. Roberts (Ed.) Battered women and their families (pp. 147-167). NY: Springer. Straus, M.A. (1992). Children as witnesses to marital violence: A risk factor for lifelong problems among a nationally representative sample of American men and women. Report of the Twenty-Third Ross Roundtable. Columbus, OH: Ross Laboratories. Read More