A Life Free of Violence against Women and Girls: Engaging men and boys
Posted 1:47 PM by Internal Voices in Labels: 12th Edition |
| UN WOMEN |
“(...) Just as the black movement cannot be left solely to black people, women’s struggle cannot be left solely to women.”
Boaventura de Souza Santos (2002
Violence against women has traditionally been apprehended as a women’s issue. However, linked to gender-based inequality, violence against women is something that is learnt and which can be fought with a different approach. Therefore, as a gender issue, men and boys are unavoidably involved. More recent initiatives have emerged regarding the need to engage men and boys as perpetrators and agents of change in preventing violence. Their participation has been encouraged in several places, for example at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, where violence against women was recognized as a manifestation of historically unequal power relations between men and women.
SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED. From a bottom-up approach, working with men and boys, both as agents of change, is essential as it enables us to tackle the structural underpinnings of continued violence against women. It is crucial to acknowledge the fact that gender norms and the way men define themselves are socially constructed and therefore can change. Stereotypical thinking and oppressive behavior are social and cultural factors that contribute to the use of violence. Since this violence is rooted in widely-accepted gender-norms, effective means must engage men, in order to address the underlying discriminatory social norms that legitimize male power, control and use of violence. Therefore, engaging men and boys should be considered as a socialization process that should already start with newborn babies.
INFLUENTIAL ALLIES. Men represent untapped and potentially influential allies in the struggle to end violence within their family, communities and decision-making process. The majority of powerful and influential positions in law, politics, finance, justice, security sector, business and media are in the hands of men. They can be effective in helping to make a change towards more egalitarian practices.
There can be difficulties of change in gender arrangements for men and boys due to socialized expectations, conceptions of masculinity, which makes it difficult for men to accept equality or even fear of social stigma or loss of dignity if men depend on women’s earnings. In spite of all this, there are many reasons for men to act in support of equality since this can be valuable for men and boys as well as women and girls. For that matter, Puspa Dhakal from Nepal said: “Gender equality would do wonders for our society. Simply [women] being able to receive an education, status, property ownership and leadership will help reduce and eventually eliminate the grave conditions that exist. Both men and women will benefit from gender equality and advancement of women. Educated, advanced and working women will add to a family's income, productivity, increasing nations' monetary and professional value, help reduce poverty, and eliminate those social taboos and caste based discriminations.”
Through awareness activities and education, men and boys can develop respectful and egalitarian attitudes towards women. Of course, it is crucial that men work hand in hand with civil society, in particular women’s organizations, in the efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women.
PREVENTION. Focusing on prevention is a key area to achieve violence-free future generations. Although work on prevention has suffered from decades of political neglect and underfunding, developing models and programs to prevent violence is the most efficient and cost-effective medium-to longer-term strategy. UN Women’s programming approaches strive to be transformative, in terms of promoting change on the individual and collective level, and empowering, by providing women with access to information, skills, resources and opportunities to overcome barriers and exercise control over their choices and destinies. A major challenge is to translate policy commitment to address gender-based violence into practice. In order to assist governments and practitioners, UN Women has launched a global virtual centre on how to address the issue. A cornerstone of its effort to tackle this global phenomenon is its initiative Safe Cities Free of Violence against Women and Girls. Launched in 2008, the notion of Safe Cities for women aims at tackling sexual harassment and violence that women experience in their daily lives on city streets, transportation and in other public spaces.
In the end, it is important to keep in mind that violence is preventable. Initiatives engaging men and boys need to receive more attention to become effective interventions. However, from a gender-responsive approach, focus should always remain on the women. As Boaventura de Souza Santas said, “…the most important struggles in the world cannot be left to a single social group”.
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