Browse by Theme: Intimate Partner Violence

Violence against women and girls or gender-based violence (GBV), whether it takes place in the home, in the workplace, in public spaces, schools or communities is one of the most widespread human rights abuses around the world. On average, 1 in 3 women globally experiences physical or sexual violence in their lifetime, usually from an intimate partner. In addition to devastating impacts on the dignity, security and wellbeing of survivors, violence against women also has broad social and economic costs across societies, including costs on public services, lost income and productivity.

In the midst of the global pandemic, there lies what the UN Secretary General described as the ‘invisible pandemic’ – gender-based violence – a pandemic that even before rates started to rise during COVID-19 affected an estimated 1 in 3 women globally.

South Africa has some of the highest rates of gender-based violence (GBV) in the world. But it is also at the forefront of global efforts to understand more about GBV and specifically how to prevent it, hosting the 2019 conference of the Sexual Violence Research Initiative (SVRI). CARE colleagues joined experts, researchers, practitioners, campaigners and activists from across the world to hear from them and share CARE’s work. Now the question is how to build on this evidence and where to go from here.

“He always came home late and drunk and he often kicked the door open while hurling insults at me and the children. I became such a miserable person.... After a number of curriculum sessions, I started to notice a change of heart in my husband, he started taking responsibility for the family needs.... He even went ahead to open up a joint account for us.” (Quote by a project participant – but not from Olive who is pictured above.) Intimate partner violence (IPV) is the most common form of violence against women and girls – but our Indashyikirwa project in Rwanda proved there are ways to change this: by supporting couples to build healthier, more equitable relationships, and by helping communities to challenge and address the values which normalise violence.

We can’t achieve women’s financial inclusion without considering harmful social norms and trying to change them. This was the key message I shared during the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation’s (SDC) annual Savings and Credit Forum in Bern earlier this month. The forum’s theme was ‘how to reach 1 billion women’ and I was there on behalf of CARE International UK and the CGAP Women’s Financial Inclusion Community of Practice to speak about how gendered social norms create barriers to women’s financial inclusion, and how to change them.

More than one in three women worldwide (35%) experiences physical or sexual violence in her lifetime; in some countries, the prevalence is as high as 70%. Gender based violence (GBV) is one of the most widespread and damaging violations of human rights in the world, but we’re starting to see some real progress in our efforts to promote a right to a “Life free from violence”.

Research shows that addressing intimate partner violence (IPV) requires working at society, community, household and individual levels to promote relationships built on respect, equality and peace. This blog shares the emerging learnings of working specifically with couples to address IPV in the context of Rwanda and speaks to the findings of the qualitative research conducted by Dr Erin Stern from London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (read more in this article by Dr Erin Stern and Ritha Nyiratunga).