Around one in three women suffers Gender-Based Violence at least once in their lifetime. What drives this pervasive issue and what are the main risk factors? How can we effectively address and prevent it?
The 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence (GBV) is an annual international campaign that started on 25th November. It is a coordinated effort by individuals and organisations worldwide to advocate for the prevention and eradication of violence against women and girls (UN 2024).
An estimated 736 million women, almost one in three, around the world have been subjected to physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence, non-partner sexual violence or both at least once in their life (WHO 2018). Climate change, humanitarian crises and displacement intensify GBV. As a result, women and girls in low- and middle-income countries are particularly at risk of experiencing GBV.
Gender-Based Violence is one of the most pervasive human rights violations in the world (UNICEF 2024). As countries have undergone economic development and growth these issues remain common. Without properly recognising and addressing GBV countries will fail short of achieving the fifth Sustainable Development Goal of gender equality. Part of addressing this challenge involves understanding what drives the widespread occurrence of such violence and how different policies and interventions can help tackle GBV. Over the past seven years, VoxDev has published a range of articles and podcasts that help shine a light on this issue.
Gender-Based Violence is prevalent in many different settings
During times of war and conflict the risk of Gender-Based Violence increases. A particularly common form of GBV is Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) which “refers to behaviour within an intimate relationship that causes physical, sexual or psychological harm” (WHO 2022). Research by Brück and Stojetz (2023), using detailed data from Angolan war veterans, finds that exposure to sexual violence during war amplifies IPV in the post-war period. GBV remains a significant issue even in non-conflict settings. Evidence from Cambodia found that areas that experienced greater trade liberalisation following WTO accession saw a relative increase in IPV. In districts with larger tariff reductions men experienced a relative decline in paid employment whilst women in these districts increased their relative entry into the labour force. Changes in labour market dynamics and intrahousehold bargaining power were likely responsible for the rise in IPV. Men may resort to violence as a means to exert control over household decision-making or to claim resources from women. As enhancing women’s economic empowerment has been recognised as one way to address gender-biased social norms and to tackle a root cause of GBV, it is important to understand how to try and mitigate potential negative backlash from men.
GBV in schools is particularly harmful as education is a vital pathway for young girls to escape poverty and avoid early marriage. GBV affects girls' mental health, self-esteem and physical safety, often forcing them to drop out of school. Evidence from Mozambique underscores the widespread nature of GBV in educational settings but also highlights that training teachers on GBV can be an effective approach to addressing the problem.
Cultural and social norms can legitimise violence against women and girls
Patriarchal and sexist views that support the notion of male dominance and superiority may legitimise GBV. These views can impact women throughout the lifecycle, including parental spending on children’s food and education to labour force participation and marriage decisions to excess mortality among older unmarried women. Sex preference and gender biases can play a role even before birth. For example, the introduction of ultra-sound in India enabled foetal sex determination and led to a rise in sex-selective abortion, equivalent to 6% of potential female births during 1995-2005. Anukriti et al. (2017) discusses the implications for the girls that survive after birth, as sex preferences often continue through childhood for girls and boys. Evidence from Uganda demonstrates that fathers have a lower willingness-to-pay for their daughters' human capital than for their sons’.
Male biases continue to shape opportunities for girls and women as they grow up, affecting all elements of their lives, including their use of health care services and their access to consumer credit.
Economic empowerment to help tackle Gender-Based Violence
Gender norms will often keep women out of the labour force. A lack of economic resources makes women particularly vulnerable to violence and can create patterns of violence and poverty. Opportunities for female entrepreneurship and employment could be a potential solution. Employment may reduce violence as it raises women’s outside options and bargaining power in the household, as found in Rwanda. However, engaging in employment may not be enough. Evidence from Zambia finds that gender norms and weak rule of law put female entrepreneurship at a disadvantage. Fear of expropriation by men leads them to work in less profitable industries.
Additionally, GBV plays a daily role in women’s lives all around the world. Street harassment and safety concerns prevent women from engaging in necessary routine activities like commuting to work or picking up children from daycare. The persistent threat of sexual harassment constrains women’s labour force participation and their potential earnings as women may choose lower quality colleges that have safer travel routes. New research from Hyderabad from India found that deploying frequent and unpredictable visible police patrols in the streets led to a 27% drop in severe harassment cases.
Furthermore, even if women do have their own income stream, control over their own resources may be limited. Interventions have attempted to tackle this by giving women better control over their wages. For example, a study in India found that providing poor women with their own bank accounts with training on how to use their account led to more female labour force participation, more financial autonomy and more progressive gender norms. This evidence suggests that empowering women can help raise their bargaining power enabling them to assert their preferences such as joining the labour force - a principle that can be applied to various aspects of their lives.
A similar form of intervention can also help women that use transactional sex as a shock-coping mechanism. Relying on sexual partners for money is a common form of shock-coping for women in East and Southern Africa. Individuals engaged in sex work are particularly vulnerable to physical and sexual violence. Helping women, for example, through support in use of saving products, can allow women to use savings for shock-coping instead of increasing sex or taking more risks in sexual relationships. Such policies also may avoid the negative consequences associated with the outright criminalisation of sex work, as documented in Indonesia.
Child marriage is a form of Gender-Based Violence
Child marriage is a manifestation of Gender-Based Violence. Globally, girls married before the age of 15 are almost 50% more likely to have experienced either physical or sexual IPV than those married after 18. This practice can lead to lower educational attainment, early motherhood and higher fertility, higher infant mortality, and poorer health and educational outcomes for the children of child brides. Furthermore, the phenomenon of early marriage can entrench gender inequality in the next generation. Evidence from Niger finds that fostering girls’ enrolment in secondary school may be a powerful policy lever to reduce early marriage in contexts where bans alone have been ineffective.
Even as countries have undergone economic development and women’s economic empowerment has improved, child marriage has prevailed. Bangladesh provides evidence of this. Researchers find dowry costs are central to this story whereby delaying marriage significantly raises the costs for the bride’s parents. It offers clear policy recommendations: provide parents with a financial incentive to encourage them to delay their daughter’s age of marriage. Rachel Glennerster discusses in this VoxDev video why providing a financial incentive is essential, rather than solely focusing on empowerment exercises for girls.
Evidence from various contexts suggests that legal bans may not be effective at reducing child marriage. For instance, research from Mexico shows that raising the minimum age of marriage does not necessarily lower child marriage rates or mitigate its harmful effects as reductions in formal marriages are often offset by increases in informal unions. While such policies may fall short in directly addressing the issue, legal reforms can still play a role in shaping behaviour and societal norms by signalling societal values and priorities. Evidence from Bangladesh found that providing information about a new law can change behaviour. However, in this study, the information interventions generated unintended consequences or ‘backlash’ effects. There was an acceleration of marriages for adolescent girls potentially due to a perception by parents of an increase in future enforcement of the law and/or state support for agency among adolescent girls. This mirrors research by Andrew et al. (2022) that recognises that interventions that only focus on changing girls’ attitudes may cause girls to receive backlash from the broader community. To achieve meaningful improvements in women’s well-being requires changing the attitudes and behaviours of those enforcing restrictive societal norms.
Given the complex nature of child marriage, programmes that try to address multiple drivers of the practice may be most effective. The Pathways to Choice programme in Northern Nigeria is one such example. Pathways is a tailor-made intervention that incorporates support for girls through mentored girls’ clubs and non-formal remedial education as well as community outreach. The researchers found the programme had profound impacts – early marriage rates for adolescent girls fell by 64 percentage points in treatment communities.
Changing regressive gender norms from the top-down
Given the pervasiveness of GBV within societies, raising female representation and participation in politics could have a broad impact. A body of research has examined how female empowerment and representation in politics can influence policy decisions and outcomes. Greater representation can lead to better policy decisions and outcomes with a policy shift towards social policies and interventions. Evidence from Brazil finds that greater female participation in political leadership roles - municipal mayors in this case - is associated with a decline in violence against women. There is a lack of definitive evidence on what the mechanisms that drive this relationship may be. This means that policy could take a broader approach focusing on empowering women and raising their political participation. Establishing women microcredit groups is one way this might be achieved, as found in India where these groups stimulated women’s political participation by building their networks.
Gender-Based Violence is a form of systematic and pervasive human rights abuse that demands more action
Gender-Based Violence manifests in various forms and is a global issue. Recognising its prevalence and associated risk factors is essential for effective prevention and the delivery of support services. Identifying and addressing its root causes, along with determining strategies to combat them can therefore have a profound impact.