Published: 06-Jul-2021
Gender-based violence (GBV) or violence against women and girls (VAWG) may be a global pandemic that affects 1 in 3 women in their lifetime. Gender inequalities have an outsized and wide-ranging impact on society. For example, they will contribute to gender inequities in health and access to health care, opportunities for employment and promotion, levels of income, political participation and representation and education.
Gender-based violence (GBV) or violence against women and girls (VAWG) may be a global pandemic that affects 1 in 3 women in their lifetime. Gender inequalities have an outsized and wide-ranging impact on society. For example, they will contribute to gender inequities in health and access to health care, opportunities for employment and promotion, levels of income, political participation and representation and education.
35% of women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence. Globally, 7% of women have been sexually assaulted by someone other than a partner. Globally, as many as 38% of murders of girls are committed by an intimate partner. 200 million women have experienced female genital mutilation/cutting.
This issue isn't only devastating for survivors of violence and their families, but also entails significant social and economic costs. In some countries, violence against women is estimated to cost countries up to three .7% of their GDP – quite double what most governments spend on education. Failure to deal with this issue also entails a big cost for the longer term. Numerous studies have shown that children growing up with violence are more likely to become survivors themselves or perpetrators of violence within the future. One characteristic of gender-based violence is that it knows no social or economic boundaries and affects women and girls of all socio-economic backgrounds: this issue must be addressed in both developing and developed countries. Decreasing violence against women and girls requires a community-based, multi-pronged approach, and sustained engagement with multiple stakeholders. The most effective initiatives address underlying risk factors for violence, including social norms regarding gender roles and therefore the acceptability of violence.
Since 2003, the planet Bank has engaged with countries and partners to support projects and knowledge products aimed toward preventing and addressing GBV. The Bank supports over $300 million in development projects aimed at addressing GBV in World Bank Group (WBG)-financed operations, both through standalone projects and through the integration of GBV components in sector-specific projects in areas like transport, education, social protection, and made displacement. The World Bank conducts analytical work-including rigorous impact evaluation-with partners on gender-based violence to get lessons on effective prevention and response interventions at the community and national levels.
School-based interventions attempt to address gender norms and equality early in life, before gender stereotypes become deeply ingrained in children and youth. A number of initiatives are developed to deal with gender norms, dating violence and sexual assault among teenagers and young adults. These target either male peer groups, or male and feminine youth together, and aim to extend knowledge of intimate partner violence, challenge gender stereotypes and norms and reduce levels of dating violence.
Other programmes targeting both males and females have changed attitudes towards violence. For instance, in the United States, a five-session programme on dating violence for students in grades 9 to 12(14–18-years-old) addressed how gender inequality fosters violence, challenged individual and societal attitudes towards violence as a means of conflict resolution, helped students develop non-violent communication skills and identified resources to support victims of dating aggression. A well-designed evaluation found that the programme significantly lowered male and female participants’ tolerance of dating violence.
Another programme within the us, Mentors in Violence Prevention, provides six or seven two-hour educational sessions to male and feminine high-school and college students, in mixed or single-sex groups. Here the students learn about different types of abuse, gender stereotypes and society’s acceptance of violence against women. In addition, role-playing helps participants to confront sexist attitudes and to actively prevent violence. An evaluation of the programme in ten schools examined the knowledge and attitudes of participants before and two to 5 months after the programme. This found that, compared to members of an impact group, participants’ knowledge of violence against women significantly increased after the programme. The study also indicated that the programme improved participants’ attitudes towards violence against women and gave them greater confidence to intervene or speak out against it.
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