This chapter offers targeted recommendations to countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, aiming to enhance the efficiency and the effectiveness of their policy and institutional frameworks in addressing violence against women (VAW).
Tackling Violence Against Women in the Middle East and North Africa
4. Conclusion and policy recommendations to address violence women in the Middle East and North Africa region
Abstract
4.1. Conclusion
In the last decade, most MENA countries have displayed a growing commitment to protect women from violence through the adoption and development of legislations, policies, and strategies to respond to VAW. Most governments have also put in place national strategies and dedicated institutional co-ordination bodies for the implementation of VAW frameworks.
The COVID-19 pandemic has tested MENA governments’ commitments to address VAW by drastically increasing VAW rates and limiting the resources and ability to deliver pre-established procedures and services.
Amidst the overlapping constrains of the COVID-19 and domestic violence crises, the pandemic has also been the scene of genuine and innovative efforts to tackle VAW. Intersectoral co-ordination efforts were sustained and women’s needs were mainstreamed in governments’ COVID-19 emergency plans. Information and Communication Technologies have also been leveraged to reach out to survivors and deliver essential services.
Many of the emergency measures and strategic shifts prompted by the COVID-19 crisis have outlived lockdowns and lessons learned will help governments anticipate future crises. While gaps in data collection, resourcing of initiatives tackling VAW, institutional engagement, and victims/survivors’ access to justice are to be bridged, MENA countries are moving toward the establishment of a whole-of-state and survivor-centred approach to VAW. The following recommendations aim to further sustain them in that effort.
4.2. Implement a whole-of-government approach to addressing VAW
Strengthen existing legal frameworks to include all forms of VAW (e.g., domestic violence, female genital mutilation, trafficking of women, psychological violence, etc.) and ensure that protection measures and criminalisation provisions align with international best practices and commitments made by MENA countries with respect to gender equality and the fight against VAW. Furthermore, existing laws should be harmonised in countries with parallel, plural or informal legal systems to ensure the same protection of all women. These laws should be supported by comprehensive policy strategies and adequately enforced, so they can effectively contribute to preventing and combating VAW.
Ensure national strategies to eliminate VAW consider women’s broader socio-economic rights and aim to transform harmful social norms e.g., through greater access to formal employment, housing, education, affordable childcare and a minimum living wage. VAW is in fact inextricably connected to socio-economic gender inequality, and social norms with victims/survivors’ dependency on their abusers often acting as a barrier in their ability to leave them.
In developing future VAW frameworks, ensure that they are adaptable to emergency settings and identify specific policies and actions that can be taken in times of crisis to allow for effective rapid responses to VAW. Since most MENA countries do not have thorough prevention policies and plans that can be rolled out in response to crises, they could consider incorporating contingency and crisis management plans into their VAW frameworks, as well as designing national emergency management strategies which integrate a gender lens, taking into account that victims/survivors’ vulnerability is often higher in such contexts.
Ensure that horizontal and vertical co-ordination mechanisms to respond to VAW are in place and that stakeholders’ respective roles and responsibilities are clear. For maximum impact, MENA countries should also make sure that these bodies meet periodically and systematically and have sufficient capacities to carry out their mandate in an effective way.
Strengthen monitoring mechanisms to assess and report on the implementation and efficacy of national VAW frameworks by engaging external entities, such non-governmental organisations and independent oversight bodies, in the evaluating and measuring the efficiency of measures aimed at addressing VAW. MENA countries could consider conducting and publishing periodic (internal and external) monitoring and evaluation exercises based on clearly defined indicators to foster accountability and transparency.
Ensure that national VAW frameworks are supported by a coherent, co-ordinated, and systematic approach to resourcing for the different initiatives tackling VAW. To counter the negative impacts on VAW, during crisis and emergency situations, MENA countries could also consider investing additional resources into relevant policies, programmes, and services in support of victims/survivors.
4.3. Promote a victim/survivor-centred culture
Develop initiatives to raise awareness and reduce stigma with the aim of encouraging people to report cases of VAW. This could include ensuring safe and confidential reporting mechanisms, reducing fear of retaliation of further violence, involving local stakeholders such as community leaders and organisations, communicating on reporting options available, etc. To capture unreported instances of VAW, MENA countries could also consider developing surveys that make victims/survivors feel comfortable in answering honestly, as well as offering trainings to promote a better and more rapid identification and reporting of cases of violence.
Strengthen the existing data collection mechanisms by:
Sustaining the commitment to collecting and compiling data on VAW to estimate the prevalence of VAW, and support evidence-based policy making and service delivery. This data collection should be based on several tools to capture the most accurate information, including from administrative data and population-based surveys.
Expanding and harmonise the collection of data disaggregated by gender and other individual characteristics to inform gender-sensitive policy choices and processes, including in emergency contexts;
Systematically applying an intersectional approach (considering individual factors such as ethnicity, class, religion, disability, migrant or refugee status, etc., and their intersections) to data collection to ensure the particular barriers and risks certain groups of women face are identified and addressed.
Engaging with rapid assessments and “big data” to collect timely information on VAW cases;
Involving non-governmental and private actors and implementing “no wrong door approaches” via which a multitude of all victim/survivors service providers, general public servants, and private sector figures are sufficiently informed to detect potential VAW and refer victims/survivors to appropriate authorities;
Promoting a culture of information sharing across sectors by making sure that all ministries provide information and relevant co-ordination actors systematise data collection with standard indicators and information registries.
Mainstream the integration of the various services provided to victims/survivors through a “no wrong door approach”, with the aim to improve service delivery and make sure that help-seekers are not turned away or left with outstanding needs. To this effect, MENA countries could promote, for example: co-location of specialised services; information-sharing and training co-ordination across agencies; deep co-operation across agencies working on individual cases towards pre-determined consistent goals, etc.
Keep expanding the digitalisation of the service provision to victims/survivors, while continuing the provision of face-to-face services to ensure the most marginalised groups of women with limited digital literacy or constrained access to technological devices receive the support they need. Going forward, MENA countries could also consider assessing the immediate and long-term impact of the digitalisation of victim/survivor services, with particular attention to safety and privacy concerns entailed in the digitalisation of support services.
Ensure sufficient shelter spaces are available to victims/survivors at all times, including during emergencies, and they are integrated into a wider range of support services promoting women’s economic empowerment, psychological support, and legal assistance.
Keep investing in developing protocols to operationalise national VAW frameworks as well as trainings for a wide range of service providers and law-enforcement authorities to increase reporting of cases of VAW.
Continue strengthening engagement with boys and men to be agents of change in fighting VAW through educational curricula and other public efforts, including communication campaigns and advocacy actions, in order to challenge and change harmful norms and attitudes which perpetuate gender inequality, build awareness, and promote girls’ and women’s rights in the MENA region.
4.4. Enhance victims/survivors’ access to justice
Sustain efforts to increase women’s awareness of their rights and access to legal aid and other legal assistance mechanisms, for both civil and criminal law needs and especially for hard-to-reach women, regardless of their financial situation, location or literacy. In emergency contexts, MENA countries should ensure that victims/survivors continue have access to judicial systems and legal services by making law enforcement systems easily adaptable.
Ensure police and justice systems cater to victims/survivors’ needs, including in emergency contexts, for instance through the prioritisation of VAW complaints and the offer of specialised and virtual services. In particular, MENA countries could consider further strengthening the capacity of actors involved in the prevention, identification and suppression of VAW, such as the police, to promote a victim/survivor-centred focus. In addition, to facilitate victims/survivors’ access to justice for interrelated criminal and non-criminal proceedings (VAW complaints, requests for divorce, child custody, alimony, and else), countries in the MENA region could further specialise and centralise prosecution and justice systems, for instance by considering the deployment of “one judge, one family” or other specialised courts.