Who Wants Gender Justice and Transformation? Efforts to Challenge Gender-Based Violence and Discrimination in Schools in Canada

A large proportion of the female population all over the world, particularly in developing countries, experience some form of gender-based violence (GBV) during their life. Early marriage, a form of GBV, is particularly highly prevalent in rural Upper Egypt. The aim of the current study was to assess the knowledge, attitudes and practices (KAP) of adolescents in Upper Egypt on domestic GBV, with a focus on early girls' marriage. The study was a cross-sectional descriptive household survey targeting 400 randomly selected adolescent boys and girls aged 11-16 years from five villages of Minya Governorate in Upper Egypt. The proportion of interviewed adolescents who could identify certain practices as forms of GBV was relatively low: the identified practices were mainly deprivation of work (9.0%), deprivation of inheritance (3.3%), arbitrary neglect and desertion (2.8%), and preventing from visiting relatives (0.5%). Abusive sexual behavior was not identified by any of the study participants as a form of domestic GBV. A total of 112 boys (56.0%) reported that they have been perpetrators in domestic GBV events at least once and 118 girls (59.0%) reported that they have been actual victims of domestic GBV. An overall 65.6% of study participants could correctly identify the legal age of marriage as 18 years, yet only 22.0% identified earlier ages of marriage as a form of domestic GBV. The vast majority of girls and boys reported that they would not agree to get married before the age of 18 years (91.0 and 87.0%, respectively). Adolescents in Upper Egypt demonstrated a less than satisfactory knowledge about the forms of GBV. Although early girls' marriage was not universally recognized by adolescents as a form of domestic GBV, they demonstrated satisfactory knowledge about the legal age of marriage, as well as a tendency to abandon the practice. Establishing a community-based awareness program for adolescents of both sexes about GBV with a focus on early girls' marriage is highly recommended.

This chapter examines rape, sexual violence and harassment, and other forms of gender-based violence within higher education (HE) by comparing students’ experiences and institutional responses across two countries: India and the UK. It suggests that the distinctiveness of higher education as a context for rape and sexual violence to occur can be analysed on two levels: first, through the ways in which wider social inequalities may be reproduced or compounded within the HE context and, second, through the ways in which hierarchies of power within HE institutions create a “conducive context” for some forms of sexual and gender-based violence and harassment to occur. Across the UK and India, despite different histories of activism to address rape and sexual violence as well as different policy contexts, our research has revealed similarities in the experiences of survivors in higher education. This appears to be due, at least in part, to the transnational culture of academia which is characterised by gendered power hierarchies that historically and today shape HE institutions.

This paper offers a critical perspective on issues around gender and sexual transformation within the context of UK Higher Education. Drawing on qualitative data carried out by undergraduate and postgraduate students, the analysis explores some of the diverse and often challenging ways in which young/er women and men are thinking and talking about gender, sexuality and feminism, as well as their strategies for turning ideas into political action. The research focuses on the activities and opinions of students belonging to an anti-sexist organisation within one UK university, who are engaged in campaigns to raise awareness about the damaging effects of gender and sexual inequalities, as well as promoting the popular appeal of contemporary feminisms. Locating the voices and research findings of the students themselves at the centre of the discussion, the paper is produced collaboratively between students and teachers who are involved in both the activist and research elements of this project. The paper also argues for (and provides evidence of) the transformative potential of alternative and critical forms of student engagement and student/ staff collaboration in relation to gender informed academic activism.

Time's up for sexual harassment in medicine

In low-income and middle-income countries, such as those in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, the COVID-19 pandemic has had substantial implications for women's wellbeing. Policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have highlighted the gendered aspect of pandemics; however, addressing the gendered implications of the COVID-19 pandemic comprehensively and effectively requires a planetary health perspective that embraces systems thinking to inequalities. This Viewpoint is based on collective reflections from research done by the authors on COVID-19 responses by international and regional organisations, and national governments, in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa between June, 2020, and June, 2021. A range of international and regional actors have made important policy recommendations to address the gendered implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on women's health and wellbeing since the start of the pandemic. However, national-level policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have been partial and inconsistent with regards to gender in both sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, largely failing to recognise the multiple drivers of gendered health inequalities. This Viewpoint proposes that addressing the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women in low-income and middle-income countries should adopt a systems thinking approach and be informed by the question of who is affected as opposed to who is infected. In adopting the systems thinking approach, responses will be more able to recognise and address the direct gendered effects of the pandemic and those that emerge indirectly through a combination of long-standing structural inequalities and gendered responses to the pandemic.

Intersectionality theory has been used primarily in legal research to provide a framework for understanding the experiences of populations situated within multiple systems of oppression, particularly in relation to anti-discrimination law and gender-based violence. Gender transformative approaches to health seek to move beyond individual-level change and instead centre on restructuring the power relationships that create and maintain gender inequalities. Intersectionality theory is well-suited for the study of gender transformation on health, but there is a lack of consensus on clearly defined intersectional methodology in the field of public health, particularly for quantitative studies. Because qualitative methodologies are well-developed and employed with regularity for intersectional health research, the objective of this paper is to describe innovative quantitative and mixed methods approaches underutilised in public health and provide researchers examples of how to design a study’s methodology to adequately address intersectional research questions. The proposed methods provide a toolkit for the investigation of complex interactions across multiple levels, which may offer insight into effective points of intervention to reduce disparities, strengthen larger social movements, and ultimately alter structural and policy contexts. Despite challenges posed by the theory, intersectional approaches may be the key to addressing persistent inequalities that limit gender transformation.

BackgroundExposure to workplace gender-based violence (GBV) can affect women's mental and physical health and work productivity in higher educational settings. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the prevalence of GBV (workplace incivility, bullying, sexual harassment), and associated factors among Nigerian university women.MethodsThe study was an institutional-based cross-sectional survey. The multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 339 female staff from public and private universities in Enugu, south-east Nigeria. Data was collected using the Workplace Incivility Scale (WIS), Modified Workplace Incivility Scale (MWIS), Negative Acts Questionnaire-Revised (NAQ-R), and Sexual Experiences Questionnaire (SEQ). Descriptive statistics, independent samples t-test, Pearson’s Chi-square test, univariate ANOVA, bivariate, and multivariable logistic regression analyses were conducted at 0.05 level of significance.ResultsThe prevalence of workplace incivility, bullying, and sexual harassment (SH) was 63.8%, 53.5%, and 40.5%. The 12-month experience of the supervisor, coworker, and instigated incivilities was 67.4%, 58.8%, and 52.8%, respectively. Also, 47.5% of the participants initiated personal bullying, 62.5% experienced work-related bullying, and 42.2% experienced physical bullying. The 12-month experience of gender harassment, unwanted sexual attention, and sexual coercion were 36.5%, 25.6%, and 26.6%, respectively. Being aged 35–49 years (AOR 0.15; 95% CI (0.06, 0.40), and ≥ 50 years (AOR 0.04; 95% CI (0.01, 0.14) were associated with workplace incivility among female staff. Having a temporary appointment (AOR 7.79, 95% CI (2.26, 26.91) and casual/contract employment status (AOR 29.93, 95% CI (4.57, 192.2) were reported to be associated with workplace bullying. Having a doctoral degree (AOR 3.57, 95% CI (1.24, 10.34), temporary appointment (AOR 91.26, 95% CI (14.27, 583.4) and casual/contract employment status (AOR 73.81, 95% CI (7.26, 750.78) were associated with workplace SH.ConclusionsThe prevalence of GBV was high. There is an urgent need for workplace interventions to eliminate different forms of GBV and address associated factors to reduce the adverse mental, physical, and social health outcomes among university women.

Sexual harassment (SH) is a form of gender-based violence (GBV) that negatively impacts women’s physical, mental, social, and financial well-being. Although SH is a global phenomenon, it also is a contextualized one, with local and institutional norms influencing the ways in which harassment behavior manifests. As more women attend institutions of higher education in Jordan, these women are at increased risk of experiencing SH in university settings, with potential implications for their health and future employment. Social norms theory, which examines the informal rules governing individual behavior within groups, has been a useful framework for understanding and developing interventions against GBV globally. We sought to apply a social-norms lens to the understanding and prevention of SH at a Jordanian university. To gain a comprehensive and nuanced picture of social norms surrounding SH, we collected qualitative data using three complementary methods: focus group discussions (n = 6) with male and female students (n = 33); key informant interviews with staff and faculty (n = 5); and a public, participatory event to elicit anonymous short responses from students (n = 317). Using this data, we created a codebook incorporating social-norms components and emergent themes. As perceived by participants, SH was unacceptable yet common, characterized as a weak norm primarily because negative sanctioning of harassers was unlikely. Distal norms related to gender and tribal affiliation served to weaken further norms against SH by blaming the victim, preventing reporting, discouraging bystander intervention, and/or protecting the perpetrator. The complexity of the normative environment surrounding SH perpetration will necessitate the use of targeted, parallel approaches to change harmful norms. Strengthening weak norms against SH will require increasing the likelihood of sanctions, by revising university policies and procedures to increase accountability, increasing the acceptability of bystander intervention and reporting, and fostering tribal investment in sanctioning members who harass women. Creating dialogue that emphasizes the harmful nature of SH behaviors and safe spaces to practice positive masculinity also may be an effective strategy to change how male students interact in the presence of peers. Any social norms change intervention will need to consider the various reference groups that dictate and enforce norms surrounding SH.

The examination of gender-based violence and domestic abuse among migrant women across the world has received very limited attention to date. This is partly because the gendered nature of migration processes has only received sustained consideration in the last decade or so, together with the fact that gender-based violence has only recently been fully recognized as an important issue both academically and in policy terms. However, the limited research available on gender-based violence suggests that gendered power relations are at the root of such abuse and that migrant women are especially vulnerable. Yet, while research on gender-based and domestic violence among immigrant communities is increasing, there remains very little work in the European or British context, with most concentrated on North America and especially among Asian and to a lesser extent among Latin Americans (however, see Beckett and Macey 2001; Gill and Rehman 2004; Macey 1999).KeywordsDomestic ViolenceLabor Force ParticipationImmigrant WomanFemale Genital MutilationMigrant WomanThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

Gender-based violence (GBV) has been identified to be one of the ripple effects of the global pandemic. In countries like Nigeria, the situation is hypothesized to be worse because of widespread poverty and gender inequalities. To examine the exposure of females to GBV during the first 3 months of the COVID-19 lockdown. This cross-sectional study was conducted in a low-income community in Lagos. Semi-structured questionnaires were administered to 130 respondents selected via systematic random sampling. The mean age of the respondents was 26.89 ± 8.67 years. Majority worked informal jobs, while only 50% had attained beyond primary education. Within the period, the respondents had been subjected to sexual (54.6%), physical (52.3%), verbal assault (41.5%), and online sexual harassment (45.4%); of which only 30% reported to the police. Furthermore, respondents subjected to sexual (p=0.004) and physical assault (p=0.032) during the period earned significantly less money than other respondents. The fact that over 1 out of every 2 females was subjected to at least one form of GBV within the short timeframe shows how unsafe girls and women in low-income communities are. This calls for proactive community-level interventions to curb the GBV menace.

In Canada, diverse people face violence and abuse at alarming rates as a result of their gender, perceived gender, or gender expression. This phenomenon is referred to as gender-based violence (GBV). Gender-based violence has many manifestations, including sexual assault, femicide, and intimate partner violence (IPV), as well as dowry-related violence, early or forced marriage and pregnancy, female genital mutilation, elder abuse, human trafficking, sexual harassment, cyber abuse, and many other forms, both visible and invisible. Crucially, GBV does not simply occur in the context of inter-personal relationships or as the result of perpetration by ‘bad men’; rather, GBV is a systemic issue that seizes upon and operates through longstanding pathologies and power dynamics—patriarchy, racism, colonialism, and transphobia to name few—rendering diverse people more vulnerable to victimization on the basis of their identity. Strategies, policies, and programs focused on ensuring victims and survivors can achieve economic security will form a vital component of any serious plan to address GBV. On this point there is notable consensus. Less agreement exists, however, when debate begins on the question of which strategies, policies, and programs ought to be implemented. In this discussion paper, we weigh in on this debate through an evaluation of an economic security tool over which there has been much fanfare in recent years: the basic income model. Two questions guide our analysis: (1) to what extent could a basic income disrupt the material conditions and forms of oppression which drive GBV, and thus reduce both risk and prevalence? and (2) to what extent would basic income be an effective support for those encountering/recovering from various forms of GBV? Our analysis is driven by two definitional assumptions about economic security and basic income. That is, we consider economic security to be a state in which criteria for financial security, stability, and continuity are fulfilled, and conceive of basic income as a class of policies that share principles of simplicity, respect, economic security, and social inclusion.

Women's health challenges in post-revolutionary Egypt

Despite decades of focus on gender and skills training, the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) landscape in Sub-Saharan Africa remains deeply gendered and rooted in wider structures of patriarchal inequality and exploitation. Engaging with recent theoretical moves toward gender-transformative and gender-just TVET programming, this paper explores how a gradual revisioning of TVET can be mobilised to challenge broader gender inequality and discrimination in precarious settings. Bringing together insights from feminist scholarship and the UN’s decent work agenda, which seeks to align fair and secure working conditions with the aspirations of workers, we ask what a gender-transformative future for TVET might look like where labour rights, sustainable livelihoods and wellbeing are incorporated from the ground up. Drawing on findings from Cameroon and Sierra Leone, from the innovative ‘Gen-Up’ project which aims to investigate possible gender-responsive TVET programmes and policies in collaboration with the TVET provider, the Don Bosco network we ask what is both possible and permissible in the fractious economic climate, where the focus on basic survival and income generation inhibits a genuine challenge to entrenched gender norms and stereotypes. For young women especially whose aspirations are multiply damaged by persistent discriminatory frameworks and who become further vulnerable at times of economic and social crisis, we ask whether current TVET programming is helping them escape the multiple forms of marginalisation they face. Even in cases where women may be portrayed as successful entrepreneurs or achieving sustainable livelihoods, the evidence suggests these individualistic narratives are leaving many young women behind. In this context of instability, precarity and increasing global and local socio-economic and gender inequalities we argue that only holistic TVET programming based on social and moral values and empowerment and proposing diverse pathways to decent work, creating forms of solidarity, collaboration and a contextualised enabling environment can act as both a lever for gender transformation and also an engine for broader socio-economic change fitting the ‘Decent Work’ vision and a constantly changing world of work.

Sexual harassment is a form of gender-based violence and discrimination that includes any explicit or implicit act of a sexual nature , that is unwelcome or undesirable, in such a way that the other person feels insulted, humiliated or threatened or fear. This study attempts to answer a basic question: Is there sexual harassment of women at work? And if so, what are the main causes? The main objective of this study is to find out the amount of sexual harassment directed against women working in all the existing institutions, For this reason, the researcher used a sample of (300) units at random to carry out the operation procedures, but after returning the forms, only (268) units admitted that they were harassed during work Therefore, the researcher applied all statistical processes to this sample, One of the most important conclusions that the researcher reached after analyzing the scale form: The majority of women who were subjected to sexual harassment were between (31-50) years old, and most of them were unmarried and married, they worked in government institutions, and the majority of them were harassed by co-workers inside the institution, Verbal harassment, such as talking about jokes and sexual stories, is one of the most common types of harassment that the majority of the sample members were subjected to, One of the most important causes of sexual harassment, as indicated by the majority of the sample, is addiction to pornographic films , One of the most important effects of sexual harassment on the victim is exposing her to fear, anxiety, and loss of confidence in herself and others, The sample members used their friends to help them get rid of the harasser as one of the methods of confrontation, and in the end, the researcher suggested carrying out intensive campaigns in order to educate all members of society about the seriousness of this phenomenon and for all existing devices and even legislators to take a serious action to confront it.

Bystanders play a key role in detecting, preventing, and addressing sexual harassment (SH) and other forms of gender-based violence (GBV) in university settings. This study aims to explore attitudes toward the factors that either facilitate or hinder individuals from actively intervening in situations of SH and GBV. A qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews was conducted between November 2023 and April 2024 with 89 key informants from universities in Austria, Belgium, Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Spain. Thematic analysis identified four main categories: knowledge and awareness, bystanders' evaluation of costs and benefits, perceptions of institutional responses, and interpersonal/community factors. Findings revealed that a lack of knowledge about SH, particularly non-physical forms, was a major barrier. Increased awareness, ability to recognize signs of discomfort, self-confidence, and knowledge of support resources were key facilitators. Lack of empathy and solidarity, and fears of social judgment or professional consequences, hindered intervention, especially in situations involving power imbalances. Conversely, protective measures, such as guarantees of confidentiality were crucial in encouraging intervention. These findings highlight the need to raise awareness, create safe environments, and promote prosocial attitudes to foster a culture of active bystander intervention.