British Council launches virtual booklet on the ‘Empowering Communities to Address Violence Against Women and Girls’ project
The British Council recently concluded an 18-month programme on empowering communities to address Violence against Women and Girls (VAWG). The project was aimed at creating a violence-free environment for women and girls to participate fully in their communities, take control of their own lives, and enjoy greater equality. Training workshops were delivered in 20 local communities, in seven Divisional Secretariat (DS) divisions in the Jaffna, Batticaloa, Monaragala, and Hambantota Districts.
The project was an initiative by the British Council, carried out in partnership with the Foundation for Innovative Social Development (FISD), Jaffna Social Action Centre (JSAC), Janathakshan, and Hashtag Generation.
The ‘Empowering Communities to Address Violence Against Women and Girls’ project
Speaking at the virtual event held to mark the completion of the project and the publication of its findings, former British Council Sri Lanka Country Director Gill Caldicott said that VAWG is an endemic problem not limited to Sri Lanka which stems from deeply ingrained attitudes and social norms which are outdated, prejudicial, and which undermine basic human rights. “Addressing this is no easy task and change will not come quickly and easily. I am proud to have contributed to this journey with the British Council. Women cannot begin to take their rightful place until and unless they are free of the fear and reality of violence, both physical and emotional.”
The live event held to launch the virtual booklet featured an eminent panel of activists and change-makers who shared their views on VAWG and the “Empowering Communities to Address Violence Against Women and Girls” project.
FISD Director – Programmes Samitha Sugathimala spoke on the project, sharing that what set this project apart was that it was done with active engagement from the communities they worked with. “We engaged with them interactively in the form of residential-style knowledge and capacity-building training programmes,” Sugathimala said. “This allowed the communities to design their own solutions to problems and get together at the community level and implement these solutions, going back to their homes and engaging men and government officials within their communities as well as working with other community-based organisations. They measured changes at the end and brought lessons and practices for wider sharing.”
Through the project, Sugathimala shared, women were able to create new situations and environments within their communities and create an enabling environment for continuous empowerment, adding: “Empowerment is very much a journey and we have been able to start them out on this journey.”
The importance of a community-led approach
Keynote Speaker, international expert on sex and sexual reproductive health, and gender-based violence and social justice organisation Shanthi Maargam Executive Director/Founder Kamani Jinadasa also spoke on the importance of engaging communities. Jinadasa shared that VAGW stemmed from two root causes, an imbalance of power, in which masculinity plays a huge role, and gender inequality.
The statistics of women and girls who experience violence are staggering, with one out of three women experiencing intimate partner violence in their lifetime. Intimate partner violence is the most common form of VAGW. Conversely, only 3% of men who perpetrate gender-based violence ever face charges. More disturbing statistics show that 30% of men have perpetrated their first rape between the ages of 15 and 19.
“One key motivation for sexual violence is a sense of sexual entitlement, something that comes from toxic masculinity, “Jinadasa noted. “If we can address this sense of impunity and entitlement, we will make a lot of progress.”
At a community level, Jinadasa shared that there are three key interventions that can be used to fight VAGW.
Group-based interventions are one form, with group workshops conducted by trained professionals that engage people in critical reflection on gender roles and behaviour. The group workshops should be diverse, engaging men and women as well as adolescent boys and girls.
Another form of community-level intervention is community mobilisation and activation, with the use of multiple forms of community initiatives to shift harmful attitudes and norms. These would be long-term intervention programmes with trained mentors and structured discussions and activities on power, gender, and VAGW.
The final form of community level intervention is social marketing and edutainment, harnessing the power of mass communication to change social norms and raise awareness in communities around norms around behaviours, laws, and systems that perpetuate VAGW.
“Within the Sri Lankan context, we need to improve,” Jinadasa said. “We need long-term intervention programmes. Behaviour needs time to change. We also need to address intersectionality and look at all our social difference and work across all levels, from the community level to the interpersonal level to the individual level. We also need to understand more about children becoming eventual perpetrators of VAGW and focus on stopping things at the source.”
Active Citizen Master Facilitator Maria (Charo) Lanao-Madden also addressed the gathering live from Northern Ireland, sharing that VAGW is a global problem that is not something that should be addressed by girls and women but by society as a whole. “The Active Citizen programme is a social leadership programme with the belief that we are globally connected but locally engaged,” Lanao shared, adding: “There is an interdependence among all of us, but we can all apply ourselves and do something at the local level. The ‘Empowering Communities to Address Violence Against Women and Girls’ project shows that it takes a community to address challenges and to reflect and decide what do next.”
Capturing meaningful stories of empowerment to drive change
Hashtag Generation Co-founder and Director Senel Wanniarachchi spoke on the “Her Safe Space” social media campaign devised by Hashtag Generation to drive the “Empowering Communities to Address Violence Against Women and Girls” project.
Launched on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, “Her Safe Space” covered all the different aspects and phases of the project and created content to promote discussion about VAWG. “The campaign was trilingual, which we felt was important in a context like Sri Lanka when talking about such issues,” Wanniarachchi explained, adding: ”The topic is very sensitive, and the campaign spoke about how the project was about changing attitudes.”
Moving away from an academic and statistically driven approach, “Her Safe Space” featured people in the project sharing their views on VAWG. “We tried to highlight voices that were reaching through the actual project and bring that into the campaign. The voices of men and women going through the training process, and the trainers as well. This way, the people in these communities would see the content on their social media feeds and it would provoke discussion.”
Wanniarachchi also shared that “Her Safe Space” was about telling stories of power and agency, of women changing narratives and confronting violence as opposed to painting the picture of a powerless woman. “Her Safe Space” was meant to show people who are actively changing the world around them. “We reached 89,995 people through the campaign. Most comments and responses were positive, but there were the occasional negative comments which showed that we’re reaching people who don’t agree with us. With algorithms on social media pushing content towards people who agree with it, negative comments show you’re bursting your bubble and reaching a wider audience.”
Embracing intersectionality and breaking silence
Viluthu Executive Director Maithreyi Rajasingham spoke on the importance of making note of intersectionality and diversity when it comes to womens’ issues. “We also need to understand women’s issues is an all-encompassing issue. Ten years after the war, we’re still talking about child marriages and school dropout rates. These issues have stayed throughout. The issues themselves are evolving. The issues that are contributing to this are also transforming in their own way because the conflict is also transforming.
“We need to do away with the idea that women are a homogeneous group. In Jaffna and Batticaloa, you have women who are minorities, women affected by the conflict, women heads of households, women whose families are disappeared, women who are families of the missing and disappeared, young women living alone or with dependents, older women living alone or with dependents, and so on. It’s an ever-evolving group.” Rajasingham also shared that drug and alcohol abuse among men is becoming an issue that is affecting women, with many women taking over as heads of households because men are unable to do so properly. “We need a special lens for these issues,” Rajasingham stressed,
“It’s not just about what area the issues are in. It’s a labyrinth.”
Rajasingham also commented on women needing to break their silence around abuse. “As practitioners, we have to accept the socialisation of women really silences them,” she noted, adding: “Women from the get-go are taught we have to endure these things in silence. We don’t recognise things as our human rights, as something we can hold people accountable for.”
Rajasingham quoted the example of microfinance, which is a huge problem in Batticaloa and Jaffna. Over the last two years, over 50 women have died by suicide due to difficulties to do with microfinance, which is made worse by sexual bribery and exploitation. In turn, this affects children who are forced to drop out of school to make ends meet if and when their parents disappear because they cannot cope with paying back what they owe.
Moving forward by empowering young people
The best hope for any kind of future lies in the hands of the next generation. “Young kids need to be involved right from the start because harmful attitudes and acceptance of violence begins at home,” Jinadasa said, adding: “It’s a constant process. Children are the future of our world. It is very important we work with young people because they are such important agents of change for the future.”
