The Possibilities of Gender Mainstreaming Social Policy on Family Violence in Hong Kong

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The Possibilities of Gender Mainstreaming Social
Policy on Family Violence in Hong Kong

• Dr. Leung Lai Ching
• 6 November 2009

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Objective of the study

• The main objective of this study is to identify
  and understand the difficulties of and
  opportunities for gender mainstreaming the
  domestic violence policy in Hong Kong and to
  develop policy alternatives in local context.

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Term Use

• Domestic violence vs. family violence
• Violence against women by known men is not a
  family or private matter.
• The abuser and the abused may not have legally
  married.
• Violence often continue after the relationship
  ended.

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Methods

• Documenting the experiences of some international
  organizations on gender mainstreaming.
• Conducting in-depth interviews of abused women,
  frontline professionals and policy makers.

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Documentation

• We have documented the experiences of some
  international organisations on gender
  mainstreaming such as the Council of Europe,
  United Nations and World Health Organisation, to
  understand the pre-requisites and implementation
  strategies of gender mainstreaming domestic
  violence policy in western countries.

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• The main areas that have been reviewed including
  (1) political views and policy plan (2) funds
  and human resources commitment (3) legal and
  judicial procedures (4) protection and services
  supports (5) public education (6) research
  activities.

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• Also reviewed domestic violence policies in Hong
  Kong such as legal documents, Policy Address
  papers, Public Budget and government documents on
  measures and actions tackling family violence
  since 2004.

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Experiences of Abused Women

• We have interviewed 20 abused women to understand
  their experiences in encountering different
  professionals when facing domestic violence, in
  particular social workers and police.
• The interviewees were referred by social service
  agencies and womens organizations such as
  survivors self-help group, shelters for battered
  women, crisis center, family service centres and
  community centres.

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Inter-professional co-ordination and collaboration

• We have conducted individual in-depth interviews
  to frontline police officers, social workers from
  FCPSU, IFSC, womens refugee shelters, medical
  social worker, and Social Security officer.
• In total, we have conducted 17 in-depth
  interviews and all these interviews have been
  transcribed

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Existing Policy Practices

• Besides collecting the views of front-line
  workers, we have also interviewed 9 policy makers
  including the officials from the Labour and
  Welfare Bureau, Social Welfare Department,
  Housing Department, Department of Justice, and
  the Police Force.
• From the interviews, we are able to understand
  the issues from a wider perspective and policy
  level.

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Findings
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Seeking Help From the Police

• Evidence in this study shows that the experiences
  of abused women in seeking help from the police
  were not satisfactory.
• When the abused women reported to the police for
  being abused by their husband, the police tended
  to view arrests as low priority and not their
  real work, or discouraged abused women to file
  their complaints

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• The police had put less effort to enforce the law
  and prosecute the perpetrators as a result.
• The problem is associated with the attitudes and
  values of the police namely (1) tend to treat
  woman abuse as an individual problem rather than
  a criminal behaviour, (2) to regard domestic
  violence as a family dispute, (3) misunderstand
  the nature of marriage, and (4) lack of gender
  sensitivity in handling the cases.

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Seeking Help From Social Workers

• Abused women also had difficulties in seeking
  help from social workers.
• A number of survivors reported in this study that
  they received inadequate support and empathy from
  social workers. It is largely due to the bias
  attitudes of the social workers on abused women,
  in particular those from Mainland China, in
  handling processes.

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• It is largely due to the bias attitudes of the
  social workers on abused women in the handling
  processes (1) social workers may think that the
  abused women, in particular those come from
  Mainland China, misuse the public money, (2) they
  think that abusers also suffered from the
  domestic violence issue, (3) social workers pay
  more attention to the welfare of children, (4)
  they lack of gender sensitivity in handling the
  cases.

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Pressure of Front-line Workers

• Findings of this study also show that the
  front-line workers including social workers and
  the police face a lot of pressure due to the
  upsurge of domestic violence cases in Hong Kong
  in recent years.
• The pressure mainly caused by the inadequate
  resource input from the government, the lack of
  coordination among different professionals and
  the loopholes in the existing policy.

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• Some front-line workers expressed frustration and
  low motivation in handling processes.

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Views of Policy Makers

• Not only the front-line workers, some policy
  makers appeared not to have clear understanding
  about the domestic violence issue.
• Most of the policy makers who had been
  interviewed in this study did not take violence
  against women at home as a gender issue or human
  right issue but family issue.

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• There was no sign of a comprehensive or
  inter-disciplinary approach to be adopted to
  combat the issue.

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Barriers to gender mainstream domestic violence
policy

• The lack of gender sensitivity of the policy
  makers.
• Inadequate resource input and service
  coordination.
• Lack of high ranking coordinating body to plan,
  to assess, to monitor and to evaluate the policy
  and practices on domestic violence in Hong Kong.

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Policy Implications and Recommendations
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Root Problem of the Issue

• First, this research has identified the root
  causes of the problem and has suggested a clear
  direction and comprehensive approach to combat
  domestic violence in Hong Kong.
• Violence against women, whether by strangers or
  family members, is a cause and consequence of
  gender inequality and an act that violated basic
  human right. Therefore, both social service
  provision and law protection are needed to deal
  with the problem.

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Policy Strategies

• Second, the study suggests some strategies on how
  the gender and equality dimension can be taken
  into account in domestic violence policies and
  activities in the planning, implementation,
  monitoring and evaluation phases. For example

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• (1) to adopt the definition, the policy framework
  and practice guidelines that suggested by the
  international organizations such as the United
  Nations, the World Health Organization and the
  Council of Europe.
• (2) to work out a comprehensive approach to set
  up a high ranking coordinating body to establish
  a Plan of Action for combating and preventing
  domestic violence in Hong Kong.

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• (3) to improve the central data collection and
  the information dissemination systems on domestic
  violence cases.
• (4) to strengthen the communication and
  collaboration between the government and the NGOs
  in order to pull more resources to combat on the
  issue.

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Improvement for Existing Practices

• Third, the problems in existing practices of
  inter-professional co-ordination and
  collaboration in handling domestic violence cases
  have been identified, that helps to improve the
  service coordination among different social
  service organizations and the communication
  between social workers and the police.

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• For example, to set up a crisis intervention team
  with the collaboration of police and social
  workers to handle crisis situation. With the
  mutual support from each other, social workers
  will feel more secure in a crisis situation, and
  the police will not confuse their role in the
  crime scene.

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Training of Front-line Workers

• Fourth, findings of this study provide direction
  and focus for the training of front-line workers
  in the future.
• For example, to increase gender sensitivity
  training for front-line workers so that they will
  be more sensitive to the needs and problems of
  abused women when dealing with domestic violence
  cases.

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Checklist

• Fifth, a checklist has been developed for policy
  branches and government departments as a tool to
  assess and monitor the policy and practices in
  handling domestic violence cases.
• In the checklist, 12 major areas have been
  identified that help the government officials to
  review their practices.
• A comprehensive guideline and explanatory notes
  are provided in order to help the concern parties
  to fill in the checklist

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Thank You