Strategic Action at the European Union level: Ways forward to prevent violence against women

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Strategic Action at the European Union level
Ways forward to prevent violence against women

• Sylvia Walby
• Distinguished Professor of Sociology, UNESCO
  Chair in Gender Research
• Lancaster University, UK
• S.Walby_at_Lancaster.ac.uk

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Ways forward

• Legal action
• There are legal bases for Directives
• Economic policy
• Action to prevent cost violence against women
  (VAWG) to EU of 228bn
• Use of structural funds
• Protect specialised service provision
• Gender balance in decision-making
• From corporate boards to judicial authorities
• Research
• Strategic Plan

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Alternative legal strategies

• Incremental, step by step, gradual, accumulation
  of small changes
• Existing practice of EU Commission
• Big bold change
• European Parliament Resolution, Feb 2014
• Draws on Article 225 of Treaty on the Functioning
  of the European Union (TFEU)
• Innovative use of TFEU
• Extending VAW policy in economic field

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6 existing Directives concerning VAWG

• EU Directives on specific aspects of VAWG
• Protection orders 2011/99/EU
• Trafficking 2011/36/EU
• Child sex abuse 2011/92/EU
• Victims rights 2012/29/EU
• Harassment (both gender and sexual) in
  employment 2002/73/EC
• Harassment in sale and distribution of goods,
  services 2004/113/EC

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Incremental change via Directives supported by
TFEU

• Civil and criminal law Article 82 (1)(a)(d)
• Judicial cooperation
• Criminal law Article 82(2)
• Mutual recognition of criminal judgements with a
  cross-border dimension
• Serious criminal law Article 83(1)
• minimum rules for definition of serious crimes
  with cross-border dimension trafficking in
  human beings sexual exploitation of women
  children

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Dont forget discrimination law

• Harassment Directives (2002, 2004)
• Employment law Article 157(3)
• Equal treatment in employment includes
  anti-harassment Ordinary legislative procedure
• Equality law Article 19
• To extend the fields in which to combat
  discrimination based on sex
• Special procedure requires unanimous action of
  Council
• Ordinary procedure restricts actions to
  non-legislative

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What are the limits?

• Changes to MS laws under TFEU 82, 83 require a
  field of existing criminal law that is already
  nearly harmonised if ordinary legislative route
  to be used
• Neither gender-based violence against women nor
  domestic violence have nearly harmonised
  definitions in MS criminal law, so fail this
  criteria
• But some areas fit, e.g. rape, domestic assault
• And
• TFEU Art 19 could create new fields, though
  requires a special legislative procedure
• TFEU Art 225 allows Parliament to ask Commission
  to do something new
• Other actions possible in field of economy

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Directive on rape?

• Rape meets Article 83 requirements
• cross-border dimension
• sexual exploitation of women and children
• Judicial cooperation requires shared minimum
  rules this needs changes in MS law concerning
• No marital exemption
• Consent-based standard

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Directive on domestic assault?

• Meets the requirements under Article 82
• Minimum rules for purposes of cross-border
  judicial cooperation
• Changes
• no marital exemption to application of criminal
  laws on assault

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From Gender Harassment to Gender-based violence?

• Harassment on grounds of gender already
• Contrary to EU law on equal treatment and
  non-discrimination Articles 157 and 19 TFEU
• Gender based violence against women is
  logically a sub-type of gender harassment
• Clarification of this would assist judicial
  cooperation in EU law
• In fields of employment and sale and
  distribution of goods and services ordinary
  procedures are OK
• But extending locations beyond these would
  require Council unanimity

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Extending VAWG policy into employment and economy

• Since VAWG is a detriment to womens employment,
  then actions within the employment field are
  relevant
• Reintegration into labour market Article 153
• European Structural Funds Article 162
• Broad economic guidelines Article 5
• Services general economic interest Article 14
• EU allows MS to decide which services are of
  general economic interest rather than of
  economic interest thus whether they are subject
  to competition law or not

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Cost of violence against women

• Cost of VAW in EU is 228bn a year
• 3 types of costs
• Public/state funded services (health, justice,
  specialised services)
• Lost economic output detriment to economic
  growth
• Pain and suffering to victim/survivor

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Research, external relations, public health
further bases for non-legislative EU action

• Research and statistics Article 338
• Surveys and research on gender based violence
  could be authorised as pursuing EU goals to
  combat sex discrimination
• External relations Article 214
• Anti-VAWG could be explicitly included in
  external relations e.g. Humanitarian aid
• Public health Articles 6a, 9, 168
• E.g. Funding Daphne for knowledge exchange since
  VAWG a detriment to public health

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Gender balance in decision-making

• Gender balance in decision-making
• EU policy
• UN Security Council policy peacekeeping
• Recent EU attempts to apply to corporate boards
• Apply to judicial authorities?
• Europol
• Judges

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Conclusions Ways forward

• Law/Directives
• New minimum standards in specific areas to enable
  judicial cooperation across borders
• To combat discrimination that is violence-based
• Economic policy embed VAWG into economic policy
• Structural funds
• Broad economic guidelines
• Protect specialised services
• Gender balance in decision-making
• Research
• Strategic plan

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References

• S. Walby. Legal perspectives for action at EU
  level. European Parliament Value Added Unit. 2013
• S. Walby and P. Olive. Cost of VAWG in EU. EP
  VAU. 2013.
• S. Walby et al. Overview of the worldwide best
  practices for rape prevention. European
  Parliament (EP). 2013.
• S. Walby J. Allen, Domestic Violence, Sexual
  Assault Stalking Findings from the British
  Crime Survey. Home Office. 2004
• S. Walby. The Cost of Domestic Violence.
  Department of Trade and Industry Women and
  Equality Unit, 2004.
• J. Towers and S. Walby Measuring the impact of
  cuts in public expenditure on the provision of
  services to prevent violence against women and
  girls. Northern Rock Trust for London. 2012.
• S. Walby The Future of Feminism. Polity 2011.
• S. Walby Globalization and Inequalities. Sage,
  2009.