Title: Strategic Action at the European Union level: Ways forward to prevent violence against women
1Strategic 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
2Ways 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
3Alternative 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
46 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
5Incremental 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
6Dont 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
7What 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
8Directive 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
9Directive 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
10From 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
11Extending 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
12Cost 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
13Research, 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
14Gender 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
15Conclusions 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
16References
- 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.