Women in the City: On Violence and Rights

Transcription

Women in the City
On Violence and Rights
WOMEN IN THE CITY
On Violence and Rights
Edited by
Ana Falú
Translated by
Georgia Marman and Paulina Matta
Women and Habitat Network of Latin America
Ediciones SUR
This book is published by the Women and Habitat Network of Latin America, with
the support of the Regional Programme ‘Cities Without Violence against Women,
Safer Cities for Everyone’, coordinated from the office of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) for Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, and
Uruguay; and with the financial support of the Spanish Agency of International
Cooperation for Development (AECID).
Title of the original edition: Mujeres en la ciudad. De violencias y derechos
ISBN Nº 978-956-208-085-9
Santiago de Chile: Red Mujer y Hábitat de América Latina / Ediciones SUR, 2009
Translated by Georgia Marman and Paulina Matta with the collaboration of Dr. Rod Burgess
and Alan Cahoon.
Santiago de Chile: Women and Habitat Network of Latin America / Ediciones SUR, 2010
ISBN Nº 978-956-208-086-6
Cover photo: Diego Rodríguez
Inside photos: Ana Falú, Diego Rodríguez, Paula Rodríguez
Printed by:
LOM Ediciones
PRINTED IN CHILE
contents
Presentation
9
Ana Falú
Gender-based Violence in the City
Violence and Discrimination in Cities
Ana Falú
15
Current Debates on Safety: A Women’s Human Rights Approach
Giulia Tamayo
39
Gender-based Violence: Clues for Analysis
Virginia Vargas
55
The Responsibility of Local Government in the Prevention
of Violence against Women in Cities
Susana Chiarotti
61
Safety, Gender Mainstreaming and Gender-based Programmes
Caroline Moser
77
Cities, Public Space, and Peaceful Coexistence
Violence and the Fragmented City
Rod Burgess
99
Without Violence against Women, Would Cities Be Safe for All?
Lia Zanotta Machado
129
Regaining Trust, Recovering the City
Marta Román Rivas
139
Coexisting in Diversity: Public Space from a Gender Perspective
Olga Segovia
147
A Contribution to the Debate on the City, Public Space, and Safety
from a Feminist Perspective
Liliana Rainero
165
Presentation
T
he Regional Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women,
Safe Cities for All’ is a pioneering initiative of the United Nations Fund
for Women (UNIFEM) Regional Office for Brazil and the Southern Cone. It
emerged from a proposal crafted by the Women and Habitat Network of
Latin America and is now being implemented in several Latin American
cities with the support provided by the Spanish Agency of International
Cooperation for Development (AECID) and UNIFEM. The Programme
brings together a variety of social actors, including local governments, regional feminist networks, NGOs, as well as women and men who are experts on the issues. Especially significant in relation to these experts is the
academic contribution of university-affiliated researchers who are dedicated to some of the issues that make the complex subject of increasing
urban violence in cities a central point on governmental and civil society
agendas.
In spite of the fact that urban violence stimulates generalised concern
throughout society, it is striking that policies on citizen safety ignore violence against women and fail to recognise that it is an integral component
of the forms of urban violence that are proliferating. As one of its main
points of departure, the Regional Programme asserts that life in cities is
not the same for all people, especially in cities of the globalised world —
metropolises, megalopolises and networked cities — where inequalities,
crime and violence are escalating. Based on this premise, the Regional Programme seeks to foster reflection and analysis on violence that capture its
complexities and identify discrimination and violence against women as
central dimensions of the broader phenomenon of urban violence. In parallel, the Regional Programme channels its actions towards demonstrating
that citizen safety cannot be guaranteed unless gender-based violence is
included in debates on urban violence, that is, unless there is acknowledgement that the issues of gender-based violence and citizen safety are
directly related.
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To summarise, the objective of the Regional Programme is to incorporate women’s rights into policies on citizen safety and to ensure a gender
perspective in city planning. The intention is to initiate debate on the issues of safety, fears and lived experience that is innovative by virtue of a
broad, more holistic scope. As such, discussion and analysis should be located within the framework of human rights, focused on prevention rather
than punishment and, above all, prioritise women’s right to live and enjoy
the city and to fully exercise their rights as citizens.
There appears to be generalised consensus regarding the need to build
cities (and, ultimately, a world) free from violence. As a whole, the population has grown tired of violence and is overwhelmed by different fears. One
needs only to recall the classic paintings of Pieter Brueghel the Elder that
date back more than half a century — ‘The Tower of Babel’ and ‘The Triumph of Death’ — to confirm that violence is hardly a new phenomenon.
However, the difference today that is a cause for concern is how violence
has become more complex and how, if we consider those who perpetuate
fear, it will not only continue, but get worse. Urban violence is currently
viewed as an inevitable phenomenon that is impossible to eradicate.
This Regional Programme is determined to build more democratic and
inclusive cities for women and men. The elimination of violence is understood to be a commitment on behalf of society as a whole; it is a precursor
to fulfilling the promise of creating ‘safer cities’, liveable and vital cities.
María-Ángeles Durán and Carlos Hernández Pezzi offer the concept of
‘shared cities’ as an alternative to those cities enclosed by walls, whether
real or imaginary, where safety means protecting oneself by staying indoors and withdrawing from public spaces — tendencies which completely undermine the goal of consolidating links between citizens.
The violence that takes place in cities is not limited to robbery and assault, the gang that dominates the corner, the abuse of women, the drug
ring that has instilled terror in the neighbourhood or the illegitimate use
of force by different actors. As it has been stated ad infinitum, violence
is hunger and a lack of schools, overcrowded hospitals, streets without
sidewalks, an absence of parks and an unjust legal system. It is discrimination based on ethnicity, birthplace, sexual orientation and age. It is the
disregard of human rights and our rights as citizens. Violence is those acts
suffered by women solely because they are women, and which constitute
practices of domination of one sex over another. Violence is rooted in long
cultural traditions that continue to be invisible, in social constructions that
are left unsaid, in political and economic relations that declare themselves
to be in the common interest without any consideration of, or accountability towards, the victims affected along the way.
Given its interest in creating safer cities, the Regional Programme places
a special emphasis on the inclusion of a gender perspective in urban planning. The issue of utmost concern is women’s right to use and enjoy the
Presentation
city and the prime objective is to foment women’s capacity to exercise their
rights as citizens and, as mentioned above, to broaden debate on safety by
situating it within the framework of citizens’ rights and diversity.
The texts included in this volume are adaptations of presentations
given by participants in the Second International Seminar of the Regional
Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women, Safe Cities for All’,
which was held in Buenos Aires from July 23 to 25, 2008. The goals of the
Seminar were the following: to provide a space for continued reflection and
knowledge-sharing regarding violence in cities from a gender perspective,
to facilitate dialogue between a diversity of actors in order to broaden and
deepen proposals, to generate results reflective of the conceptual debates
underway and to develop new strategies for action in the region.
The Seminar brought together representatives of UNIFEM for Latin
America and the Caribbean, as well as representatives of different United
Nations agencies. In particular, I wish to highlight the participation of the
Director of the UN-HABITAT Regional Office for Latin America and the
Caribbean, Cecilia Martinez; of HABITAT Nairobi, of the Huairou Commission, of the Canadian NGO Femmes et Villes (Women in Cities), as well
as of academics and experts in the field. There were debate sessions along
with presentations of the work being carried out in the cities participating
in the Regional Programme — Bogotá, Colombia; Rosario, Argentina; and
Santiago, Chile. Delegates from local governments and NGOs, as well as
members of the Women and Habitat Network of Latin America, the Popular Education Network of Women (REPEM) and the Latin American and
Caribbean Committee for the Defence of Women’s Rights (CLADEM) participated as representatives of the development and implementation process of the Regional Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women,
Safe Cities for All’.
In terms of the themes that structured the Seminar and served to establish a conceptual framework for tackling the persistence and impunity of
gender-based violence, the focus was on the relationship between public
and private space, safety (or the lack thereof) and the peaceful coexistence
of citizens, as well as gender-based violence and urban violence. The city
constituted the common thread as the setting where all of these issues converge and come to life.
In light of the context of profound urban transformations that characterise developing countries, there are two key questions that help to organise our reflections. Firstly, what are the challenges related to this debate
and to the implementation of public policies designed to build cities without violence from a gender perspective? Secondly, what lessons can we
identify related to the elaboration of proposals that strengthen the rights of
women as citizens? These are the concerns that gave rise to and continue
to drive the Regional Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women,
Safe Cities for All’, and they also orient the texts gathered together in this
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book. The articles constitute contributions that, from different points of
view, inspire, enrich and enable us to trace the paths forged by women
in Latin America. By uniting them in this book, the aim is to provide a
meaningful contribution to a challenging and complex issue that demands
perspectives that highlight the particular needs, interests and experiences
of social subjects.
Ana Falú
June 2009
Gender-based Violence in the City
Violence and Discrimination in Cities
Ana Falú
I
ncreasing urban violence has become a central problem in cities as
it affects people’s quality of life on a daily basis, as well as their ability
to exercise their rights as citizens. Far from being a one-dimensional or
abstract subject, the concept of violence refers to a complex issue with multiple dimensions and analytical entry points. It is important to differentiate
between forms of violence that are actually experienced and those that are
feared without necessarily having occurred. When committed behind the
closed doors of the private sphere, violence is almost always inflicted upon
women. When violence is manifest in public space, it is generally masculine. Though violence in the streets primarily affects men, perceptions of
fear related to violence are greater among women.1
This focus on violence and discrimination against women in the public
spaces of cities reaffirms an idea that has been asserted in various articles
since the 1980s. Cities are not the same for women and men, especially
contemporary cities, which are ‘less embraceable, less decipherable, more
unknown and, hence, the source of fears and differences that seem to be
irreconcilable’ (Segovia 2007: 16).
Our objective is to investigate how these distinct forms of violence have
a differential impact on the lives of women in public spaces and how women succeed in taking ownership and use of the cities.
The starting point for this discussion is the supposition of a continuum
regarding the forms of violence inflicted upon women that take place in
Ana Falú is Professor and Researcher at the National University of Cordoba, Argentina.
Former Regional Director of the United Nations Fund for Women (UNIFEM) Offices of Andean Region and for Brazil and the Southern Cone (2002–2009). She is a research member
with the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) of Argentina; founder of CISCSA (Centre for Exchange and Services for the Southern Cone, Argentina), and cofounder and coordinator (1996–2002) of the Women and Habitat Network of Latin America.
1 Surveys conducted by the Women and Habitat Network of Latin America, within
the framework of the United Nations Trust Fund in Support of Actions to Eliminate Violence against Women, show that fear of violence is greater among women than men (CISCSA
2007).
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both the private and the public world — aggression, sexual harassment,
rape, murder, in the home, on the streets and on public transit. Although
not always reported or typified as crime or duly punished, these crimes are
proliferating. In this sense, violence that is individualised via the bodies of
women, the bodies we inhabit, becomes social and political. This makes
it possible to reveal and understand other types of discrimination, such
as those linked to sexual orientation, ethnic origin, age, social position or
place of residence, that mark the lives of people in cities. Urban space, be
it public or private, serves as the physical and cultural setting where these
forms of violence transpire, where they are lived and suffered.
Until very recently, the rationale for including women — their demands
and needs — in discussions on urban issues was questioned sceptically.
However, it would seem that there has been progress in reaching consensus regarding the inclusion of a gender perspective in urban planning,
both on the part of governments and civil society. The inclusion of this
perspective helps to illuminate the differences between being a man and
being a woman, distinctions present in social and cultural constructions
based on the way in which the behaviour and values infused by the differences between the sexes are defined.
As a result of cultural transformations and, above all, the actions of
women themselves in defence of their rights, today an analytical gender
perspective is also incorporated and employed in a cross-cutting way in
urban issues and planning. This is a substantial achievement considering
that this is a field whose so-called neutrality has only seemed to conceal
sexism and which has contributed to the creation of cities that are inhospitable to women. In this context women’s right to the city, a topic addressed
at various international conferences since the 1990s, refers to the right to
live in more equitable, democratic and inclusive cities. To move forward,
governments, both national and local, must make a greater commitment
to acknowledging and including the needs and experiences that are specific to women in the increasingly globalised cities. These are cities that
are ambiguous in their promises and present constant challenges that go
unmet, in which levels of wealth and sophistication coexist with the social
phenomena of segregation, drugs, violence and other scourges.
In this article, I propose to contribute to the position that cities are the
terrain on which citizenship is built and co-exercised. The central question
I use to guide this inquiry is how women live these new urban territorialities in comparison to men. This question is linked to another: how can
we move forward in public policies that engender cities and territories
and which are more inclusive and respectful of diversity? Before us lies a
difficult intersection of issues — complex in and of themselves and, at the
same time, difficult to correlate, but all significant to governmental and
societal agendas.
I will develop this text in three sections.
Ana Falú / Violence and Discrimination in Cities
In the first, I briefly review urban transformations within the context of
global processes. I seek to address those impacts that are most relevant on
the level of local territories and new problems emerging within the urban
agenda.
Next, I aim to tackle the question of violence as an emerging issue in cities, an issue of primary concern for policy-makers, academia, international
agencies of cooperation, city governments and civil society. I will make
reference to both the violence that is manifest and the fears that are felt, as
well as the differential impact on both men and women.
In the third section, I will use a critical perspective to briefly examine
some of the core, intersecting issues linked to violence and the stereotypes
that fuel it, which must be deconstructed. Finally, I will conclude by reviewing some of the determining factors that characterise approaches to
violence.
Experiencing and Conceptualising Cities vis-à-vis Global Processes
The year 2007 will be remembered as a turning point in the history of humanity. For the first time, the world population became definitively urban.
This is a reality recognised in the 2007 United Nations Population Fund
(UNFPA) Report, as well as the 2007 UN-Habitat Report on Habitable Cities. In the two hundred years from 1800 to 2000, the global level of urbanisation grew from 3 per cent to more than 50 per cent, representing more
than 3.2 billion people living in cities at the beginning of the twenty-first
century. As one of the most obvious results of this shift, cities grew, became
more complex and also became fragmented, an expression of the social and
economic segregation of urban territories. As indicated by Sassen (1999),
17 out of the 20 largest cities in the world are in developing countries. She
adds that this growth has been accompanied by an intensification of physical deterioration, particularly apparent in these and many other large cities
that fail to develop the technical capacities and infrastructure required to
support such growth. In sum, Sassen is highlighting the fact that increasing
suburbanisation and metropolitanisation, as well as the growing concentration of the poor, unemployed and homeless, are common to developing and developed countries. According to the Economic Commission for
Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the number of cities in Latin
America with more than one million inhabitants grew from 29 to 50 during
the last decade, an exponential increase.
There seems to be a consensus that one of the most significant consequences of globalisation and the structural adjustment policies implemented in the 1990s has been the transformation of cities, as well as the
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way of conceptualising them; more specifically, how they are planned and
managed. Beginning in that decade, Latin American cities underwent a
second period of modernisation distinct from that of the 1940s and 1950s,
which was characterised by import substitution and responded to the demands of industrial capital. This new incarnation answers to the pressures
and interests of financial capital, to large-scale real-estate investments, and
to a globalised economy grounded in multinational companies and banks
(Sassen 1999).
Over the course of the last decades, we have witnessed an increasing
transformation of the cities and spaces of our everyday lives as a result
of diverse economic, social, cultural and technological phenomena. Urban
society has become more complex and, in the process, it has modified social behaviour, the use of time, and forms of mobility and communication. The emphasis on competitiveness and the need to attract national
and international investment has placed great importance on the scale and
nature of urban agglomerations, on the availability of technical and social
infrastructure, and on urban governance.2
With the intensification of globalisation, the transformations in territorial structures have become more accentuated, not as independent phenomena, but rather, as part of a global process characterised by increasing
interdependencies and high social costs. Different types of social segregation become heightened and there do not appear to be signs indicating
that the globalisation processes taking place contribute to solutions. On
the contrary, they have amplified the segregation. Several authors, such
as Borja, Burgess, Castells, Harvey and Sassen, bring a critical perspective
to these issues, and are all in agreement that contemporary urban society
is confronting a process of spatial fragmentation that segregates distinct
social groups based on certain shared characteristics. This segregation is
exhibited not only by indicators related to income, occupation and wage
gaps,3 but also by the population’s actual access to what the city has to offer.
One result is a new model of spatiality, with peripheral areas where zones
of high commercial development coexist with stretches of backwardness
and poverty. This model of global cities reflects segregation on the basis of
class, socioeconomic level, gender, ethnicity and age. As argued by David
2 ‘Governance’ has been defined by the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements
(UNCHS) as ‘co-operation between government and non-government actors. Good governance means effective co-operation between these actors to bring about solutions that are in
the general interest and likely to receive wide support. Good governance thus entails inclusive decision-making processes’. United Nations Centre for Human Settlements, Women in
Urban Governance (Nairobi: UNCHS, 2000).
3 See Retratos de las desigualdades, elaborated by IPEA (Institute of Applied Economic
Research, Brazil), DFID (Department for International Development) and UNIFEM (United
Nations Development Fund for Women) for Brazil, which indicates that while a black woman
earns 276 reales, a white man earns 978 reales for the same job.
Harvey (2008), the ‘right to the city’ seems to turn into a chimera; not all
have the same symbolic and material resources to take ownership of the
city in the same way, nor to transform it according to their desires and interests. In particular, those groups living under conditions of greater social
vulnerability or in ‘marginal’ situations suffer and experience more severe
restrictions, both in urban peripheries and dilapidated downtown areas.
In Latin America, cities exhibit a tension between extreme forms of
backwardness and the modernity imposed by global society via the communication and technological revolution and the globalised market. There
is heated debate regarding what globalisation offers and who reaps the
benefits of macroeconomic policies based on neoliberal strategies and the
reconstruction of the state. Neoliberal policies imply significant transformations in development strategies, according to which cities are re-valued
as ‘motors of change’. Examples of these transformations are the ‘new centralities’ that are defined by urban concentrations of wealth. In contrast,
peripheral areas are characterised by the sprawl of impoverished territories, not just in the sense of economic poverty, i.e. income, but in terms of a
lack or precariousness of services, infrastructure, transportation and safety.
As a result of this segregation, the quality of urban life and the rights of
citizens are jeopardised to an ever-greater extent.
Francesc Muñoz (2008), a professor at the Autonomous University of
Barcelona, coined the term urbanalisation to describe the present urban
phenomenon. His argument is that the large cities of the world seem like
clones designed to respond to the demands of the financial and real estate
market instead of the needs of the population. One finds the same chains of
franchises and the same hustle and bustle during the day contrasted with
a nocturnal desertion that turns them into unpopulated territories without
life. They are cities that attract tourists while failing to include their own
citizens. There is nothing haphazard or coincidental regarding how the
‘urban productivity’ that is offered destroys local production networks unable to compete. Burgess (2008) asserts that the urban fragmentation existent in developing countries is directly linked to the enormous impact of
globalisation and neoliberal policies on an urban and social structure that
was already characterised by individualism and great inequality. Based
as they are on concepts that currently dictate mobility and land use, new
urban policies contribute to social polarisation, violence and inequality,
instead of to the consolidation of societies that are more just.
In a similar analysis, Cuenya (2000) argues that modernized sites connected to the globalisation process and its local base of support are expanding in Latin American cities. However, the numerous residential neighbourhoods of the middle and lower-middle classes that make up the bulk
of the city remain far-removed from the signs of revitalisation. Meanwhile,
areas of low-income settlements undergo a process of densification and
become more over-crowded given that they cannot expand since vacant
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land is often under dispute and usurped for more profitable uses. Furthermore, when these settlements are contained within areas that are destined
for new projects, their vulnerability increases faced with the onslaught of
global capitalist urbanisation.
As witnessed by positive trends in some socioeconomic indicators (increases in formal employment, sustained growth of the GDP, greater levels of education),4 the region is currently experiencing a critical moment.
Nevertheless, there are challenging phenomena to be confronted in these
fragmented urban agglomerations, such as escalating violence in cities. By
the 1990s, the region ranked in second place among the most violent places
in the world (Dammert 2004), with homicide rates that practically doubled
global averages. Recent studies contend that the region is currently the
most violent in the world in terms of urban crime (Briceño-León 2007).
This constitutes a profound transformation of daily life in Latin American
cities, a phenomenon that should be evaluated in conjunction with what
would appear to be the two greatest challenges for Latin America: surmounting social inequality and strengthening democracies. Achievements
and failures in either of these realms have a direct impact on women’s and
men’s quality of life, although in different ways.
First, the region boasts the highest levels of inequality and most severe
enclaves of poverty, giving rise to phenomena such as the ‘urbanisation of
poverty’ and, by extension, the ‘feminisation of poverty’. Despite significant strides forward in the twentieth century, in tandem with the progress
made is the reality that millions of Latin Americans, the majority of whom
are women, are unaware of their rights and do not duly demand their fulfilment. The exercise of citizens’ rights is still weak, partial and unequal
and coexists with multiple forms of exclusion.
Second, following long periods of dictatorships, a process of democratic
consolidation has been taking place in Latin America since the 1980s.
Nonetheless, fragile governance and low-intensity democracies persist.
Concerning women’s rights, advances have been achieved in terms of
their recognition and the creation of specific institutions to monitor their
enforcement, including affirmative action initiatives, legislation and equal
opportunity programmes. In general, though, these have been partial and
contradictory advancements, neither sufficiently legitimised nor prioritised, without sufficient resources, and with a nominal capacity to affect
the social, symbolic and cultural change required to make progress in
equal rights for women and men.
4 Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Panorama
Social 2007. In 2006, 36.5 per cent of the region’s population was living below the poverty
line (194 million people) and 13.4 per cent was living in a situation of extreme poverty or
destitution (71 million people). Based on the figures from 1990, in that time period poverty
decreased by 11.8 per cent and destitution by 9.1 per cent.
These challenges take shape in a region that is overwhelmingly urban,
with close to 80 per cent of the population living in complex urban agglomerations and the majority residing in the 50 cities or so that exceed one
million inhabitants,5 some of which are the most populous in the world.
This is the case of megalopolises such as the Federal District in Mexico and
Sao Paulo in Brazil; they are networked metropolises and cities, enormous
urban centres of promise. In these cities, territories that are increasingly
segregated and characterised by great inequality and major social calamities coexist with the most sophisticated forms of development, employment, educational and recreational opportunities; with political, social and
cultural life; and with the dream and the possibility of breaking the cycle
of poverty.
The Unequal City
The city is not the same place for men and women; they neither live, enjoy nor suffer it in the same ways. Violence in the private sphere inflicted
by the hands of those closest to us continues to be the form of violence
most frequently suffered by women, the form that limits and restricts their
rights. Yet, there is growing evidence related to a broader phenomenon:
violence inflicted upon women solely for being women. This is a clear instance of the domination of one sex over another, an expression of historically unequal relations of power of which women are the victims, as well
as others who are subjected to discrimination. Violence against women in
public spaces exhibits qualities that are similar to that which takes place
behind closed doors and which subjugates their bodies, forms of aggression that are perplexingly labelled as ‘crimes of passion’, that enjoy a high
degree of social tolerance and which manage to blame the victims.
These situations contrast with advances of the twentieth century that
have engendered a high recognition of social rights in general, and particularly the rights of women. This awareness has been fomented by the
conferences convened by the United Nations at the end of the twentieth
century, specifically, the World Conference on Human Rights (Vienna,
1993) and the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995).6 In the
5 Data from ECLAC. See http://www.eclac.org, Human Settlements.
6 See all of the Platforms for Action and commitments emerging from the United Nations Conferences, including the following: the UN Conference on Environment and Development (ECO-92 – Rio de Janeiro, 1992), the Second UN Conference on Human Settlements
(Habitat II – Istanbul, 1996), the Worldwide Declaration on Women in Local Government
(1998) of the International Union of Local Authorities (IULA), the Declaration of the Founding Congress of ‘United Cities and Local Governments’ (Paris, 2004), the International Charter for Women’s Right to the City, developed by the Women and Habitat Network of Latin
America, and other instruments such as the ‘European Charter for Women in the City’ (1995)
and the ‘Montreal Declaration on Women’s Safety’ (2002).
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last few decades, various international, regional and national agreements
have been reached, some of which have been binding, such as the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
against Women (CEDAW) in 1979, the subsequent victory represented by
the enactment of the Optional Protocol to CEDAW, and the Convention of
Belém do Pará.7
There have been advances on the acceptance of rights by a significant
proportion of society and, even more crucially, by governments, several of
which have formalised these commitments in public policies and governmental initiatives. However, despite these gains and the establishment of
the issue of gender-based violence as a public and political matter of concern, the exercise of power by one sex over the other persists in society. According to Jacqueline Pitanguy (2006), the assertion that ‘all human beings
are born free and equal in dignity and rights, as stated by the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, is recent and, sadly, still very modest. The majority of societies are structured based on first and second class
citizens’. In essence, what is recognised as violence and punishable crime
is influenced by factors tied to the social class, sex, sexual orientation, race
and the ethnicity of victims and perpetrators. At the same time, women’s
right to a life free from violence, one of the most legitimised issues on the
public agenda, has been inserted into society as a public and political topic.
This has made it possible to name the unnamed, to give visibility to what
was concealed, and, at the same time, to achieve recognition that violence
against women goes far beyond the private and domestic sphere.
Much progress has been made during the last decades. Preserving
these accomplishments is essential, as there are still immense challenges
and what has been won is always under threat. The eradication of violence
against women means joint action by distinct social actors, including organisations and individuals, women and men. It demands transformations
at the level of culture, the symbolic and the imaginary terrain on which the
subordination and devaluation of women has been realised.
7 The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
(CEDAW, 1979), ratified by the UN and considered to be binding, has been included in the
majority of the Constitutions of different countries. However, this very valuable instrument
does not explicitly address the issue of violence, given tensions that could not be resolved
between member states. Recently in 1992, the CEDAW Committee asserted in Recommendation no. 19 that violence is the greatest and most pernicious form of discrimination against
women. Belém do Pará (1994) is the Convention against Violence developed by the Organisation of American States (OAS) in the city of Belém do Pará, Brazil, after which it was named.
This Convention inspired the laws concerning violence against women in the 1990s in Latin
America. It is worth highlighting that even the strong human rights movement did not recognize violence against women as a problem, arguing that a focus on the issue would weaken
the movement. It was not until the Vienna Conference (1993), that women’s rights were recognised as indivisible human rights.
Gender in Public Space
Public space continues to be masculine. Historically, public spaces have
been off-limits to women and their ‘invasion’ of it has been the product
of their struggles. Their objective is to secure access to a space where they
can actively exercise their citizenship, a space of participation, a space for
the construction of subjects endowed with rights, not simply objects of
rights.8 Yet despite their triumphs, women in general blame themselves if
something happens to them in urban spaces. The internalisation of the cultural belief that public or urban space is masculine, and therefore barred
to women, contributes to their feelings of responsibility when they are victims of a crime in public places, for being out during times considered to
be socially inappropriate for women or for wearing ‘improper’ clothing.
Women’s fear of moving freely through the city produces a kind of estrangement with respect to the spaces they occupy, and to their use and
enjoyment of the city. In such circumstances, some women develop individual or collective strategies that enable them to overcome the obstacles
hindering them from using the city and participating in social, economic
and political life. In other cases, the result is a withdrawal from public
space, which is experienced as threatening, leading sometimes to the complete abandonment of public space and the subsequent impoverishment
on a personal and social level.
These fears, tied to historical and cultural constructions of ‘being women’, contribute to eroding women’s self-esteem and increasing their feelings of insecurity. At the same time, these fears function to intensify the
dependencies and weakening of citizenship, as they are also transferred to
familial, neighbourhood and social contexts. As such, they contribute, almost imperceptibly, to a circular process characterised by setbacks, by the
production and reproduction of old and new feminine subjectivities that
revolve around fear and women’s relationship with it.
Confronted with the increasing predominance of these phenomena, we
wonder how public spaces should be conceptualised. Are they considered
to be spaces of freedom that foster interactions between citizens, both individually and collectively? Or are they, as Foucault would say, spaces of
control? Habermas (1989) developed the category of the ‘public sphere’,9
applied to public spaces, as the realm for citizenship building. He referred
precisely to streets and squares as spaces of freedom and for exercising
citizenship. His perspective was not simplistic, rather, his vision of public
8 When older women in the city of Sao Paulo are asked whether they like to attend
shows, they answer that while they do like to watch dance performances, they much prefer
dancing themselves.
9 Understood as the realm in which the bourgeoisie of the seventeenth century negotiated with the state.
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spaces was based on the dream of modernity, that these were places of dialogue and democratic exchange, with all their tensions and confrontations.
This is a conception that he recognizes himself as one of the unfulfilled
promises of modernity.
From another, almost antithetical perspective, Foucault claims that
the ruling classes view public spaces as places where they can assert their
power. His analysis dates back to how the acropolis and agoras of the
Greek cities were perceived, defined as spaces only for citizens, as was the
case with the Roman Forum. He posits that these public spaces are conducive to the exercise of a ‘disciplinary power’ that, strategically, facilitates
the control of the population by the group in power.
Public space is produced socially, it is where relationships of a distinct
nature are expressed and fostered, including those of subordination, such
as gender. Although the emphasis is placed on women, in relation to different forms of discrimination, it would seem that the analytical category
of ‘gender’ makes visible not only those forms of discrimination against
women, but all of those that affect other groups and for other reasons.
We agree with Virginia Vargas regarding her assertion that ‘public spaces
not only contain and exhibit relations of domination between the gender
groups, but also, multiple social, economic, cultural and political dimensions’ that are in constant tension and conflict.
Other authors (Segovia and Dascal 2000) who deal with the issue of
public space from the perspective of insecurity and its social construction
do not necessarily focus on gender relations. Nevertheless, they do argue
that, in the context of the social construction of insecurity, the abandonment of public spaces and the retreat into ‘protected’ spaces ultimately
generate more insecurity. These are circular and cumulative processes that
are reproduced in the large cities of the region and the world. As a result, those places where a sense of collective belonging should be fostered,
spaces of social interaction, are lost. As insecurity increases, this ‘circular
and cumulative’ process of fear gains momentum in the case of women, as
well as for those groups that, given their circumstances, find themselves
in a situation of greater vulnerability: young people, homosexuals, AfroLatin Americans, indigenous people, among others.
What is worrisome is precisely the loss of value associated with socialisation and the exercise of citizenship. Particularly during certain times of
the day, public spaces — streets, squares, recreational places — lose the urban vitality capable of nourishing inter-relationships, socialisation, the social fabric and the exercise of citizenship. Together, these transformations
and the abandonment of the public spaces in cities affect women most of
all. They live with fear independent of their social condition or their residential circumstance because, for women, fear precedes or accompanies
violence. Even so, women go out to work, often having to navigate areas
that turn into real traps for their integrity, or are perceived as such.
Urban Violence and the Agendas on Citizenship
Increasing urban violence has become a central issue on agendas related
to citizenship. In relation to this tendency, Burgess (1998) asks whether
cities are intrinsically violent, that is, if violence is an inherent aspect of
urban culture and society. He responds by affirming that ‘violence occurs
at every spatial scale at which society is organised and in this sense urban
violence is a social problem with an urban expression’. Along the same
lines, Michel Misse (2002) argues that the use of the term ‘urban violence’
situates the issue of violence within the framework of sociological urban
analysis, thereby eliminating the central focus on criminality. Likewise,
Moser and Schrader (1998) argue that crime and violence are factors that
also affect physical, human, social and environmental capital and which
undermine the conditions for ‘urban productivity’. They emphasise the
macroeconomic impacts of violence, given that it erodes physical capital
and assets as well as human capital, ultimately constraining rights and access to what the city has to offer.
Today, this old phenomenon of violence in cities presents distinct traits,
as it is perceived as inevitable and, at the same time, experienced as an impediment to urban life. Insecurity changes people’s daily lives, it restricts
freedom and rights, and it exists in cities where public space is increasingly perceived as intimidating. What is puzzling and contradictory is that
among Latin American cities, those that are among the most visited in the
region given their extraordinary urban vitality, are simultaneously considered to be the most dangerous. A case in point is Rio de Janeiro, where
there certainly are frightening data — each day 25 people are murdered as
a result of increasing violence.
The figures on violence are noteworthy in our region, and increasingly
both violence and fear move more money, resources that are subtracted
from human development.10 Burgess (1998) quotes figures that show that
between 10 and 15 per cent of developing countries’ budgets were allocated to preventing and combating crime and violence.11
There is a perception of crime that has become ingrained as fear among
citizens. Susana Rotker (2000) speaks of ‘citizen fear’ or ‘citizenships of
fear’, perceptions of risk and threat that are aggravated in cities that are
10 According to Rojas (2008), the kidnapping ‘industry’ alone accounts for US $1.5
billion per year. Using the rate of kidnappings as an indicator, he asserts that Latin America
is the region with the highest levels, even without including the countries where there are
armed actors, where the rates climb substantially.
11 Buvinic (2008: 45) cites studies sponsored by the International Development Bank
(IDB) on the economic impact of urban violent crime in Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela. The final calculations of costs, expressed as a percentage of the Gross
Domestic Product of 1997, varied between a low of 5.1 per cent in Peru and a high of 24.9 per
cent in El Salvador, with an average of 14.2 per cent for the six countries.
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more and more segregated, with downtowns emptied of their inhabitants,
entire sectors pushed to metropolitan areas, and sprawling territories characterised by a lack of resources — deficiencies that coexist in the same
peripheral areas with housing complexes with controlled perimeters, an
array of services and private security systems.12 These phenomena, accompanied by new behaviour and forms of social interaction among the
population, could be summarised as a ‘reduction of citizenship’. In some
cases, they are met with militarisation or ‘policing’ in order to ‘look after’
specific sectors of cities, which in turn has an impact on people’s quality of
life, both that of ‘suspects’ and those who are ‘protected’.
There is growing concern regarding the difference between the violence
that is perpetrated and that which is perceived. Insecurity is included as a
key issue in demands related to citizenship, surpassed only by economic
and labour issues. Although insufficient and under-reported,13 the data
on violence against women illustrate how old phenomena emerge in new
guises. What are these forms of violence responding to? Are they new forms
of violence or do they indicate increased awareness and recognition of the
issue, and therefore, more reports filed? Are they the product of women’s
empowerment and decreased tolerance for gender-based violence? Or is a
patriarchal system under threat responding to a need to reassert its social
control? Or maybe they are a manifestation of the increasingly conspicuous inequalities of a world defined by neoliberal policies and the complex
phenomena of the contemporary moment?
Core Issues Related to Violence
Feminism has taught us that it is necessary to build objective and verifiable lines of argumentation in order to be able to deconstruct forms of discrimination that have been ‘naturalised’ in society and, at the same time, to
transform that place of ‘otherness’ to which science and philosophy have
relegated women, as well as other social subjects, for millennia.
12 Nowadays, ‘safety and security’ are privatized and move alarming amounts of money. ‘Safety and security’ operate as a business and, consequently, within the market logic that
predominates in the Latin American context, which is characterised, as already mentioned,
by low intensity democracies and high levels of corruption. Ultimately, this ‘business’ frequently breeds the violence that it purports to counter.
13 It is necessary to stress the lack of violence-related data that is disaggregated by sex.
The homicides of women are increasing by dramatic increments in many cities of the region.
Furthermore, these are murders that are committed solely based on gender, that is, they are
femicides. According to official data, in Pernambuco, located in Recife, Brazil, in January 2006
alone 40 women were murdered. Juarez, Mexico, has become a symbol of public violence
against women as a result of homicides that have yet to be clearly resolved. In 2004, the State
of Chihuahua, to which Juarez belongs, ranked sixth in the country in terms of homicides of
women and girls. See Lagarde (2008).
In relation to urban violence, the first stigmatisation to be discussed,
which constitutes a key analytical issue, is the link between poverty and
violence. Urban poverty is often identified as one of the principal causes of
violence. However, it is important to emphasise that numerous studies (for
instance, Carrión and Núñez 2006) demonstrate that there is not a clear
and direct correlation between these two phenomena. It should be noted,
for example, that when political violence, which should be considered separately, is not taken into account, the poorest countries in the region, such
as Haiti and Bolivia, do not have the highest levels of violence in their cities. Likewise, the evidence shows that crime is greater in capital cities or in
wealthier areas where there are more severe inequalities (Vanderschueren
and Lunecke 2004). As such, the link between urban violence and poverty
is one of the core issues that must be deconstructed. With this aim, we outline several arguments that challenge the stigmatisation of poverty.
If the percentage of the population living below the poverty line is analysed in comparison with the percentage of people involved in criminal
activity, the numbers speak for themselves. The majority of people living
in precarious situations are members of a working population who are trying relentlessly to put an end to the vicious circle of poverty. Vera Malaguti
(2005) is the author of a text on the fear of poor or impoverished classes,
which are associated with chaos and disorder. Using Rio de Janeiro as an
example, she argues that there is a strategy of control that has served to
‘naturalise’ authoritarian practices. She considers the city and analyses the
aesthetic consequences of these practices, which, according to Malaguti,
are manifest in hierarchical urban spaces and settings, that demarcate,
identify or create intangible and tangible borders for the ‘new strangers’,
those who cause disorder and destroy the ‘purity’ of the life of consumption (Bauman 2007 in Malaguti 2005: 54). What is noteworthy is that, at the
same time, these borders are even more marked for those populations with
minimal resources who fear areas of affluence in the cities — those same
people who are the suspicious ‘other’ in the eyes of the more prosperous.
Poor people also fear and mistrust institutions. The credibility of legal
institutions, transparency and justice is incredibly weak in Latin American
society. Brossard de Souza Pinto (2008), a Brazilian lawyer, claims that it is
possible that the period of authoritarian dictatorships had a series of consequences of which we are not yet fully aware. He stresses that of all the
evils of authoritarianism, none is worse than the destruction of the concept
of legality: ‘to fulfil the law has become something unimaginable’. In relation to the militarisation of safety and security, Brossard states that ‘there
is an old principle that maintains that the use of power is an invitation to
excess’. The issues of institutionality, legality, transparency or, conversely,
the fragility, weakness or lack of these elements is a key factor in the way
violence is perceived and suffered by society as a whole, particularly by
the groups that are the most discriminated against.
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Along the same lines, a second stigmatisation results in discrimination
against another ‘suspicious’ social subject — young people. To be a ‘bearer’
of youth is to cause mistrust, and when youth is combined with poverty,
residence in a ‘bad neighbourhood’, the colour of one’s skin (race or ethnicity) and one’s sexual orientation, the situation only gets worse. This is
not meant to deny the existence of gangs of young people in the big cities
of the region, formed primarily by young men who are involved in criminal activity, such as drug trafficking and robbery. However, what needs to
be explored in regards to these criminal gangs is whether they constitute a
response to a social problem or whether it is merely an issue of criminality.
Based on their experiences in the street and their neighbourhoods, from
a very young age these young men learn about social hierarchies and the
place designated to women’s bodies. Superimposed with spatial segregation is a sexual division — also hierarchical — that orders territories, defining which should be used by men and off-limits to women.
John Hagedorn (2006) is certainly correct in arguing that ‘the problem
of urban organised armed violence is here to stay, and it will only change
when the nihilism and marginalization that sprout in the backyards of globalization are addressed’. However, returning to the argument made by
Malaguti (2005), it is worth highlighting the assertion of Viva Rio, an NGO
that works in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro. They declare that youth who
were or continue to be involved in criminal activity associated with drugs
do not make up more than 2 per cent of the population. This figure is significant in that it supports the argument that it is social exclusion, inequality, impoverishment, discrimination and segregation that foster violence in
cities, and not poverty.
An issue that cannot go without mention, and one of the most problematic features of globalised cities, is the violence that is committed based
on xenophobia and racism. Without trying to address the complex issues
of multiculturalism and migration, it is interesting to note that a form of
urban segregation similar to that found in Latin American cities is also displayed in other more developed societies. Making reference to migration to
Spain, Rosa Cobo14 claims that ‘at dusk in the neighbourhoods of Lavapiés
in Madrid, or in Raval in Barcelona, those bars which are most frequented
by foreigners are almost completely filled with men, and migrant women
disappear from public spaces’. As Nancy Fraser discusses in Justice Interruptus (1997), this is a truly complex issue given that the commitment to
human rights and social equality seems to supersede that of cultural differences. We must deconstruct this concealment of discrimination and/or
violence, public or private, justified on the basis of ‘cultural values’ (Morey
14 Rosa Cobo is a Spanish researcher and professor. Text from Mundo Mujeres (Madrid,
July 2008).
2008), and contrasted with the universality of women’s human rights. The
same applies to any reduction of citizenship based on xenophobia, religion, sexual orientation or colour of skin.
Our aim is to stimulate debate on the issue of public space, ‘the public’
and ‘the private’ as political dimensions. We envision the city as a space to
be lived. Streets, squares, transit routes and gathering places are the setting
for recognition and exchange between citizens with diverse identities, and
between citizens and the state. According to this vision of the city, women
take ownership of their rights and take back the streets and the discourse
of recognition is extended to the rights of other excluded groups.
To reiterate the arguments of Lia Zanotta Machado,15 it is critical to emphasise that the majority of violence suffered by women continues to take
place behind closed doors. Furthermore, violence, both in the private and
public realms, is grounded in and defined by gender stereotypes and discrimination against women. To be a poor, young woman means a greater
risk of experiencing violence, be it private, public or institutional. As always, women’s bodies are at stake — a territory to be occupied, a bodilyterritory perceived as a commodity, as available. Also at risk are women’s
bodies as a political category, as that initial place where rights are exercised
and violence is resisted — the body as resistance. It is a private and unique
space, the first space that we can make our own in order to take ownership
of other territories: the house, the neighbourhood, the city, the country. The
bodies of women are sites for defending rights that are still limited and
where power is asserted and violence inflicted. To be able to appropriate
public spaces, we must take ownership of our bodies, bodies that, as Maffia explains, are both paid for and stripped of their value.16
Tamara Pitch (2008) suggests a provocative approach to empowering women in order to eliminate their vulnerability to violence, making
the links between autonomy and safety on one hand, and subordination
and vulnerability on the other, as well as raising awareness and moving
forward regarding the right to use and enjoy cities. She offers a positive
perspective on the development of the ability to take risks as a characteristic that makes women safer. Pitch states that resources, both material and
symbolic, are needed if these capacities are to be enhanced; ‘women do not
need the sterilisation of urban terrain, but rather, more social, economic
and cultural resources that enable them to brave the said environment
with confidence’.
15 See her article ‘Would Cities Be Safe for All without Violence against Women?’ in
this edited volume.
16 Diana Maffia is a philosopher and a Member of Parliament with the City Government of Buenos Aires. Text taken from the Seminar of the Architectural Association of Buenos
Aires. July 2008.
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Canadians from the Women’s Urban Safety Action Committee (CAFSU)
have outlined the consequences of a lack of safety for women, 17 indicating
the limitations they impose in terms of using and enjoying the city. Some
of the most significant are the following:
• Fear of circulating at any time of day.
• Restricted mobility.
• Obstacles to participation in social life: physical and recreational
•
•
•
•
activities, studies, work, social or political involvement.
Lack of self-confidence, lack of autonomy.
Perception of the outside world as dangerous (mistrust).
Isolation (particularly for older women).
Obstacles to fulfilling one’s full potential, as an individual and as a
member of the community (survival rather than fulfilment).
María Naredo (1998) argues that women put innumerable strategies of
self-protection into practice that severely limit their personal freedom and
autonomy. It is interesting to draw on Naredo’s observations regarding a
study on women and urban mobility carried out in London. One of the
conclusions was that 63 per cent of the women interviewed never went out
alone at night. This is a clear indication of the type of defensive attitude
adopted by women as a strategy of self-protection, which inevitably translates into limits to their autonomy and that can eventually be as victimising as the crime itself.
Determining Factors in Approaches to Urban Violence
There are several points of agreement among those working on these issues. Firstly, it is agreed that approaches to violence are frequently guilty
of superficiality. There is a lack of balance regarding what is reported as
violence, how it is reported and what is deemed to be of concern. In general, both victims and perpetrators are valued differently depending on
their origins, social class and position in society. A surprising aspect of responses to growing urban violence is that they tend to pay more attention
to goods and properties than to people. Private goods seem to be much more
protected than human lives.
In those societies where an escalating proportion of the population
is living below the poverty line, compassion does not appear to be what
motivates the preoccupations of those who have possessions, but rather a
17 Women’s Urban Safety Action Committee (CAFSU), Women’s Safety: From Dependence
to Autonomy. CAFSU’s Tool Kit, (Montreal, 2002). Available at http://www.femmesetvilles
.org/pdf-general/cafsu_fiches_en. pdf (accessed October 2009).
defensive attitude or fear linked to the devaluation of their properties or
goods. As a result, there are more and more barriers and more guarded
perimeters.18
At the same time, there is a greater trivialisation of violence. Scholars
dedicated to the issue, such as Briceño-León (2007), refer to actual threats
and imaginary fears. Although the violence in the region is based on concrete incidents, it is also based on an imaginary world transmitted by social actors and interpreted and reinterpreted by citizens. The media are
instrumental in perpetuating the perception of violence that emerges from
this imaginary world, in terms of what is communicated, how it is communicated, and the sensationalism of the message. Violence is simultaneously
depicted as a generalised imminent threat, bordering on a cause for panic,
and as a series of disconnected, exceptional events.
In this respect, the media exert a fundamental influence on the configuration of urban imaginaries by, as Silva (1992) demonstrates, treating crime
or violence against women as ‘crimes of passion’, or by producing analysis
that attributes blame to young people, criminalises poor people or assigns
responsibility to immigrants. Through predominantly true, but unique
stories, these same media disseminate a perception of situations with no
way out in which a clear tendency to negatively associate public space and
safety prevails. ‘Natural’ reactions to the increased fear caused by these
threats consist of not going out, not exposing oneself to danger, and taking
refuge in private places. The most common responses are a well-locked
car, a house behind bars, gated communities with surveillance and poor
suburbs located at a distance (Davis 2001, in Segovia 2007: 17).
By generating elitist, controlled and patrolled urban spaces, the above
pattern has had clear implications for citizens and also for cities. In many
cases, the result is a semi-abandoned city, with social sectors that have lost
their rights as citizens, thus becoming groups embroiled in tension, as well
as permanent and mutual mistrust. Rotker (2000) warns of the construction of a new social subject in Latin American cities, that of the ‘potential
victim’, who establishes links with his or her environs based on this negative potential, be it in a gated community, a shanty town, or a favela. The
common denominator is a sort of shared identity among the inhabitants of
the city — the possibility of being victimised.
Salmi (1998) points out that incidents of violence are rarely analysed
vis-à-vis the historical, social and economic context. Urban violence is examined as a phenomenon in and of itself, free of context, instead of according to a sequential, causal and reflexive logic. There is no analysis of
the violence in society that links neoliberal policies and the privatisation
18 San Salvador is a city enclosed by barriers of barbed wire or electric fences. In
Guatemala City, as soon as dusk falls there are no people out in the street; the city becomes
abandoned.
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of various services including those related to health, educational and recreational services with violence rooted in discrimination or that inherent
to social inequality. It seems necessary to pose questions that allow us to
move forward in making violence in general visible, and particularly those
forms experienced by women solely because they are women. Revealing
this gender-based violence also makes it possible to put the spotlight on
those people discriminated against based on their ethnicity, colour of skin,
or sexual orientation.
Finally, it is indispensable that approaches to violence avoid the trap
of representing the ‘protagonists’ of violence as pathological individuals,
insane or sick. This sort of explanation erroneously presents violence as an
irrational and individual reaction, instead of as a learned behaviour that
is reproduced with the exercise of power of one sex, class or race or ethnic
group over another.
The tendency to interpret violence as an individual flaw rather than
as a social construction for which governments and states are responsible
diminishes the possibility of confronting the problems and searching for
collective solutions. Instead, the forms of violence embedded in society are
made invisible.19
Conclusion
We reiterate that cities are not the same for men and women, and to that we
add that nor are they the same depending on one’s age, race, ethnicity and
sexual orientation. What is real and what is fiction regarding the construction of violence — the reasons for violence and the degree of safety in the
city — is intimately tied to cultural constructions, to the subjective realm of
these perceptions (Falú 1997). This is demonstrated by the limitations that
impede women from exercising their rights as citizens, constraints that are
constructed and accepted by the social collective.
It seems as though fear precedes the realization of violence. For this reason,
it is imperative to address these perceptions, these fears, and to empower
women by strengthening their rights and identities as citizens and committing to build consensus regarding the ‘right to a life free from violence’
in public and private spaces. In so doing, it becomes possible to cultivate
enjoyment of the city and the right to live in it.
In the process of developing proposals regarding a plan of action, it is
essential to become familiar with, share and transfer experiences. ‘Women
19 Marcela Lagarde demonstrates that feminicides in Mexico are dispersed throughout
the entire country, and that victims are of diverse ages and social classes. The pattern discovered was related to gender-based violence and not to mafias. Página 12, November 25, 2007,
‘El feminicidio, sus causas y significados’, an interview with Mariana Carvajal.
in Cities’ (WICI), a non-governmental organisation in Montreal, Canada,
with vast experience working on the issue of safe cities,20 phrase it thus: See
and be seen, hear and be heard. To this end, they propose strategies that involve the social collective with the goal of improving quality of life and institutional conditions. They highlight the importance of awareness building and strengthening democratic institutionality, particularly within legal
entities and security forces. They consistently advocate that these efforts
should be carried out within the framework of human rights and the law,
and they seek to rebuild and strengthen the social fabric and confidence
in the state. They attempt to contribute to better forms of citizenship and
shared existence in neighbourhoods by involving the social collective in all
of its diversity and reinforcing the ‘virtuous circle’ of duties and rights.
Faced with social anomie, the potential of social movements must be
leveraged, along with the efforts and social connections that, with an increasingly sophisticated political agenda, are succeeding in incorporating diversity. The agreements and agendas put forward by governments
are significant in this regard, particularly those of local governments. The
democratic dynamics that currently exist in Latin America are promising
with respect to advancing on the agenda of rights for a diverse social collective.
Virginia Vargas (2008) argues that the ability to articulate the agenda
of women’s rights with the urban agenda implies the connecting of three
dimensions: public space, citizen safety and gender. Vargas defines space
(public and private) as the ‘container’ of action, including that with a potential for effecting change, thereby making space a strategic setting for
transformative action. This is a quality that places it in a strategic position
with respect to action. Precisely for this reason, we need to create new and
more democratic conditions of life for all in these cities of the new millennium, which should be understood as spaces of political action, social life,
economic development and culture.
With the objective of rebuilding the social fabric, Durán and Hernández
Pezzi (1988) have put forth a powerful idea, that of the ‘shared city’: the
city in which we can, from our multiple identities, experience diversity
through respect for and interactions with Others. The idea of a shared city
opens up a political horizon that, without oversimplifying, implies proposals for an improved democratic coexistence. The materialisation and
future progress of these ideas within a democratic coexistence requires the
participation of varied social actors, governments, academia, civil society
organisations, feminist networks, and organised women.
As long as there is violence, there will not be democracy, and, as stated
by our Spanish colleagues, ‘there is no democracy without women’.
20 Visit their website at http://www.femmesetvilles.org.
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Current Debates on Safety:
A Women’s Human Rights Approach
Giulia Tamayo
‘When I use a word’, Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither
more nor less’.
‘The question is’, said Alice, ‘whether you can make
words mean so many different things’.
‘The question is’, said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be
master — that’s all’.
Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass
T
o put limits on power and expand our liberties are constant objectives
in the on-going struggle for human rights by global social movements
such as feminism. During the last five decades, several events and debates
have led from the organised expressions of the so-called ‘second-wave
feminism’1 to current manifestations of feminism in all of its diversity. As
a result, new axes have been developed for interrogating, imagining, and
transforming our realities. All over the world, old queries are reformulated
to confront new realities. At the same time, the pertinence of past perspectives is examined in light of their capacity to interpret what has stayed the
same in the midst of changes. It often seems like the velocity of the changes
occurring quickly renders any new debate ephemeral, while the continuity
and instability of changes have contributed to a certain amount of weariness among society.
In recent times, the issue of safety on a global and a local level has
inspired both written reflections and actions by feminists and the wom-
Giulia Tamayo, a human rights lawyer, is responsible for the area of campaigns and research with the Spanish office of Amnesty International. She is a member of, and researcher with, the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defence of Women’s Rights
(CLADEM), and is associated with The Flora Tristán Centre for Peruvian Women, Lima,
Peru.
1
The second feminist wave took place during the 1960s.
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en’s movement. In turn, these discourses and initiatives have led, with
varying degrees of success, to proposals and demands targeted at decision
making centres in a world where dominant power structures have hardly acknowledged these voices or permitted their participation in matters
of these centres’ concern. Although today there is certainly more official
rhetoric regarding both women’s safety and their human rights, practical
results show a stubborn reality that falls way behind formal pledges and
declarations. Even when cloaked in institutionality, and supported by an
internationally constructed regime of human rights, many concepts and
proposals remain extremely limited in their real capacity to guide and influence governmental actions. Indeed, they have even less weight in the
process of defining and designing long-term policies. Governments are
still not held accountable regarding their role as guarantors of women’s
human rights and, therefore, for impacts and results attained or the lack
thereof. Likewise, there is still a failure to treat the development of policies
for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, using all
available means, as a governmental obligation that must not be delayed.
This paper aims to review contemporary debates related to women’s
safety and human rights. Insofar as is possible, the goal is to dissipate both
the fatigue and the vertigo that have dogged efforts related to these issues.
Also, the aim is to encourage researchers to continue documenting the
constantly shifting ground of how and why certain trajectories are chosen,
changes occurring along the way, the costs incurred, challenges, failures,
promising leads that are lost, and also the gateways discovered. These reflections have no claim other than being a tool for a critical examination
of those public policies in Latin America currently treated as discourses,
measures and practices for ‘producing security’. They constitute analyses
of the ways these policies interrelate, how they interpret and influence inequalities and hierarchies based on gender and how they evaluate the state
of women’s human rights in the Latin American region. In dealing with
these matters, I deliberately chose not to restrict my reflections to policies
on gender-based violence or public safety that have incorporated instruments and measures demonstrating a gender perspective. Rather, I will
focus on the interdependence between human rights and safety as a dimension constructed via multiple social policies,2 and not as the outcome
of a specific sectoral policy where administrations draw up programmes
regarding women’s safety.
In keeping with the same, I do not intend to examine particular meas-
2 I use the term ‘policies’ to signify governmental policies. Notwithstanding, also relevant are policies of an intergovernmental, global or regional nature that interact with state
policies on national and local levels. Furthermore, the influence of policies implemented by
other actors, such as economic ones, on decisions, resources and results must also be taken
into account.
Giulia Tamayo / Current Debates on Safety: A Women’s Human Rights Approach
ures and programmes developed in Latin America that could be branded as women’s safety policies. Rather, the starting point for the critical
overview that I am proposing is the observation that these programmes
and measures have been assigned a marginal position, a condition that
has favoured their vulnerability and susceptibility to being discontinued.
Meanwhile, women’s human rights have been greatly affected by a body
of policies that, together, have undermined every attempt to build a form
of safety that is meaningful from a perspective of human rights and gender
equity.
In spite of the efforts and best practices initiated by women’s organisations and some institutional allies, their achievements have tended to fade
over time. The reality is that they have been unable to satisfy criteria corresponding to the recognition of women’s human rights and ineffective in
their attempts to dismantle the realities that create social inequality and a
lack of safety and to overcome the failures in protecting women’s human
rights. This may explain the meagre results demonstrated by indicators
related to the reduction of gender-based violence,3 as well as those related
to the fulfilment of women’s human rights.4
Keys to Identifying Debates on Safety
The debates on safety have multiplied since the ‘global movement for
women’s human rights’5 formed and, subsequently, emerged into political
3 It must be noted that, regarding concrete results, the elimination of gender-based
violence, or even its substantial reduction, represent enormous challenges requiring significant and long-lasting efforts by governments. This is because of how deeply entrenched both
gender-based violence and the historically unequal power relations between men and women underlying it are. Nevertheless, this is not meant to ignore the evolution of some data,
where available, regarding certain patterns of gender-based violence and the emergence of
new ones.
4 I am using the categories of indicators appearing in ‘Promotion and Protection
of all Human Rights, Civil, Political, Economic, Social and Cultural, including the Right to
Development’. Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and
consequences, Yakin Ertürk. Indicators on violence against women and State response. A/
HRC/7/6, 29 January 2008. Published by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner
for Human Rights, Human Rights Council. This report is part of the process of formulating
indicators to measure the compliance of human rights international instruments, which has
led to the development of several reports, such as, the ‘Report on indicators for monitoring
compliance with international human rights instruments’, UN Document HRI/MC/2006/7,
11 May 2006.
5 I take the concept of the ‘global movement for women’s human rights’ from The Global Women’s Rights Movement, by Wendy Harcourt (2006). In turn, she is making reference to
the definition articulated by Peggy Antrobus, according to which this movement is ‘formed
out of many movements shaped in local struggles and brought together in the context of global opportunities and challenges (…) as women discover commonalities and come to a better
understanding of how the social relations of gender are implicated in the systemic crisis…’
(Antrobus 2004: 1–2).
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public space where this global movement has deployed various forms of
strategic action over states in articulation with other movements.
In part, current debates on safety have been shaped by internal polemics in the field of feminist theory and politics and their consequences in
terms of how women’s’ citizenship and struggles are perceived. Yet debates on safety have also emerged out of dialogues and interactions with
other movements, and their experiences of advocacy in the public and institutional realms. These experiences have extended not only to state and
local levels, but also to intergovernmental institutions, including those of
the international community existing on global or regional levels.
The first key to identifying existing debates on safety from a vantage
point of women’s human rights is connected to what has been categorized
as ‘body politics’, a term with its origins in feminist thought and action.
Originally, it was a concept that revolved around violence against women,
decisions regarding sexuality and reproduction, and the health of the feminine population. However, more than just identifying these issues, it challenged the traditional notion that they belonged in the private sphere, and
were to be regulated by the ‘naturalisation’ of inequality. As a result of this
shift, the feminine subject was incorporated into the realm of human rights,
and dimensions of human dignity hitherto unacknowledged were brought
to the forefront, lending momentum to a dynamic process dedicated to
human rights and the recognition of all people, in all of their diversity,
as subjects entitled to rights. Beyond offering support to those suffering
inequalities on personal and interpersonal levels, this process extended to
the terrain of the international responsibilities of governments. As such, it
became fertile ground for political dispute given that it was considered by
certain states as a threat to cultural identities, to religions having influence
over states and/or to the very sovereignty of states themselves.
New tasks were defined and made explicit within the framework of
governments’ responsibilities regarding respect for, and protection and
enforcement of human rights. For example, a key focus was those obligations aimed at enabling the exercise of internationally recognised rights by
means of proactive measures and positive actions. This covered not only
relations between men and women in areas such as family and community, but went further to include people’s relations with government and
limits to governmental power. As a result, new channels for submitting
complaints and confronting government were established regarding matters of policy, legislation, decisions, and practices that, directly or indirectly, and with the tolerance or acquiescence of governments, amounted to
classic violations of human rights. Peremptory norms of international law
(jus cogens) that had not previously been considered in relation to the protection of women’s human rights were enforced, including prohibitions on
discrimination, torture and slavery. Likewise, issues related to gender were
identified as key to understanding international rights crimes, domestic
and international armed conflicts and global and/or regional security.
The international character of the women’s movement achieved via local micro-strategies has undoubtedly led to enriched agendas, but they
have certainly not been free from conflict. Through the connection of, and
dialogue between, different situations and experiences, new discourses
have sprouted and spread. The United Nation Conferences have constituted favourable grounds for articulating and disseminating the demands
and proposals of women’s movements, but they have also become the
source of specific rules, language, and determining factors flowing back
towards the organisations.6
Starting with the United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development (Rio de Janeiro, 1992), known as the Earth Summit, a new
course was outlined based on the input of diverse feminist voices and other
women’s movements. The purpose of this new trajectory was to achieve
a holistic understanding of existing problems and of the means necessary
for tackling the adversities caused by policies that have led the planet to
a critical state and have also taken advantage of existing inequalities with
the effect of exacerbating them. Body politics opened up new fields related
to issues such as population, poverty, militarisation, peace. The consequences have often been controversial, but also the source of new alliances.
This was the beginning of links between several social movements, such
as those engaged in issues related to environmental justice. The impacts of
the form of globalisation imposed by the power centres of late capitalism
are undeniable. However, at the same time, a new social movement known
as the Social Justice Movement has emerged, which resonates particularly
among new generations of activists.
For a long time, especially in Northern countries, there has been a tendency to exaggerate the polemic between the case for equality or difference in feminist debates.7 Often, this has concealed the advances made in
terms of practical challenges and action, which is probably the best field
to measure how the global movement for women’s human rights has integrated or contested current discussions on safety.
My interest lies in observing the trajectory of a social movement that
6 Diverse authors have analysed the influence of United Nation Conferences on women’s movements. See Arvonne Fraser and Irene Tinker, eds., Developing Power: How Women
Transformed International Development (New York: The Feminist Press, 2004), quoted by Wendy
Harcourt (2006). Harcourt examines the validity of some of the doubts and, conversely, celebrations related to those experiences. These conferences have been widely studied in Latin
America and the Caribbean in terms of their impacts on women’s lives and on the feminist
movement, including the internal conflicts within the latter.
7 Although the polemics that I am referencing comprise a wider spectrum than I am
presenting here, debates held in Latin America — in all of their variations and modulations — have also echoed the tension between the so called ‘feminism of equality’ (tout court
feminism, according to Celia Amorós) and the self-designated ‘feminism of difference’. See
Amorós (2005).
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has incorporated into its agenda increasingly complex issues regarding
the arrangement of the public and the private realms. More specifically, I
intend to explore this movement vis-à-vis its assertions and criticisms, in
essence, how it has intervened and participated in the process of defining
and developing policies related to ‘human security’, ‘public safety, ‘citizen
safety, ‘global safety’, among other terms coined nowadays to refer to old
problems that demonstrate new components and complexities. The point
is to situate feminist debates in their appropriate contexts, to acknowledge
their impacts, their legacies, and their outcomes. The reality is that one
cannot disregard the fact that policies for inclusion based on an abstract
conceptualisation of equality have remained rooted in formal normative
concepts, often impeding any emancipatory potential. On the other hand,
by espousing notions characterised by essentialism and speculation, explanatory models based on totalising theories regarding ‘the feminine’
and ‘the masculine’ have ignored the internal differences that exist within
these identity-based groups. Furthermore, these explanatory models perpetuate assessments that are a priori negative regarding certain feminine
experiences of resistance towards dictates imposed by tradition or, likewise, by late modernity. The more mechanistic and reductionist that these
approaches are, the more they have intensified tensions within women’s
movements. Moreover, this has had consequences on the vitality of precisely those global, regional and local mobilisations that enabled diverse
groups to join forces and successfully question the long tradition according
to which women’s human rights were unrecognised by the international
community and governments.
Indeed, reality has gone beyond and almost exhausted this controversy,
spawning more complex approaches and practices capable of recognising
women’s experiences of oppression and resistance.8 An approach to gender inequalities and hierarchies based on intersectionality is slowly being
incorporated into both analyses and actions. In conjunction with this approach, there are new demands regarding governmental policies, both local and national, as well as intergovernmental policies of different scope.
In terms of human rights, the implementation of an approach based on
intersectionality has triggered the integration of new contents and criteria
into the process of formulating and assessing the measures that governments need to introduce, and according to which their performance can be
evaluated. When a government enforces measures that increase the vulnerability of certain communities, thereby overexposing them to a lack of
safety and risk, or when it fails to develop measures to eliminate forms
of institutionally-induced vulnerability, 9 that government is guilty of per8 See Creanshaw (1994), among others.
9 As an example, in Spain, advances made in the data available on homicides against
women by their partners or former partners show significantly differential rates that could be
petuating discrimination and aggravating disadvantages. By making these
forms of discrimination visible, much concrete ground is won in terms of
the universality of rights, i.e. the goal of ‘all human rights for all’. Moreover, the intersectionality approach has brought into relief the capacity of
actors to develop agency even when they are in the most disadvantaged of
positions, enabling them to exercise citizenship in a world that segregates
them and makes their experiences invisible. As more attention is paid to
these experiences, the criteria developed as recommendations to states become better, thus creating a heritage, a wellspring of ‘best practices’.10
In short, the objective is to observe the ideas and trajectories informing
the mobilisations and interventions that affect our reality, so as to rethink
the paths being followed and to integrate new discoveries with lessons
already learned.
The notion of persons as subjects capable of observation who produce
both reality and meaning, who are capable of agency within their environments and who are not just inert objects of policies and interventions, is
being embodied by women’s movements in an agenda aimed at procuring
citizenship. Aware of developments that have nullified people’s right to
participate in decision making processes, reducing participation to mere
formal procedures without any base in concrete dimensions key to equality and human rights, several authors have argued for the need to ‘politicise democracy’. Concurrently, renewed attention has been directed at
the links between economy and politics, finally questioning the hegemonic
ideology of the last three decades regarding the alleged autonomy of the
economic sphere.
Norbert Lechner pointed out that, in times of uncertainty, practice precedes theory. For generations of women in Latin America and other regions
of the world who have experienced spaces of tradition and social insertion
as sites where their rights are restricted, the ability to act has offered not
safety, but often extreme uncertainty and hostility. The politicisation of the
adversity faced by women set in motion practices aimed at the fulfilment
of rights, encompassing issues that had not previously been associated
with self-determination, human dignity or solidarities. Along these lines,
recognition of the diversity that characterises the women’s movement has
been the strength behind mobilisations, as well as being the source of a
theoretical and political contribution to action. In Latin America, the no-
a sign of inequalities in safety and protection attributable to a woman’s status as a foreigner
or an immigrant. In spite of this, no measures have been taken, despite declarations regarding the principles of equality and non-discrimination included in the Organic Law 1/2004, of
Measures of Integral Protection against Gender Violence (Spain).
10 Regarding good practices, see Good Practices in Legislation on Violence against
Women. Expert group meeting organized by United Nations Division for the Advancement
of Women, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, United Nations Office at Vienna,
Austria, 26 to 28 May 2008.
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tion of citizenship based on diversity enjoys increasing acceptance, with an
emphasis on actors’ capacity for agency, emancipation, and the universality of human rights as a framework for denunciations, as well as demands
and proposals. Nonetheless, this route demands new skills, above all an
enormous ability to listen to others and to connect in networks, where all
of us play a role in overcoming the zero-sum game produced by absolute
certainties.
Trends in the Field of Human Rights and Safety:
A Bleak Decade for Women
During the World Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna (1993), as
well as during subsequent conferences in the 1990s, the global women’s
movement developed a comprehensive agenda addressing the different
spheres where inequalities between men and women took place. In addition to being a key issue in mobilisations for the recognition of women’s
human rights, gender-based violence was recognised both conceptually
and politically as an expression of the inequalities between men and women. The architecture of inequality and its impact on the totality of human
rights — including economic, social and cultural rights — were always the
target of Latin American women’s movements. The eradication of inequalities took on a new meaning as a human right that could be demanded;
thus, the commitment of governments and the international community
had to surpass mere promises. According to the consolidation of the regime of international law, governments were to be considered guarantors
of human rights, and as such, charged with responsibilities for which they
could be held accountable.
Nonetheless, during the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing)
in 1995, women’s movements were already warning of a reality that would
be confirmed a decade later, i.e. the intensification of global tendencies
that were already undermining governments’ capacities as guarantors of
human rights. Paradoxically, we women were arriving too late in the sense
that governments were already unable to guarantee our rights, and at the
same time, we were too early to exercise and enjoy those rights in a world
organised around the promised advantages and benefits of the market.
Economic agents configured a normative reality based on the tendencies
and powers of the global hegemony through the creation of ‘no-law’ zones
and via their influence over national and local political elites, encouraging them to assign privileges to the detriment of any activity aimed at redistribution or correcting inequalities. In a flurry, political administrations
began to shrink the role and reach of government, trimming social investments and restructuring institutions that previously had a key role in the
prevention of abuses and the protection of fundamental rights. The way
forward was liberty and security, but for capital, not people. The semantic
appropriation of these concepts by the market as a means to reflect its interests signalled a reality that saw people’s rights emptied of their content.
As a result, rights became mere normative formalities, and governments
lost all capacity formerly assigned to them to regulate, promote, protect
and enforce human rights.
As far as women’s human rights are concerned, many Latin American
governments gave almost no sign of compliance with international commitments. Instead, they gravitated towards domestic or family violence,
failing to comply with international standards and often putting forth
programmes and actions supported entirely by international cooperation,
without committing any state financing. In the narrow opening granted
to women’s rights in the legislative and judicial fields, it was argued that
some demands were in conflict with already existing rights — thus ignoring that the only real conflict was precisely the one that the institution of
human rights rejected: that old dispute between privileges and rights. Far
from advancing coherent government policies, a process characterised by
equal parts progress and setbacks was unleashed, sometimes as the result
of changes of administrations but often within the same government. This
same tendency took hold in sectoral policies on health, as well as policies
and mechanisms related to equality. By 2000, only five years after Beijing
Declaration and Platform for Action, Latin American women’s movements
already sensed that there was no reason to think that policies fomenting
exclusion could be counteracted by inclusive policies aimed at reducing
the risks, damages and disadvantages produced by established policies.
Additionally, at the beginning of the new millennium, in the name of
safety and security many governments began to level the regime of international law designed to protect human rights. The use of force at the expense of human rights delivered societies back to a vision of a world where
there were no limits to power, where international law could be violated
with premeditation and without any consequences. Simultaneously, fundamentalisms of every ilk thrived, whether based on religion, an ideology
or the market. In this context, once again women and their bodies — as
markers of identity — would become objects of regulation, appropriation,
consumption or punishment, and, ultimately, of the forms of violence deployed in the framework of power differentials that are at once tolerated
and uncontrolled.
The real face of the new global order is visible in the migratory movements from South to North — from Latin American, African or Asian regions — as well as within/between regions, whether triggered by armed
conflicts or by the aggravation of the already unbearable conditions of life
created by economic re-engineering on a global level, or environmental
displacement. Women migrants confront all forms of pre-existing inequali-
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ties, including contemporary forms of slavery, the only difference being
that they exist in intensified forms. The businesses of war, arms, drug trafficking, prostitution, and human trafficking have prospered in these times
that have seen the word ‘security’ repeatedly invoked, to an unprecedented extent, with wanton disregard for human rights. Women’s involvement
in criminal activities, also driven by gender inequalities, has overexposed
them to state repression. Meanwhile, those who control organised crime
have witnessed their enterprises and influence flourish in large territories
where women have become marked targets not only for criminal violence,
but also for abuse inflicted solely because they are women. As a result of
their failure to exercise due diligence11 in their prevention and investigation of the crimes, to prosecute and punish offenders, and to adequately redress victims, i.e. their general inaction and negligence regarding their obligations, governments end up contributing to violence in its most extreme
forms, such as murders of women, labelled in Latin America as ‘femicides’
or ‘feminicides’.12
In Latin America, women have increasingly become targets of violence
inflicted by authorities and security forces in response to their legitimate
activities in defence of their rights or those of their communities. Sexual
violence has been used to repress protests and social conflicts, as a tolerated conduct and even as a deliberate strategy exercised by security forces,
or by armed groups in places that are the setting for internal conflicts. The
11 The concept of ‘due diligence’ is of paramount importance in the definition of states’
international responsibility and in the field or women’s human rights. When a state does not
exercise due diligence in the investigation and prosecution of crimes that violate internationally recognised rights, it is an infringement of international responsibility, given a lack of
compliance with the duty to protect human rights. The ruling of the International Court of
Human Rights in the Velásquez Rodríguez case set a precedent regarding the understanding
of states’ obligations to exercise due diligence.
12 I am using these categories in accordance with their strict definition, i.e. the murder of women for the sole reason of being women, a meaning recently incorporated by the
United Nations in its documents. Although this paper does not intend to participate in the
controversy incited by the term feminicide in our region, it is advantageous to note the technical and legal consequences of changing the scope of the concept. The effective use of the term
demands more rigorous attention to the framework of human rights as a means to avoid
divisive conflicts and sterile debates. Indeed, the connection to the concept of ‘genocide’ communicates the idea that the murder of women is not contingent upon victims’ individual
characteristics, but rather, their membership in a particular group — in this case, their gender.
However, in the context of criminal law, the element of mens rea must exist, defined as the
intention to exterminate, destroy and eliminate said group, whether partially or totally. This
adds the burden of demonstrating mens rea — the intention to commit this crime — in the
judicial process to establish the criminal responsibility of individual actors. While the acquiescence of a government to certain patterns of violence certainly has consequences regarding
international law, it should not be confused with the criminal responsibility of individuals,
in which case the criminal definition must clearly describe the criminal act (actus reus). If we
wish to win the battle against impunity, we must be very careful in these matters. Political
battles are most effective when they are based on a careful assessment of the practical tools
available. This is what I was alluding to when I mentioned the need to introduce new abilities
and a fine-tuned capacity to listen.
existence of these forms of violence has defined the region as a dangerous
place for women based solely on their condition as women, while institutional and de facto privileges granting impunity persist.
Notwithstanding these realities, the efforts of governments and the
international community remain limited to words and always postponed
promises, and the international commitments of the 1990s have been forsaken, as expressed in the Millennium Development Goals. Even as daily
tragedies continue to proliferate, the media selectively directs public attention elsewhere. The limited access of a handful of women to power structures is met with bells and whistles, while women with less social power
face increased disadvantages and risks.
Undoubtedly, this was not the scenario imagined by the women’s
movement in the 1990s when it mobilised in pursuit of women’s human
rights. The process of global re-engineering unleashed in the 1980s and
crystallised with the beginning of the new millennium has blocked possibilities for progress.
Modernity and the Geography of Inequality and Fear:
The Creation of Unsafe Cities
For the subject of modernity, loyal to an ethos of domination over nature,
cities constituted a space of protection and reduced risks in contrast with the
world external to urbanised territories, which represented a lack of safety
and a place outside of the constructed, normative order. Today, however,
this image of chaos formerly used to define nature has been transferred to
cities. Once associated with the dream of reason, these have now become
their inhabitants’ nightmare. With the emergence of new individual and
community identities at different levels, notions of ‘the inside’ and ‘the
outside’ have changed. As a result, perceptions of the Other as menacing
are increasingly more complex. At the same time, social movements make
new demands regarding the creation of a type of citizenship capable of
managing a common project, ensuring human rights for all people, and
creating meaningful experiences of safety in the presence of fear and the
constant barrage of concrete threats.
The kind of development inherent to modernity and the resulting dynamics in terms of social production and reproduction have created local scenarios linked to a global topos, with definite consequences for both
perspectives on safety and the mobilisations meant to ensure it. As a result, contemporary societies demonstrate substantial changes in matters
of safety, which in turn determine perceptions of risk directly linked to the
threatening conditions produced in our environment precisely as a result
of those very changes. Among the transformations emerging from these
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dynamics, there is the perception of the Other as the source of the risks
generated by violence, misery and suffering, as well as the displacement
of fear from the sites where it was previously located.
At the beginning of the 1990s, I was involved in carrying out a research
project in a low-income neighbourhood in Lima, Peru (Tamayo and García
Ríos 1990) and some of my observations related to that project are relevant
to the current discussion. In my interviews with them, men and women
from two different sectors of the city associated their neighbourhoods
with safety, while associating the neighbourhood of the Other with danger. People from each sector used their perceptions of fear to narrate their
experiences. I described the city I lived in as a territory that suffered its
realities. Indeed, people had become easy prey for discourses capable of
quelling their feelings of insecurity and their concerns about the possibility of being the next victim. The image I was left with was one of space as
dictator, imposing restrictions, confinement and bars, and people trapped
by fears spanning from their bedrooms to public spaces.
One of the most significant authors to theorise on the society of risk in
the context of the transformations of developed modernity is Ulrick Beck.
He wrote that
[r]isks experienced presume a normative horizon of lost security and broken
trust. Hence, even where they approach us silently, clad in numbers
and formulas, risks remain fundamentally localized, mathematical
condensations of wounded images of a life worth living. (…) Behind all
the objectifications, sooner or later the question of acceptance arises and
with it anew the old question: how do we want to live? (Beck 1999: 28)
What is the Meaning of Safety? The Challenges of Making Women’s Human Rights a Reality
In contemporary times, ‘safety’ and ‘security’ have become polysemic
concepts, similar to terms such as ‘governability’ or ‘governance’.13 The
13 The term governability was used for the first time in 1975 in the report The Crisis
of Democracy. Report on the Governability of Democracies to the Trilateral Commission, by Michel
Crozier, Samuel P. Huntington, and Joji Watanuki (New York: New York University Press,
1975), as a conceptualisation that responded to social demands. The thesis that served as a
foundation was based on the idea that social expectations and demands have increased significantly, while the capacity and resources of government to address them have diminished.
Unfulfilled expectations were interpreted as a factor contributing to conflict, and it was also
asserted that citizens’ participation in political life and increased state responsibilities aggravated the deficiencies of democracies, rather than making them more governable. In light
of these beliefs, the suggestion was to redirect the participation of citizens and to contain it
within more controllable limits, to ‘technify’ the administration of society and entrust it to
strategic actors (businesses, professional associations, stakeholders/interest groups) operat-
term ‘governability’ was coined and put into circulation three decades
ago, when different social movements were emerging and gaining visibility and impact, among them, organised groupings of women from South
and North. Armed with this term, it was possible to put forth the idea of
a crisis impacting the authority of democratic systems and the stability of
systems of production, the underlying message being that states might be
overpowered by social demands. As such, it was predicted that specifically
the recognition of citizens’ rights and the expansion of citizenship would
generate conflicts and threats to democracies. Thus, the answer was to protect democracies from their own ‘excesses’. To guarantee governability, the
proposal was to ‘de-politicise’ social issues so as to ‘unburden’ the state.
In concrete terms, this translated into transferring the responsibility to organise, manage and fulfil social needs from the government to the market,
thus sanctioning the separation of politics and the economy. These are the
conservative interests and criteria that have taken hold during the last decades, informing the reconfiguration of the world order and introducing
elements that have impeded the recognition and actual exercise of rights,
as well as the possibilities for substantive advocacy in political decisions.
Before the end of the century, the very executives in control of the process of global economic restructuring introduced expressions such as ‘responsible globality’, the motto of the Davos World Economic Forum held
in1999. In effect, world economic leaders acknowledged the lack of control
and the irresponsibility affecting the processes of globalisation. The World
Social Forum that took place for the first time in 2005 in Porto Alegre, Bra-
ing within institutional frameworks that served as the backdrop for their interactions, their
agreements and conflict resolution. For the authors of the Trilateral Commission Report, governability included not only the capacity to govern the state apparatus, but also a country’s
status as governable. On the other hand, the term ‘governance’ appeared in 1985 when J. R.
Hollingsworth and L. N. Lindberg published the article ‘The Governance of the American
Economy: The Role of Markets, Clans, Hierarchies, and Associative Behaviour’, in Private
Interest Governments: Beyond Market and State, edited by Wolfgang Streeck and Philippe Schmitter (London and Beverly Hills: Sage, 1985). As a contribution to the political debates of the
1990s, along with J.C.L. Campbell, the same authors published The Governance of the American
Economy (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991), a work considered
to be a basic reference in the field. Both concepts, ‘governability’ and ‘governance’, were
widely promoted by international financial institutions such as the International Monetary
Fund, the World Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank. Among the documents
published, most important was Governance and Development (1992) by the World Bank, whose
premises were developed in the early 1990s. In the academic sphere, these concepts were
pivotal in shaping in the direction of the discipline of political science. During the decade of
the 1990s, the concepts of governance and governability became so widely used that adjectives were being added to them to create new terms such as ‘good governance’, ‘accountable
governance’, ‘democratic governability’ and ‘democratic governance’. During that decade,
diverse World Conferences coincided with the end of the Cold War, including the Earth Summit (Rio de Janeiro, 1992), the World Conference on Human Rights (Vienna, 1993), the World
Summit for Social Development (Copenhagen, 1995), and the Fourth World Conference on
Women (Beijing, 1995). The concept of ‘good governance’ also appears in the United Nations
Millennium Declaration and the Millennium Development Goals (2000).
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zil, was a direct response to the Davos Forum. Its mandate was to support
pro-democratic planetary institutions capable of managing global public
goods and avoiding their destruction by short-term interests.
The term ‘governability’ has passed through various stages and served
many different purposes since it was originally conceptualised until
present day. By means of a practical example, the ‘problems of governability’ that were first attributed to southern states have more recently
been designated to states defined as ‘failed states’. The word ‘security’ has
undergone a similar process. The conceptual lineage of certain terms is
often overlooked, as are problems related to their meaning. We cannot disregard the fact that, in recent years, the term ‘security’ has been used by
certain interests to further a sort of substitute for human rights, and not to
ensure that they are respected, protected and enforced. Pressure groups
have made use of the concept in order to cultivate a state of insecurity in
people and, to a significant extent, as a means to guide constituencies into
supporting authoritarian projects and security-based approaches, even
in allegedly democratic states. Indeed, the term ‘security’ has proven invaluable in cases when the goal was to stigmatise groups that, even in
a peaceful manner, dissent or imagine alternative worlds. This includes
groups, such as indigenous nations, who demand accountability from institutional bodies, defend human rights or seek to protect their communities and territories from the greed of economic agents. The mantra of safety
has fragmented us, made us more vulnerable and converted us into mere
spectators of political decisions that affect our lives. It has not been used
to communicate a vision, but to make other ways of thinking impossible.
Paradoxically, in the name of security, some societies have even reached
the point of considering it desirable to renounce fundamental rights and
liberties. At the same time, the popularisation of the term ‘safety’ has had a
negative effect on citizenship, promoting the surveillance of one another as
a civic virtue. Furthermore, its high profile in the media has meant that it
circulates without being subject to reflection or criticism. As is well known
in relation to advertising,
the point is to create a slogan that will receive no opposition; to the
contrary, one that everyone supports. No one knows what it means,
because it has no meaning, and its crucial importance lies in the fact that
it takes people’s mind off questions that do have meaning. (Chomsky and
Ramonet 2001: 20)
In spite of all the obstacles delineated thus far, in every region of the
world, on local, global or ‘glocal’ scales, women have not ceased to organise, nor do they appear willing to retract their demands in exchange for a
token form of citizenship. Against adverse conditions, they find ways to
express themselves and new opportunities for growth. They connect with
one another in networks and explore new strategies to build democratic
environments where it is possible to transform their human rights into a
reality.
References
Amorós, Celia. 2005. La gran diferencia y sus pequeñas consecuencias… para las
luchas de las mujeres. Colección Feminismos. Madrid: Ediciones
��
Cátedra/Universitat de València/Instituto de la Mujer.
Antrobus, Peggy. 2004. The Global Women’s Movement. London: Zed
Books.
Beck, Ulrich. 1999. World Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. Malden,
MA: Polity Press.
Chomsky, Noam, and Ignacio Ramonet. 2001. Cómo nos venden la moto. Barcelona: Icaria Editorial.
Crenshaw, Kimberlé. 1994. Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color. In The Public Nature of Private Violence, eds. M. Fineman, and R. Mykitiuc, 93–118. New
York: Routledge.
Crozier, Michel, Samuel P. Huntington, and Joji Watanuki. 1975. The Crisis
of Democracy. Report on the Governability of Democracies to the Trilateral
Commission. New York: New York University Press.
Díaz-Guijarro Hayes, Jean, and Giulia Tamayo. 2006. Palabras fallidas: justicia de género y ciudadanía en los nudos de la gobernanza, Presentation in First International Congress on Human Development, Madrid
2006. http:// www.reduniversitaria.es/ficheros/Giulia%20Tamayo.pdf.
Harcourt, Wendy. 2006. The Global Women’s Rights Movement. Power Politics around the United Nations and the World Social Forum. Civil Society
and Social Movements Programme Paper no. 25. Geneva, Switzerland:
United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD).
Tamayo, Giulia, and José María García Ríos. 1990. Mujer y varón. Vida cotidiana, violencia y justicia. Lima: Raíces y Alas/Tarea.
Vargas, Virginia. 2005. Feminisms and the World Social Forum: Space for
dialogue and confrontation. Development 48(2): 107–110.
53
Gender-based Violence: Clues for Analysis
Virginia Vargas
M
y approach to gender-based violence consists of some reflections
intended to be political‑theoretical clues for its analysis. The starting
point will be a brief overview of some of the distinctive traits of this type
of violence and the social and cultural dimensions to which it is connected.
Along this line, I will explore political and epistemological perspectives,
the spatial and temporal manifestations of violence, its subjective components, and its place as a matter of interest to women.
Firstly, one of the most relevant aspects to take into consideration is the
need to situate violence against women as an issue integral to democratic
agendas and projects. Obviously, confronting the same entails innumerable
changes that are state´s responsibilities, although not exclusively: they also
belong to civil society and social movements. In this sense, it is fundamental to focus on violence against women from a standpoint of democratic
dispute, of criticism regarding the present reality, of a praxis that questions
the existing social and sexual relations. Analyses grounded in this perspective show dynamic and complex relationships between gender-based violence, public space, and the security and peaceful coexistence of citizens,
thereby offering the political and epistemological foundations to build a
discourse in which each of these factors is highlighted and interrelated.
From an epistemological point of view, one of the main characteristics
of this triad — gender-based violence, public space, and the security and
peaceful coexistence of citizens — is that while knowledge exists related
to gender issues, to the different manifestations of violence, and to cities
and urban matters, no framework has been developed to link these three
dimensions. The only available descriptions derive from social actors’ con-
Virginia Vargas is a sociologist also specialised in Political Science. She is a founding
member of The Flora Tristan Centre for Peruvian Women, Lima, Peru, and a representative
of the Marcosur Feminist Network to the International Board of the World Social Forum. She
coordinated Latin American and Caribbean organisations in the NGOs Forum that took place
during the IV World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995).
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crete experiences, their perceptions and fears, all of which are fundamentally subjective. This quality calls for the development of objective standards to identify both the emotional components of those descriptions and
the realities outside of them.
The above leads us to acknowledge the importance of approaching the
phenomena of gender-based violence and the interrelations it subsumes
not from a single theoretical paradigm or one discipline exclusively. It is
crucial to re-establish an interdisciplinary perspective and, furthermore, to
recapture the notion of gender-based violence not only as an expression of
that power which arises directly from the core of gender relations, of relations between men and women, but also, as an expression of a multiple
power that has its roots in different social spaces, those of the public sphere
and daily life.
Another aspect that needs to be highlighted in an analysis of violence,
as obvious as it may appear, is that it happens in space, and that, to a great
extent, it depends on the spaces where it takes place and the relationships
among the different spaces where it occurs. According to this view, space,
both public and private, is the container of action — but a container not
only of violent actions, but also of those whose aim is the broadening of
rights and the transformation of gender roles as a starting point for overcoming violence. In this sense, public space, intertwined with private
space, figures as the scenario for social networks, for the social fabric, for
resistance and initiatives, all of which are conditions fundamental to the
very existence of citizenship. When we re-establish democracy as our political framework, it is essential to do so using the perspective of social
actors who build their rights as citizens. We usually ascribe this process to
public space, but the building of citizenship must not be dissociated from
private space; we must proceed by identifying the possibilities, limits and
contradictions of private space, as well as how it interacts or fails to interact with public space.
On the other hand, the phenomena we are examining are not only spatial; rather, they also occur in time. The space-time relation appears to be
fundamental, both in the sense that it is a constitutive facet of reality and
its dynamism, and that it opens up a wide range of very special signifiers,
such as the relationship between geography and history, as established by
the feminist geographer Doreen Massey. In this relationship between geography, history and spaces, the central idea is that places are filled with
history. Indeed, social phenomena do not take place outside of space, time,
or gender relations. Multiple factors are at play, refuting the abstractness
and immobility of space or a linear progression of time. From this perspective, in the same measure that we incorporate the different dimensions already mentioned into our analysis, geographic space becomes the
space of biographies. Moreover, in the space of biographies, bodies — particularly women’s bodies — act as vessels of biographies. Indeed, bodies
Virginia Vargas / Gender-based Violence: Clues for Analysis
have memory, and store the memories of times and spaces of violences
present and past. This is the reason for the vicarious fear women feel regarding things they have not experienced personally, but know that have
happened and are happening to many others, such as being physically or
sexually assaulted in public spaces.
From this point of view, and in the words of Betania Ávila, bodies are
fields endowed with citizenship. The body takes action, resists, and is the
internal location of transformations related to age, suffering, resistance.
Therefore, it is not an abstract entity.
Space must be recovered in all of its complexity. Wendy Harcourt and
Arturo Escobar specify the different scales of space that must be considered: the body itself, which is present in all of the other scales; the home;
the neighbourhood/city, and public space. All of this brings into relief the
multiple uses and meanings of space. For instance, homes are the ambivalent space of love and violence on a daily basis; neighbourhoods/cities
seem to be a sort of refuge that mediates the pressures coming from the
private and public realms and, at the same time, they are not safe places.
This challenges the dichotomy of public space as the sphere for growth,
and private space as the setting for violence and subordination, demonstrating a much more complex relationship between them.
However, space cannot be defined only as a refuge or as a site for violence. It can also be an opening for exceptionality, for transgression and
risk, for countercultural political strategies, for street marches, graffiti, and
multiple other forms of protest. This opportunity for risk and conflict is
essential to the construction of the public realm, of an inclusive and democratic sphere that promotes active citizenship. The problem is not that certain spaces are the sites of conflict or carry risks. In contrast, the issue is
how to intervene in this conflict.
Another aspect of gender-based violence that needs to be highlighted
as central to the analysis is subjectivity. The fact is that violence against
women is underestimated, devalued, made invisible both for society and
for women themselves. It is necessary to treat fear as an analytical category
and subjectivity as a fundamental piece of information in that process, as
is being done in the Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women,
Safe Cities for All’. The problem for women is not so much a lack of rights,
although it is true that they are not sufficient and tend to exist as formalities. Instead, the main obstacle is women’s difficulty in perceiving themselves as deserving of those rights, something that affects the development
of citizenship. In spite of the formal existence of a framework of rights, on
a subjective level women do not see themselves as full owners of the same.
A meaningful intervention would be to guide a change in citizen’s unformulated conceptions towards an awareness of being worthy of rights.
However, the process of altering subjectivities confronts serious obstacles
in the case of women, because it does not depend solely on their will. It
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is also related to all of the barriers they must overcome in order to exercise autonomy in the different spheres and levels where their lives unfold.
Such is the case, for instance, regarding women who have suffered violence and manage to enter a women’s shelter. There they might remain
for a couple of months, but then, due to their lack of paid employment
and a subsequent lack of economic autonomy, they are forced to return to
the circle of violence and the subsequent weakening of their physical and
sexual autonomy. Indeed, this also affects their political autonomy, as it is
not nourished by socio-cultural autonomy. The socio-cultural dimension,
which is fundamental, does not relate solely to citizen’s safety, but to a
context that actively recognises human rights. The democratic organisation of community life, a recognition of citizens’ rights and duties based
on diversity, and the existence of a secular state and culture — these are
some of the dimensions with the greatest potential to impact and broaden
women’s socio-cultural autonomy.
A last dimension important to consider is that of women’s interests.
When we refer to the processes that characterise violence, to the relation
between cities and women’s safety and autonomy, what are the interests of
women that we are talking about? We are singling out those that augment
women’s room for manoeuvre and freedom of action, those that strengthen their physical, political, economical and socio-cultural autonomy. These
interests have not always been considered in relation to violence. There
is no doubt that women’s struggles have led to the establishment of laws
against violence in all Latin American countries. However, the results are
still uncertain and, even worse, do not reflect the magnitude of the drama
affecting women. Furthermore, these laws seem to be based on the idea of
women as victims, and not on their capacity as subjects whose rights have
been violated.
This victimisation of women is, perhaps, one of the factors that best explains why it has been easier to enact laws concerning violence (even if
they are not enforced), than laws regarding sexual and reproductive rights,
in particular, those ensuring access to legal abortion services. The latter
identify women not as victims, but as transgressors proactively trying to
exercise new rights. Conversely, the subject of violence has also given birth
to a highly demobilising discourse. Paraphrasing Nancy Fraser and Linda
Gordon, when citizenship is devalued — in this case, women’s citizenship
— rights are not treated as an inherent obligation of democracy, but as
tokens of governments’ good will, graciously bestowed upon women as a
form of palliative charity. This is the most dangerous trap arising from the
tendency to victimise women, because it extends beyond the limitations
of legal or police institutions in their ability to conceive of women as subjects of rights. That is, the victimisation of women leads to viewing them
as guilty: women who walk in the streets are simultaneously victims and
blameworthy — for wearing short skirts, for being ignorant or rebellious,
Virginia Vargas / Gender-based Violence: Clues for Analysis
and so on. In this manner, the victimisation of and designation of culpability to women end up severing violence against women from the social and
cultural context that allows it and, at the same time, deprive women of the
rights they are entitled to.
This schema offers clues worth following. It is widely accepted that prevention is fundamental in matters related to gender-based violence. Yet, it
would seem that a change of discourse is needed to redirect the emphasis
placed on police procedures, legal definitions, more severe sentences, and
reparations, which has had the effect of limiting the effectiveness of social
policies intended to prevent violence. Its goal has been to persuade men
not to assault, kill or rape women based on the fear of punishment, instead
of giving women the elements that would enable them to strip men of their
power to commit these crimes. It is crucial to put forward both a short and
long-term perspective that aims to empower women, spanning an awareness of their rights in their daily lives and the implementation of policies
that foster and protect those rights.
In conclusion, I have no definitive and straightforward proposals regarding such complex matters, but instead, some questions. How do we
recognise and assess the clues that emerge from experiences of struggle
against violence carried out in specific contexts, such as cities? And how
can we begin to replicate some of these strategies?
When dealing with the issue of violence, many different analytical dimensions are necessary, some of which have been mentioned above. However, there are always new dimensions to consider, new questions to ask.
For instance, in what way can spatial design serve as a mechanism of control and social exclusion for women and for men and for different social
classes? How are the dynamics of social exclusion intensified for women at
certain times of day and in certain places? These considerations are highly
relevant for city planners.
It is also necessary to highlight other forms of non-visible violence. A
case in hand is one that was addressed at the last meeting of the Popular Education Network of Women (Red de Educación Popular entre Mujeres, REPEM), where a young feminist from Patagonia, a member of a
group constituted by lesbians called Desert Fugitives, spoke of their battles
against sexist and homophobic violence to gain visibility. With that purpose, they hold protests and use symbolic strategies such as appropriating
language. As an example, the term ‘marimacho’ (butch), which is tremendously pejorative in Spanish, is infused with a different meaning, that of
being transgressive.
Much remains to be said. Other areas that demand attention include
studies on masculinity and the practice of new masculinities regarding
violence, as well as an intercultural perspective. The latter takes on special
meaning in cities given the mega phenomenon of migration. The realities
related to migration demonstrate that women cannot be analysed as a ho-
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mogeneous group, just as cities cannot be discussed solely from a local/
territorial point of view. We live in a globalised world, and we must embrace a cosmopolitan view. A change of imagination is much needed. We
must shift our gaze from the nation‑state to the global, where the local is
a central nucleus (every global phenomenon is local at some point in the
planet, says Boaventura de Sousa Santos), but a nucleus that in itself, by
itself, without connections, leaves much outside and is incapable of accounting for the complexity of life in our cities.
The Responsibility of Local Government in the
Prevention of Violence against Women in Cities
Susana Chiarotti
… sometimes different cities follow one another on the same
site and under the same name, born and dying without knowing one another, without communicating among themselves.
Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities
T
he initiative ‘Cities without Violence against Women, Cities Safe
for All’, spearheaded by the United Nations Development Fund for
Women (UNIFEM) and implemented by several organisations from different countries, offers the opportunity to consider citizen safety through
a new lens. This broader and more in-depth perspective illuminates issues
that, until recently, had remained invisible. When we, as state or non-governmental organisations, design interventions in cities, it may be tempting
to base our ideas on a vision of the ideal city, and ignore that there are
always other cities that coexist with this ideal — hidden cities overlapping
in multiple layers. If our proposals do not recognise this complexity, they
will remain incomplete, simplistic and incapable of adequately addressing
many-sided and multidimensional problems.
Violence against women is but one of the threads of a complex social
fabric that is not self-evident to the naked eye. In spite of the continuous ef-
Susana Chiarotti is a lawyer who specialises in Family Law (National University of
Rosario, Argentina). She is the Regional Coordinator of the Latin American and Caribbean
Committee for the Defence of Women’s Rights (CLADEM) and Director of the Institute for
Gender, Law and Development, (INSGENAR) in Rosario, Argentina. Chiarotti is the author
of numerous articles and publications on human rights and women’s rights and is in charge
of the Seminar ‘Gender and Legislation’ in the MA programme ‘Power and Society from the
perspective of gender’ at National University of Rosario. She is also a consultant with the
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Division for the
Advancement of Women (DAW). She worked in Bolivia with the Permanent Assembly for
Human Rights, as well as with indigenous communities and has participated in the creation
of numerous organisations dedicated to women’s rights and human rights.
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forts of many social actors, it is still difficult to make gender-based violence
visible, to quantify and confront it in its real dimensions, and to include it
in the debates on citizen safety. Strategies designed to prevent this particular form of violence, and to provide assistance to the women impacted by
it, often treat it as an isolated problem affecting one group or sector of the
population. They seldom take into account the fact that violence against
women can influence the lives of more than half of the inhabitants of a
given area. In addition, frequently it is only one facet of violence against
women that is addressed — family violence — while the rest of its many
manifestations are neglected.
Violence against Women as a Violation of Human Rights
The recognition of violence against women as a violation of human rights
was the result of many years of work by numerous social actors involved
in advocacy efforts in multiple spaces, but particularly in those related to
international bodies such as the United Nations and the Organisation of
American States (OAS).
When the text of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) was being drafted, the issue of violence against women had still not been inserted in public agendas. For that
reason, it does not appear in the text approved by the United Nations General Assembly in 1979. However, in 1992, several years after its ratification,
the members of the Expert Committee monitoring the Convention realised
that it was necessary to add a text that would elucidate the profound links
between violence against women and gender-based discrimination. In response, they drafted General Recommendation no. 19,1 which states that
‘gender-based violence is a form of discrimination that seriously inhibits
women’s ability to enjoy rights and freedoms on a basis of equality with
men’. Accordingly, and to comply with article 1 of the Convention (which
defines discrimination), it follows that governments must eliminate not
only the causes of discrimination against women, but also, its most painful
symptom — violence.
On June 25, 1993, the United Nations World Conference on Human
Rights adopted the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, which
states that ‘the human rights of women and of the girl-child are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of universal human rights (…). Gender-
1 United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women
(CEDAW), CEDAW General Recommendations Nos. 19 and 20, adopted at the Eleventh Session,
1992 (contained in Document A/47/38), 1992, A/47/38.
Susana Chiarotti / The Responsibility of Local Government in the Prevention of Violence...
based violence and all forms of sexual harassment and exploitation (…)
are incompatible with the dignity and worth of the human person, and
must be eliminated’ (Part I, art. 18).
A conceptual revolution regarding human rights took place in Vienna.
For the first time, something occurring in the private sphere was considered to be the responsibility of governments. The implications of this shift
were highly significant; it was accepted that human rights must be upheld in both the public and private spheres and, likewise, can be violated
in both. Governments are accountable for forms of violence exercised by
public officials, as well as those exerted by individuals, in the case that
they have not been prevented, punished or eradicated by the government.
This means that governments can be held responsible for actions or omissions, for perpetrating or tolerating gender-based violence.
Given the pervasiveness of violence against women, in August 2005
the Secretary-General of the United Nations requested an in-depth study
on its causes and consequences. The results were published by the UN in
2006, in a report entitled Ending Violence against Women: From Words to Action. Study of the Secretary-General. This text treats violence against women
as a form of discrimination and a violation of human rights. Hence, the
three concepts become definitively intertwined and connected. The Study
served as the foundation for a world campaign for the prevention and
eradication of violence against women launched in December 2007 by the
United Nations General Assembly.
At the same time, the Inter-American System was developing initiatives aimed at establishing an international treaty concerning genderbased violence. In June 1994, the General Assembly of the Organisation of
American States released the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women, also known
as the Convention of Belém do Pará, named after the Brazilian city where
it was approved. The Convention was the culmination of five years work
undertaken by the Inter-American Commission for Women, the organisation that had promoted the initiative and brought together a group of experts to debate the issues and produce a draft proposal of the Convention.
This version was reviewed and vetted by a wide range of organisations,
including women’s groups, which subsequently provided their opinions
and comments. Intensive negotiations took place in the Foreign Offices of
different countries and finally, in 1994, the only convention dealing specifically with violence against women was signed. In fact, neither in the
international system (United Nations), nor in other regional systems of human rights (Africa and Europe), is there an agreement that approaches this
subject matter so directly and completely. Moreover, it is the most ratified
treaty in the Inter-American system.
The Convention of Belém do Pará stresses that the unequal conditions
faced by women are characterised by discrimination and violence. In its
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Preamble, it defines the following principles:
• Violence against women constitutes a violation of their human
rights and fundamental freedoms.
• It impairs or nullifies the observance, enjoyment and exercise of
such rights and freedoms.
• It is a manifestation of the historically unequal power relations between women and men.
The Convention defines a new human right, ‘the right to be free from
violence in both the public and private spheres’ (art. 3), thereby stating in
precise language a notion that previously had to be inferred from different
articles present in a variety of treaties and declarations on human rights.
The Convention defines violence against women as ‘any act or conduct,
based on gender, which causes death or physical, sexual or psychological
harm or suffering to women, whether in the public or the private sphere’
(art. 1).
The fact that the definition includes both violent acts and conducts is
crucial, particularly in Latin America, where judges frequently determine
that there is no violence unless there is violent conduct, i.e., acts repeated
on a regular basis. When this is the predominant rationale, serious incidents that take place only once go unpunished, even though they result in
the death of many women.
According to the Convention of Belém do Pará, violence can take place
within the family unit, the community, and the State. This means that there
are three spheres that should be under protection. It is important to highlight this clarification given that, in many countries, there is only legislation related to violence against women in the domestic sphere, meaning
that the other two are left unprotected.
According to articles 7 and 8 of the Convention, the duties of governments are multiple. They are responsible for implementing the necessary legal reforms in addition to ensuring the education and training of
all those involved in the administration of justice. These include police
and other law enforcement officers, as well as personnel responsible for
implementing policies for the prevention, punishment and eradication of
violence against women. Governments are charged with developing mass
campaigns on the subject, establishing legal recourse for women who have
been subjected to violence, and creating the necessary legal and administrative mechanisms to ensure that women subjected to violence have access to restitution, reparations or other just and effective remedies. States
Parties also agree ‘to modify social and cultural patterns of conduct of men
and women, including the development of formal and informal educational programs appropriate to every level of the educational process, to
counteract prejudices, customs and all other practices which are based on
the idea of the inferiority or superiority of either of the sexes or on the
stereotyped roles for men and women which legitimize or exacerbate violence against women’ (art. 8, par. b).
Hemispheric Report on Violence against Women
On October 26, 2004, the Mechanism to Follow-up on the Implementation
of the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and
Eradication of Violence against Women, ‘Convention of Belém do Pará’
(MESECVI) was created. This Mechanism was constituted by two entities,
one of which was a Committee of Experts on Violence (CEVI) in charge of
elaborating national reports based on a questionnaire sent to governments
regarding the application of the Convention. In order to produce these
national reports, the experts considered not only official, governmental
answers, but also counter-reports from women’s and human rights organisations, shadow reports presented to other international organisations,
and supplementary documentation. Finally, from the sum of national reports emerged a Hemispheric Report, which was approved by the experts
during the third meeting of the CEVI, held in Buenos Aires, Argentina,
July 18–20, 2007.
The Hemispheric Report was reviewed during the Conference of States
Parties held from July 9 to 10, 2008 in Caracas, Venezuela, where it was
also approved and then published. The Report is based on the experts’
evaluation of the answers to a questionnaire provided by twenty-eight
governments of the region, and contains information presented until July
2007. This round of evaluation includes a year of follow-up to observe the
compliance of States Parties regarding their commitments to implement
the measures included in each chapter of the questionnaire.
The Hemispheric Report warns of four problem areas common to the
twenty-eight countries forming the Committee: a) legal frameworks, legislation, national plans; b) access to justice; c) budgets; d) statistics.
Why were these issues chosen?
Legal Frameworks
Legal frameworks were chosen as a problem area because the mandate to
treat violence against women as a violation of human rights has not yet
translated into national legal standards in all Latin American countries to
an adequate extent. Many of the laws passed in our countries were drafted
between 1989 and 1996. Some of them were approved before ratification of
the Convention, and accordingly, their focus is far more limited.
Although most countries have laws on domestic violence, in a large
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number of cases the focus is on protecting families, not on guaranteeing
women’s rights, and their language is neutral. All family members are protected from violence exercised by any other relative. However, despite the
fact that it is predominantly women who turn to this law, the protection
they receive is partial. By way of illustration, very few countries punish
rape within marriage. In most cases, sexual violence by intimate partners
finds no answer from justice, unless the couple has already initiated the legal process of divorce or separation, and even then, it is not easy to ensure
that it is taken into consideration.
Laws on family violence are necessary and important, but they are
not sufficient to fulfil the mandates of the Convention. They should be
taken to deeper levels and implemented correctly. Yet even when this is
accomplished, the government still has the obligation to legislate clearly
and unambiguously on the matter of violence against women in the family sphere.
The analysis of legal frameworks and the obligations that countries
have to implement them draws attention to a very serious problem. That
is, only one of the spheres where violence takes place, the domestic one, is
taken into account — and still only partially. More than twenty years after
the Convention was ratified, just a few countries have a legal framework
that addresses violence in all of the spheres where it occurs: the family
sphere, the community sphere, and the state sphere. Most countries have
laws against domestic violence, but women have no legal recourse related
to gender-based violence that arises in the community and state spheres.
However, the onus that the Convention of Belém do Pará places on
governments goes beyond demands for adequate legislation. The Convention also demands that governments take all necessary measures for
implementing the public policies, programmes and services required to
extend the benefits of protection granted by law into people’s daily lives.
Otherwise, we remain on the level of symbolic declarations, with no concrete advantages to citizens.
Laws must be accompanied by national plans focused on the implementation of the social measures necessary for the actual enforcement of
laws, rather than on mere declarations regarding the need to eradicate
violence. The Experts Committee emphasises this need, given that it has
been observed that many countries have approved laws regarding violence without plans related to their enforcement. A qualitative jump is
needed to progress from formal declarations that violence is a violation of
human rights to the development of tools for its prevention, punishment,
and eradication.
Access to Justice
The second issue discussed by the Hemispheric Report is access to justice,
given that this is a concern shared by thousands of women throughout the
region who must navigate justice systems that do not adequately respond
to gender-based violence. It was observed that courts do not often take
action when these types of crimes are reported, or they perpetuate stereotypes during judicial proceedings that result in the impunity of perpetrators, particularly in cases of sexual violence. Our judicial systems must treat
international treaties as obligatory for the three branches of government:
the Executive Branch, the Legislative Branch and the Judicial Branch. Furthermore, these branches must also be responsible for the implementation
and enforcement of these treatises. However, judges who cite international
treaties in their legal decisions are few and far between. The Convention of
Belém do Pará has not been recognised by, or incorporated in judicial systems; thus, this is a challenge that is still outstanding. The problem is even
more serious with respect to federal governments, since there are not homogeneous regulations that apply to entire national territories. As a result,
women in different provinces or states face unequal conditions concerning
the law and justice systems.
According to the Hemispheric Report, issues related to access to justice
have received less attention from governments despite their importance.
The information provided by different governments is not detailed, but
rather, very general and sometimes vague or confusing and in no case is
it explicitly stated whether there is effective access to justice for women
suffering violence.
The Committee also makes the following observation regarding a tendency of many countries:
Also, the CEVI notices that in several questions within this section, certain
topics emerge, such as conciliation or mediation between the victim and
her aggressor as part of the services provided for women who experience
violence. (…) It is of grave concern to the CEVI that these methods
continue to be used, as they cannot be applied to cases of violence in
which fundamental rights have been violated and there is no possibility
of negotiation. For that reason, the Committee strongly emphasizes not
offering mediation or reconciliation mechanisms before the legal process
occurs, whether or not such a process is established, nor in any stage of the
legal and support process for women victims of violence. (CIM 2009: 36)
Budgets
With relation to the issue of budgets, the Committee concluded that the
formal commitment of governments should translate into specific and
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genuine budget items to ensure adequate implementation of national
plans and guarantee the sustainability of the process to eradicate violence.
This is not a matter of wealth or poverty; it is about priorities. When a
problem is considered to be important, it is treated accordingly in budgets.
One of the obstacles to securing adequate budget items is an underlying
philosophical stance that defines women as a group or sector, and not as
half of the population.
The CEVI is concerned that those States that have bodies engaged in
implementing plans and programs in favour of women, including gender
equity and violence, report budget allocations, while the States that do
not have these offices do not report or do not have specific budgetary
allocations. This demonstrates the need for a governmental body that
specializes in gender and that has its own budget. (CIM 2009: 51)
This is very interesting because it demonstrates the potential for a synergy that facilitates the mutual strengthening of spaces for women within
governments, and the Mechanism of Follow-up of the Convention. Most
spaces within governments that are dedicated to gender have adopted the
problem of violence against women as one of their central lines of work.
Budgetary support dedicated to eliminating this form of violence would
also strengthen these institutional spaces.
Statistics
The fourth issue represents a worldwide need for statistics and data attuned to reality so as to intervene in a relevant manner in its transformation.
Pursuant to article 8, paragraph h) of the Convention of Belém do Pará,
States should guarantee the investigation and compilation of pertinent
statistics, and information on the causes, consequences and frequency of
violence against women.
Most States lack consolidated statistical information on complaints,
arrests, and court decisions in cases of violence against women. The vast
majority of States (1) do not have this information, (2) only have partial
estimates, or (3) have data based on information given by some police
stations or courts in a few regions in the countries. (CIM 2009: 53)
Furthermore, no State has mechanisms to evaluate the under-registration of cases.
Responsibilities of Local Governments
What happens on the level of local governments? The same problems
observed on the national level also occur on the levels of provincial and
municipal governments. Approaches to gender-based violence are partial
and, in general, limited to family violence, leaving unaddressed the multiple forms of violence against women manifest in urban spaces. Beyond
the partiality of approaches, there is another problem regarding the role
of local governments that is captured in the following question: What do
international treaties represent for city governments? There are two main
obstacles that have been detected.
The first one is related to the fact that most local governments do not
feel bound by international treaties on human rights, including those that
prohibit discrimination against women (CEDAW), or prevent, punish or
eradicate violence against women (Convention of Belém do Pará).
From the perspective of women’s organisations, local territories appear to be an adequate space for putting into practice all of the principles
associated with human rights, for example, those related to democracy,
the exercise of citizenship, political participation, and gender equality. All
principles of human rights incorporated within national Constitutions can
and should be adhered to on local levels. When an international agreement
on human rights is ratified, its enforcement is mandatory for all levels of
government (national, provincial/state and local/municipal). It is governments on all scales and levels that are responsible for applying these agreements and ensuring that they can be exercised and enjoyed by all people.
Therefore, the mandate to eradicate discrimination against women contained in several international treaties on human rights now incorporated
into national Constitutions is also obligatory for local governments, both
their executive and legislative branches. Gender equality is not optional
but compulsory in all governmental structures and policy design.
Along with treaties that explicitly forbid discrimination based on gender, CEDAW also demands that all necessary measures are taken, in all
areas and sectors, to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women
and to ensure the full development and advancement of women through
positive actions, ‘for the purpose of guaranteeing them the exercise and
enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms on a basis of equality with men’ (art. 3).
The Plans and Platforms of Action signed in the United Nations during
the 1990s after the World Conferences of Vienna (Human Rights), Copenhagen (Social Development), Cairo (Population and Development) and
Beijing (Gender Equality, Development and Peace), also defined goals for
achieving this equality that held all governmental entities accountable, including those on the local level.
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During the Middle Ages, international treaties were made between cities and were mandatory principally for those who ruled them. Presently, in
the age of globalisation, cities behave as micro-states immersed in a legal
field that is, according to Boaventura de Sousa Santos (1999: 19), a ‘constellation of varied legalities (and illegalities) activated in local, national, and
transnational spaces and times’. This local legal sphere has many of the
benefits of the direct exercise of democracy, but is hindered by the fact that
some of those who are responsible for the micro-state believe that international legislation is an exclusive responsibility of the national government
(and the same problem is also typical of some provincial governments).
A second obstacle to achieving gender equality and respect for women’s human rights is related to the belief that obligations defined by international treaties are mandatory for the Executive power, i.e. the President, Governor or Mayor, but not for the other two branches that form the
tripartite structure of governments: the Legislative and Judicial powers.
This tendency is also detrimental when considered in terms of city governments. It would be much easier for everyone if the actions and policies
of the Executive power were based on by-laws enacted by city councils
inspired by and in accordance with international norms on human rights
and non-discrimination. Also crucial is that the entities of the local government (urban guards, municipal police, etcetera) that are in charge of
enforcing those by-laws comply with their mandates and act accordingly.
If the obligations delineated by international treaties were fully assumed by local governments, most of women’s problems would be solved,
since gender-based violence would be addressed in a holistic manner — in
legal frameworks, in budget allocations, in studies and research designed
to get at the root of the problems, in the filing of cases, in surveys, statistics
and attention to victims. Yet since this is still not the case, it is important to
explore other forms of violence against women in urban space that are still
not contemplated within the legislations and/or policies of local governments in Latin America.
Firstly, when talking about inhabitants of urban space, in Argentina we
are referring to 89.3 per cent of the population, that is, almost 90 per cent.
This is a sign of the extremely high rate of urbanisation in the country
that keeps on growing to the detriment of rural areas. When speaking of
women, we are referring to 51.3 per cent of the population, that is, more
than half. I emphasise this second figure to dispel the belief that women’s
demands are sectoral.
To address this issue, we must first acknowledge that women inhabit,
walk through, participate in and use urban space — be it a plaza, a stadium or streets — differently than men. Indeed, women are out and about
in the city at different hours, for different reasons and via different modes
of transport than men (Tobío and Henche 1995: 25 and fol.). Likewise, the
proportion of women represented in local governments differs from that of
men; frequently it is significantly lower. Women’s participation and influence in public space can be said to follow concentric circles that are more
encompassing at the level of grassroots organisations and in suburbs, and
grow narrower closer to spaces of greater power, such as those associated
with financial, political, sports and religious circuits that dictate public affairs in the city.
The most evident manifestations of gender-based violence are those related to the use of public space and the access to and enjoyment of public
services, especially health care, educational, transport and security services. With regard to health care services, the reality is one of long distances
separating homes and hospitals when no appropriate facilities are available in neighbourhoods, and the long waiting periods people must endure
to get attention. Furthermore, they are often subject to mistreatment and
discrimination by staff members, which can become further aggravated by
factors such as poverty and ethnic or racial origin. In relation specifically
to sexual and reproductive health services, abuses range from insults and
humiliation to the refusal to administer anaesthesia during surgery. These
practices have been reported in several Argentinean cities, especially in
Rosario, where an Observatory on Health, Gender and Human Rights
(INSGENAR 2003: 34) was created. The realm of mental health services is
also one of abuse, mostly of mentally challenged girls and teenagers.
In schools and educational facilities, girls and female teenagers suffer
from bullying, verbal and physical abuse and intimidation by their male
counterparts and, often, they are also abused by their teachers and other
authority figures within the school. These situations call for collaboration
between school authorities and local institutions of control.
Abuse taking place on public transit is widespread, ranging from groping, pinching, rubbing and pushing, to rape. To ride on buses or trains
loaded with soccer fans (hooligans), gangs or aggressive groups, may put
your life at risk.
Violence perpetrated by members of security forces, particularly the police, against women in police stations or in places where raids or searches
are being conducted has also been reported by human rights organisations
(Amnesty International 2008). As for correctional services, in spite of the
recommendations made by the Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights in the case ‘X and Y c/. Argentina’,2 women visiting inmates are
subjected to intimate body searches in almost all detention centres in the
country.
2 This case was presented to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights of the
Organization of American States (OAS) and in 1996 culminated in a Report by the Commission ordering the Argentinean government to end intimate body searches of women visiting detention centres, on the grounds that they affect their dignity, privacy and personal
integrity.
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Violence against women in public space is still more dramatic in poor
neighbourhoods or shanty towns — called ‘villas miseria’ in Argentina —
not only because of inadequate street lighting, a lack of police presence, or
the long distances people must travel across vacant lots or open fields, but
also due to the disintegration of codes related to camaraderie and ways
to peacefully coexist with others. In Rosario’s ‘villas miseria’ thirty years
ago, it was a rule that nobody robbed or assaulted neighbours. Today this
social code no longer exists, and many women are living in peripheral
neighbourhoods with fewer security-related services than in more central
or private neighbourhoods.
Frequent Obstacles to the Implementation
of Human Rights Mandates by Local Governments
Besides the obstacles mentioned above, there are other barriers to the implementation of governmental obligations with regard to human rights.
Among them are the following:
a) Violence against women is still considered to be a minor issue unrelated to safety issues affecting the general population and, accordingly, it
has yet to be included in policies on urban safety. Safety continues to
be handled in a segmented manner. The violence that affects women
in all spheres, including their own homes, has not been linked to other
manifestations of violence, such as social or political violence. (The
ability to make these sorts of linkages requires the analysis of different manifestations of violence, their causes, connections, ways of preventing them, etcetera.) The examination of urban safety regulations
clearly demonstrates that violence against women is not a priority in
local plans or budgets. As Lechner (2002) states, political plans hardly
ever take people’s daily worries and fears into account. According to
a study that he carried out in Chile, this disconnect between public
policies and daily lives might well be at the root of the indifference
towards public affairs felt by large sections of the population.
b) Measures have not been taken to revert the increase in violence against
women in the mass media or games and programmes of the new information technologies. In Spain, a videogame that awarded points to the
player who had sex with a woman working as a prostitute and then
killed her sold millions of copies to young males between the ages of
15 and 35. The impact of such images and messages, designed with
state of the art technologies, cannot easily be counteracted afterwards
by the odd flyer or TV spot. The glorification of such audacity and
violence tends to reduce inhibitions towards committing violent acts
in places other than virtual battlefields. The result is a contempt for
human life, especially the lives of women.
c) The spirit of international accomplishments that define gender-based
violence as a violation of women’s and girl’s human rights has not been
adequately incorporated within the design of laws and programmes
on violence against women.
d) Social and institutional measures dedicated to protection (battered
women’s shelters, specialised police units, victim services) reach a
limited range of beneficiaries, mostly those women residing in capital
cities. Left virtually unprotected are inhabitants of small cities, towns,
rural areas or places distant from large cities, and women from indigenous communities.
e) Numerous governmental programmes employ paradigms that are
victimising and paternalistic, instead of promoting a human rights
paradigm. They present women as vulnerable victims, not as citizens
entitled to a life without violence. It must be made clear that women
do not want the protection of a State acting as guardian, but rather,
they want their rights to be guaranteed and respected.
The Need for Holistic Answers
The diversity and seriousness of the different forms of violence against
women demand holistic answers, including campaigns aimed at counteracting the root causes of gender-based violence, especially discrimination against women in all of its manifestations. In addition, urban plans
and policies must address all forms of violence according to the spheres
where it appears, that is, not only the violence that occurs in the domestic
realm, but also those forms exercised in the community and by governments. A holistic approach to violence requires a designated budget appropriate to the scale of the problem and as evidence of local governments’
real commitment to eradicate it. This is the approach adopted by the Gender, Law and Development Institute (INSGENAR) in Rosario, Argentina.
Since 1997, INSGENAR has been developing the proposal ‘Rosario, Human Rights City’ in the framework of the UN Decade for Human Rights
Education. It has done so in collaboration with the People’s Movement for
Human Rights Education (PDHRE), the Museum of Memory of the Municipality of Rosario, the Provincial Ministry of Human Rights, the Ombudsman Office, as well as non-governmental organisations dedicated to
human rights, women’s organisations, an association of women architects
and representatives from indigenous communities. The common goal has
been to promote respect for human rights, equity and peace among different sectors, such as the police, teachers, students and neighbours. The tools
utilised have been diverse, ranging from contests to redefine the basic hu-
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man rights to proposals to transform the neighbourhood.3 In essence, this
collective initiative is an attempt to bring the discourse on human rights
closer to the urban fabric of daily life by using a holistic approach that
connects a gender perspective with an ethnic-racial perspective. The safe
cities proposal presents new possibilities for joint, collaborative efforts that
should be carefully explored.
This initiative in Rosario, the UNIFEM Regional Programme ‘Cities
without Violence against Women, Cities Safe for All’, continuous debate
between governmental and non governmental programmes, the incorporation of violence against women into debates on citizen safety — if these
efforts can be combined, they have the potential to generate a more realistic and effective approach to that invisible subterranean city discussed
above. By approaching violence as a symptom of sexual discrimination, these
initiatives encourage all levels of the State to assume their responsibilities
in the eradication of the causes of discrimination against women.
It will not be an easy task to overcome the obstacles we have outlined
and fully implement international treaties on human rights, such as the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women (CEDAW), and the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention,
Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Convention of
Belém do Pará). Among other measures, governments will have to develop appropriate legislation, official programmes, training mechanisms and
judiciary reforms, to work in conjunction with mass campaigns contributing to the cultural change needed for the eradication of violence against
women.
Civil society, which comprises not only female and male citizens, but
also businesses, the media, associations and other social organisations,
cannot remain indifferent to these endeavours. Civil society must not only
respect the law; rather, it shares the responsibility of ensuring that the law
is actually implemented and enforced.
Although these challenges might seem monumental, we must remind
ourselves that we are leading the charge in the most powerful and rapid
cultural change in history. For our grandfathers’ and grandmothers’ generation, it was common to think that beating a woman was not just legitimate but, on some occasions, even advisable. There was no legislation on
the subject and judges considered violence against women as something
to be dealt with in private. In just thirty years, our efforts have contributed
to the establishment of legal norms, training programmes for female and
male judges, and social strategies such as shelters, proactive police departments, self-help groups and literature on the issue. The task at hand is to
build on these changes.
3
For more information on this proposal, visit http://www.insgenar.org.ar.
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UN – United Nations. 1993. Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action /
conf.157/23, World Conference on Human Rights, Vienna, 14–25,
June 1993.
————. 1995. Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. The Fourth World
Conference on Women, Beijing. 15 September 1995, A/CONF.177/20
(1995) and A/CONF.177/20/Add.1 (1995). New York: United Nations
Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW)
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————. 2006. Ending Violence against Women: From Words to Action. Study
of the Secretary-General. New York: United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW).
unfpa – United Nations Population Fund. 2001. A Practical Approach to
Gender-based Violence. A Programme Guide for Health Care Providers and
Managers. New York: UNFPA.
Safety, Gender Mainstreaming and Gender-based Programmes
Caroline O. N. Moser
T
his paper is a personal challenge for me. Having worked on urban
violence, on gender-based violence, and on gender mainstreaming, it
represents an opportunity to combine together three distinct perspectives
and, in so doing, to see whether it provides a useful analytical and operational tool for increasing women’s safety in cities.
The importance of women’s safety and security in cities throughout
the world — both within the household as well as outside in public spaces
— is now widely recognised. An extensive range of state and civil society institutions are currently implementing a range of cutting edge ‘good
practice’ policies, programmes and projects to rigorously address the issue of women’s safety in cities, which is indicative of the extraordinary
progress to date.
Amid the many success stories, this paper raises two pertinent questions that may inform the (re) conceptualisation of such programmes. First,
is women’s safety a separate women’s issue, or is it one that needs to be
mainstreamed into broader safer cities research, policy and practice? This
paper briefly describes gender mainstreaming as a policy approach and
explores its contribution to women’s safety policy goals and the associated
range of strategies that address the different types of violence experienced
by women.
Second, do urban safety issues affect all women equally or are contexts of exclusion and poverty, as well as characteristics of identity and
agency, also important determining factors? Incorporation of the gender
mainstreaming component of gender analysis into violence roadmaps —
of categories, types and manifestations of violence in urban areas — may
provide a useful mainstream operational tool to ensure that the critical in-
Caroline O. N. Moser is a nonresident senior fellow in Global Economy and Development at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC, and Professor of Urban Development
directing the Global Urban Research Centre at the University of Manchester, UK.
Original text in English.
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78
terests and needs of poor urban women are incorporated into mainstream
gender-based programmes.
Gender mainstreaming has been severely criticized on various accounts. These include the fact, as some feminist services maintain, that
such an approach threatens women’s autonomy. Others are concerned that
mainstreaming reduces financial and institutional resources specifically allocated to women’s needs. Finally, the most vocal criticism maintains that
is has ‘failed’, either because it has not been implemented at all, or because
when it has, this has subsumed women’s interests into those of families,
households or communities.1 The severity of such criticisms means that
they also need to be addressed when discussing the contribution of a gender mainstreaming approach to women’s safety.
What is Gender Mainstreaming?
Gender
stages:
i)
ii)
iii)
iv)
mainstreaming can usefully be identified in terms of four related
Defining gender mainstreaming;
Getting a gender mainstreaming policy into place;
Implementing gender mainstreaming in practice;
Evaluating or auditing the practice of gender mainstreaming.
To explore its contribution to women’s safety it is useful to start by
elaborating briefly on each of these four stages.
Defining Gender Mainstreaming
The origins of gender mainstreaming stem from the 1995 Beijing Platform
for Action (PfA), when governments across the world endorsed a policy
to promote gender equality and empower women. Gender mainstreaming
was identified as the most important mechanism to reach the PfA’s ambitious goals, with the UN adopting gender mainstreaming in 1997 as the
approach to be used in all policies and programmes in the UN system.
Most definitions of gender mainstreaming follow closely those set out
by the UN Economic and Social Council (1997: 28), which defines it as follows:
1 For instance, a UNDP report concluded that gender equality perspectives are not
adequately mainstreamed into the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) reports and confined primarily to Goal 3 (UNDP 2003). See also Birdsall et al. (2004), Watkins (2004), Whitzman (2008), Moser (2006), Sandler (1997).
Caroline O. N. Moser / Safety, Gender Mainstreaming and Gender-based Programmes
Mainstreaming a gender perspective is the process of assessing the
implications for women and men of any planned action, including
legislation, policies or programmes, in all areas and at all levels. It is a
strategy for making women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences
an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring and
evaluation of policies and programmes in all political, economic and
societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is
not perpetuated. The ultimate goal is to achieve gender equality.
Two further aspects of gender mainstreaming appear in some definitions. First, there is the institutionalisation of gender concerns within the
organisation itself, with gender equality in staffing and other organisational procedures to ensure a transformative process for the organisation
in terms of attitudes and ‘culture’. Second, some definitions emphasise
gender empowerment through women’s participation in decision-making
processes, such that women’s voices are heard and they have the power to
put issues on the agenda.2
Getting a Gender Mainstreaming Policy into Place
Throughout the last decade, governments and civil society organisations
across the world have sought to implement the PfA and, in so doing, to
develop gender mainstreaming policies, strategies and methodologies. A
desk review of fourteen development-focused organisations — bilateral,
international financial institutions, United Nations and international nongovernmental — identified the following critical key components in their
gender mainstreaming policies (Moser and Moser 2003):
•
•
•
•
•
•
A dual strategy of mainstreaming gender equality issues into all
policies, programmes and projects, combined with context-specific strategies supporting targeted actions for gender equality.
Gender analysis (sex disaggregated data and gender analytical information).
Women, as well as men, playing an active role in decision-making
processes to influence the development agenda.
Capacity building and gender training in organisations.
Monitoring and evaluation of systems and tools.
Combined institutional approach with all staff, supported by gender specialists sharing responsibility for implementation.
2 The degree to which ‘equality’ as against ‘empowerment’ is emphasized by different
agencies may reflect the extent to which they are focused on all women in society, or prioritizing those who are poor. Development agencies prioritize poverty reduction and emphasize
empowerment as much as equality as a mechanism to achieve poverty reduction (see Moser
2005).
79
Implementing Gender Mainstreaming in Practice3
The real challenge in gender mainstreaming is to implement it in practice.
This requires institution- and context-specific strategies. Figure 1 shows in
diagrammatic form the components of a twin-track strategy that includes
the following two components:4
• Integration of women’s and men’s concerns (needs and interests)
throughout the development process (in all policies and projects).
• Specific activities aimed at empowering women.
Figure 1. Components of a Gender Mainstreaming Strategy
1. Integration
of women’s and
men’s concerns
in all policies &
projects
GOAL:
Gender
equality
Equality
OUTCOMES
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STRATEGY:
Twin-track gender
mainstreaming
2. Specific
activities aimed
at empowering
women
Empowerment of
women
Source: Moser (2005: 10).
The implementation of both strategies combines both equality and
empowerment outcomes, and also ensures that some of the criticisms of
gender mainstreaming, identified above, are addressed — namely that
women’s specific needs are excluded.
3 This section draws on Moser (2005).
4 This diagram was developed as a tool for the UK Department for International Development (DFID) as part of a Gender Audit Methodology (see Moser 2005).
Evaluating or Auditing the Practice of Gender Mainstreaming
The biggest challenge for auditing gender mainstreaming is the issue of
measurement.
First, it is necessary to identify the wider context. For instance, in a
gender audit undertaken for the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the measurement of gender mainstreaming was contextualised within the contested debate about ‘policy evaporation’. In this
debate, closely linked to the Millennium Development Goals, it is argued
that ‘gender mainstreaming has failed’, owing to the lack of real on the
ground impact on gender equality. In undertaking the audit, I extended
the framework to the following three evaluation concepts:
• Evaporation: When good policy intentions fail to be followed
through in practice.
• Invisibilisation: When monitoring and evaluation procedures fail to
document what is occurring ‘on the ground’.
• Resistance: When effective mechanisms block gender mainstream-
ing, with opposition essentially ‘political’ and based on gendered
power relations, rather than on ‘technocratic’ procedural constraints.
Appropriate quantitative or qualitative indicators to assess progress in
gender mainstreaming, based on the structure in Figure 1 above, include
the following:
• Implementation: Measurement of gender mainstreaming strategy in
terms of: a) Integration of women’s and men’s concerns throughout
the development process; b) Specific activities aimed at empowering women.
• Outputs and impacts: Measurement in terms of equality and the empowerment of women.
This section of the paper has shown that gender mainstreaming is not a
simple planning blueprint but rather is a complex process with a number
of interrelated components. Summarizing the main elements of each component is a necessary first step in order to explore its potential contribution
to women’s safety policy goals and associated strategies. The following
section explores these in terms of the four components.
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Implications of Gender Mainstreaming
for Women’s Safety Policy and Programmes
The incorporation of a gender perspective in policies and programmes related to women’s safety has definite effects in multiple dimensions. Policies and programmes vary according to their scope and influence, their
content and the channels through which they are implemented.
Defining Gender Mainstreaming for Safety and Security in Cities
Gender mainstreaming requires a shift from a specific focus on women’s
security to one that incorporates the safety and security of women and
men, as well as boys and girls. Such gender disparities can then be crosscut with other types of diversity such as those based on age, ethnicity, race,
or sexual orientation. A mainstreaming framework also provides the opportunity to focus on the interrelated nature of different types of violence
and the different social actors, which may be male or female perpetrators
or victims.
An example to illustrate this, which comes from a participatory urban
appraisal of violence (Moser and McIlwaine 2004, 2006), is a causal flow
diagram of intra-family violence and insecurity in Bucaramanga, Colombia. Figure 2 shows three young men’s perceptions of the interrelated
relationship between different types of violence. They identified socially
constituted intra-family violence between their parents (almost certainly
gender-based violence) as the basis for other types of violence. This leads
some young people, particularly young men, to leave home and join gangs,
or to turn to drugs, which are linked with insecurity as well as the economic violence of robbery, attacks, crime and delinquency. The outcome is
increased fear, together with the erosion of trust, unity, and social institutions associated with the erosion of social capital. The importance of such
a holistic causal analysis relates to the associated strategies for violence
reduction. This allows for a better understanding of the linkages between
gender-based violence within the household and other types of violence
in public spaces,5 with important implications for cross-sectoral genderbased programmes and projects.
5 As an indigenous young man, also in Colombia, once explained to me: ‘I joined
the guerrilla so I could get a gun, so I could shoot my father, and stop him beating up my
mother’.
Figure 2. Causal flow diagram of intra-family violence and insecurity in Bucaramanga, Colombia (drawn by three young men from a youth centre)
Social mistrust
Intra-family
violence
Lack of unity
Insecurity
Fear
Lack of social
institutions
Gangs
Robbery
Attacks
Delinquency
Crime
Killing
Drugs
Source: Moser and McIlwaine (2004).
Getting a Gender Mainstreaming Policy for Safety in Cities in Place
As identified above, the implementation of a gender mainstreaming policy
comprises the development of the following dual strategy:
• The mainstreaming of women and men’s safety and security issues
into all policies, programmes and projects.
• Context-specific targeted interventions to both protect women
from insecurity and empower them to lobby local institutions, such
as the municipality and civil society organisations, to make the city
safe for them.
To inform such a strategy requires a detailed gender analysis of violence and insecurity. A violence roadmap provides a useful diagnostic tool,
first to list the extensive manifestations of violence in a specific context,
and then to categorize them so that policymakers can identify appropriate solutions. Table 1 provides one such example taken from a consultation process in Honduras, in which the predominant categories, types and
manifestations of everyday violence were identified.6
In a context where the economic and social violence of youth gangs
6
This section draws on Moser and Winton (2002), and Moser (2004).
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84
(maras) was a primary concern of the state and civil society alike, the roadmap was an important diagnostic tool to take account of other important
manifestations of violence including institutional violence, as well as the
prevalence of gender-based violence affecting women’s safety inside and
outside the home.
Table 1.
A gendered violence roadmap: A diagnostic tool to identify contextspecific categories, types and manifestations of violence
Category of
violence
Political
Types of violence by perpetrators
and/or victims
State and non-state violence in
situations of conflict and fragile
cities
Manifestations
Guerrilla and paramilitary conflict
Armed conflict between political parties
Political assassinations
Rape as an instrument of war
Extra-judicial killings by security forces
Institutional
Violence of the state and other
‘informal’ institutions, including
the private sector
State- or community-directed social
cleansing
Lynching
Doctor/patient and teacher/pupil abuse
particularly girls and women
Kidnapping
Armed robbery
Drug trafficking
Economic/
Institutional
Organized crime
Car theft
Protection of business interests
Small arms dealing
Trafficking in prostitutes
Economic
Economic/
Social
Economic/
Social
Delinquency/Robbery
Violence intimidation to resolve
economic disputes
Street theft with women as victims
Robbery with women as victims
Youth gangs (‘maras’)
Collective ‘turf’ violence; robbery, theft
Street children (boys and girls)
Petty theft
Social
Gender-based intimate partner
and sexual violence between
adults
Physical, sexual or psychological abuse
primarily of women
Social
Child abuse: boys and girls
Physical and sexual abuse, particularly in
the home
Social
Inter-generational conflict
between parents and children
(both young and adults)
Physical and psychological abuse of both
men and women, boys and girls
Social
Gratuitous/routine daily violence
Lack of citizenship in areas such as
traffic, road rage, bar fights and street
confrontations
Source: Adapted from Moser and Winton (2002).
Note: The manifestations of violence where women and girls are more likely to be the victims
are in italics. Those that affect men and women equally, as perpetrators or victims, are in
bold. In normal case are those manifestations of violence where men are predominantly the
perpetrators and victims, such as political and economic violence.
Reviewing this roadmap from a gender mainstreaming perspective
raises the question as to how gender is represented. How can we ensure
that such maps do not become gender neutral, with gender-based concerns evaporated?
In terms of mainstreaming gender, Table 1 is exploratory rather than
definitive. But it is intended to illustrate how a gendered roadmap can become a useful tool to show the way different categories and manifestations
of violence are clustered by gender and age, where men and/or women
are more likely to be perpetrators or victims, as well as the range of violence affecting children and youth.
Implementing Gender Mainstreaming in Security
and Safety Policies, Programmes and Projects in Practice
Although not necessarily identified as such, an extensive range of programmes and projects already seek to mainstream gender primarily by
addressing gender-based violence. Table 2 seeks to provide a systematic
categorisation of the main policy and programmatic approaches in terms
of objectives, level and the type of interventions. As with any categorisation, these are ideal types. Although some are separate gender-based violence initiatives, practitioners are shifting more towards more integrated
approaches. Therefore, it may be useful to distinguish between three types
of gender-based programmatic interventions:
• Women-focused programmes: these specifically focus on protect-
ing or empowering women.
• Women-focused components in integrated programmes: these of-
ten end up as additional ‘add-ons’ to programmes.
• Gender-mainstreaming programmes that address women’s and
men’s needs equally: the danger is that women’s priorities may
face evaporation or resistance.
In addition, institutions responsible for implementation vary along a
continuum. At one end are neighbours, the community and local women’s
organisations undertaking small projects; at the other end are municipalities, national government and, finally, international institutions, with global initiatives. Within this continuum, different organisations have comparative advantages and disadvantages.
85
Set of cross-sectoral measures to prevent
or reduce violence
‘Rebuilding’ social capital, trust and
cohesion in informal and formal social
institutions
Citizen/Public/Community
Security
Community Driven
Development (CDD)/Social
Capital
Family violence
Community based solutions
Crisis services for victims
Ongoing support & prevention
Communication campaigns
School programs
Programs for perpetrators
Domestic/family violence
National level programs
Municipal level programs
Youth gangs/maras
Social violence
Economic violence
Social violence
Economic violence
Arbitrary detention
Municipal level programmes
UN guidelines
Government human rights advocates or ombudsman
Civil society advocacy NGOs
Task force on humanitarian abuse
HR abuses
Traditional systems of justice
Political violence
Staff training
School-based education programmes
Gender-based violence
Institutional violence
Vocational skills training
Cultural & recreational activities
Promotion of behavioural change
Youth policies /social protection
Education reform
Entrepreneurship
Women’s police stations
Youth violence
Youth violence
Community policing
Training of police and judiciary
Conciliatory mechanisms
Delinquency
Family violence
Accessible justice systems
Mobile courts
Robbery
Judicial, legal and police reform
Innovative urban-focused interventions
Crime
Types of violence
Source: Adapted and updated from Moser and Winton (2002); Moser, Winton and Moser (2005).
Deterrence and reduction in violence
opportunities through focusing on
the settings of crime rather than the
perpetrators
Crime Prevention through
Environmental Design
(CPTED)/Urban Renewal
Cross-Sectoral Approaches
Human Rights
Conflict Transformation/
Non-violent resolution of conflict
through negotiation and legal
enforcement of human rights by states,
and other social actors
Violence prevention through the
reduction of individual risk factors, and
victim support
Public Health
Education
Violence deterrence and control through
higher arrest, conviction rates and more
severe punishment
Criminal Justice
Sector-Specific Approaches
Objective
Gender mainstreaming of policy approaches to violence and examples of associated urban-focused interventions
Policy approach
Table 2
86
In urban centres throughout the world, a growing number of examples
of programmes are designed to mainstream gender-based violence reduction into sector-specific and cross-sectoral violence reduction programmes.
I will mention just one, Crime Prevention through Environmental Design
(CPTED), which uses the urban-specific problem of renewal and upgrading as an entry point to address comprehensively various types of violence, including sexual abuse. Such an approach seeks to deter or reduce
violence opportunities by focusing on the settings of crime rather than the
perpetrators.
One such example is the ‘Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading’ project in the Khayelitsha township, Cape Town, South Africa. The
project feasibility study demonstrated a strong relationship between levels
of violence and crime, and inadequate infrastructure provision, much of
which was identified as spatially manifested. Extreme levels of rape, for
instance, were exacerbated by narrow paths, open fields, distant communal latrines, unsafe transport hubs, poor lighting, empty shacks, and proximity to shebeens7 (KfW / City of Cape Town, 2002).
In seeking to respond to extreme violence levels, it developed an interlinked ‘triangle’ that connects the following:
• Urban renewal strategies for better environmental arrangements
(to reduce opportunities for violence).
• Criminal justice measures (to discourage potential violators).
• Public health and conflict resolution interventions (to support victims of violence).
Gender-based violence interventions are integrated into a spatiallyconstituted urban renewal strategy to deter offenders, both criminal and
sexual in nature (see Table 3). This includes the improvement and installation of lighting, Closed-circuit Television (CCTV) and public telephone
systems, internal public transportation, safe walkways, and outside toilets
replaced by sewers. Specific anti-rape strategies include rape crisis centres,
counselling services, self-defence training, community awareness-raising,
and police training and increased presence in dangerous locations. The
program also incorporates interventions to bring jobs and services closer
7 A ‘shebeen’ was originally an illicit bar or club where excisable alcoholic beverages
were sold without a licence. In South Africa and Zimbabwe, during the apartheid and the
Rhodesian era, shebeens were most often located in black townships as an alternative to pubs
and bars that were reserved for whites, and where black Africans could not enter. Initially
shebeens were operated illegally, selling homebrewed alcohol and providing patrons with
a gathering place where they could meet and discuss political and social issues. During the
apartheid, they became a crucial place for activists to meet. They also provided music and
dancing, allowing patrons to express themselves culturally. Currently, shebeens are legal in
South Africa and have become an integral part of South African urban culture. Taken from
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shebeen.
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88
to residents through the development of a series of ‘safe nodes’, where
complementary violence reduction facilities are clustered together in one
area.
Table 3. Violence prevention through urban upgrading: The Khayelitsha Project
Spatial and non-spatial gender-based
Spatial manifestation
Domestic spaces
Types of gender-based
violence prevention or reduction
violence
interventions
Assault
Houses of refuge, and counselling and
conflict resolution facilities.
Rape
Emotional abuse
Open public space
Rape
Open fields
Assault
Narrow lanes
Murder
Empty stalls
Sanitary facilities
Rape at or near public
sanitary facilities
Shebeens
Assault
Rape
Drug/alcohol violence
Schools
Physical violence
Group rape
Roads & transport
Assault
Sexual harassment &
assault by drivers
Police stations equipped with trauma
facilities and female officers.
Police receive training in handling
domestic violence cases.
Awareness-raising campaign on
domestic rights.
Police receive training in handling
domestic violence cases.
Awareness-raising campaign on
domestic rights.
More visible police patrolling and
neighbourhood watches.
Sewers installed and outside toilets
phased out.
Communal sanitary facilities supervised.
Shebeens relocated to where social and
police control is efficient.
Alternative socializing opportunities
where alcohol is controlled.
Business code of conduct by Shebeen
owners’ association.
Schools protected against theft and keep
out guns by installing better fencing,
metal detectors and guard dogs.
Guarded schools could then double as
safe playgrounds after hours.
Stations declared gun-free zones (metal
detectors and lockers).
Jobs and services brought closer to
residents: reduce transport needs.
Trains need to be accompanied by
police.
Source: Summarized from KfW / City of Cape Town (2002). (In Moser, Winton and Moser
2005: 112–153).
One advantage of spatial solutions is that physical infrastructure initiatives are relatively straightforward to implement and can increase perceptions of safety and well-being. However, it is important to reemphasise that
this is only one of a fascinating range of new interventions that include the
re-examination of traditional sectors such as criminal justice from a gender perspective, through to new municipal level initiatives such as citizen
security projects that identify community safety and security as a public
good. Such projects recognise the importance of building partnerships to
reduce violence and acknowledge that the primary responsibility is not
only that of the police, but of local governments as well, with a crucial role
for municipal leaders. (See for instance CSIR 2000, Shaw 2000, Whitzman
2008.)
Evaluating or Auditing the Practice of Gender Mainstreaming for Safety in Cities
As identified above, evaluation is highly complex and expensive, with
important differences between quantitative and qualitative indicators, as
well as between implementation and outputs and impacts. Since this could
be the subject of a paper itself, here I would like to raise just one question:
Where does the money go?
Tracking where the money goes provides a concrete way of measuring
the extent to which gender mainstreaming polices are integrated into design, let alone implemented, or evaporated. This is particularly important
in comprehensive integrated cross-sectoral interventions to reduce urban
violence.
One such example is provided by the Inter-American Development
Bank-supported national-level ‘peace and citizen security’ projects currently being implemented in Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Jamaica
and Uruguay (IDB 1998, 2001, 2002, 2003; Traverso 2001).8 As summarized
in Table 4, this is a blueprint approach based on a similar, underlying policy that links public health (violence prevention) and criminal justice (violence control), with common components across countries on institutional
strengthening, juvenile violence prevention, community-police relations
programmes, and social awareness and rehabilitation programmes.9
Embedded in these broad categories are specific actions to prevent and
reduce gender-based violence that vary across countries.10 For instance:
• In Colombia, the project supports multi-service centres for fami-
lies by strengthening detection protocols and training staff. In the
city of Medellin, early detection protocols identify cases of abuse in
children and youth in schools.
8 This section draws on Moser and Moser (2003) and Moser, Winton, and Moser
(2005).
9 Honduras places a distinct emphasis on positive development and community facilities for at-risk youth.
10 The demonstrated links between children witnessing violence at home and subsequent juvenile delinquency provides the rationale for mainstreaming gender components
— in this way legitimizing domestic violence interventions as a key element in combating the
insecurity experienced in many Latin American cities (see Buvinic et al. 1999).
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90
• In Honduras, the domestic violence strategy involves strengthen-
ing the assistance and case follow-up system, public workshops on
addressing the problem, and training. A telephone hotline is also
provided to promote a reporting culture.
• In El Salvador, an added emphasis is on strengthening family values to address the ‘root causes’ of violence.
• In Jamaica, the project aims to develop a national plan for violence
prevention, with a chapter addressing intra-family violence.
• In Uruguay, the domestic violence component includes a public information campaign, training for public employees who deal with
victims of abuse, and support centres for victim care.
Since there is no specific budget line for gender-based violence, it is not
possible to assess directly the relative amount apportioned to this. Nevertheless, the budgets are revealing. As shown in Table 4, in all countries
the greatest proportion (38–52 per cent) is spent on community and other
actions to prevent juvenile violence and delinquency, while up to a third
(23–31 per cent) goes to institutional strengthening. At the same time, there
are interesting differences that are likely to have implications for genderbased violence.
Table 4.
Comparison of components and budget allocation in IDB violence reduction projects in four Latin American countries (Amounts are in US $
millions)
Colombia
Component
Jamaica
El Salvador
Honduras
Amount Per cent Amount Per cent Amount Per cent Amount Per cent
Institutional
strengthening
$27.9
29
$5.2
26
$8.4
24
$6.8
31
Community & other
actions to prevent
juvenile violence &
delinquency
$19.7
20
$7.6
38
$13.8
39
$11.4
51
Social awareness &
communication
$8.8
9
$0.6
3
$4.1
11
$0.5
2
Community
policing & criminal
justice
$28.5
30
$2.8
14
$3.3
9
$0.9
4
Total
$95.6
100
$20.0
100
$35.4
100
$22.2
100
Source: Author’s re-categorisation of data from four project documents (see IDB 1998, 2001,
2002, 2003). (In Moser, Winton and Moser 2005: 155).
Note: Totals may not add up to 100 per cent because of rounding errors. Differences in the
ways in which countries assign activities across project components make cross-project comparison difficult. Colombia, the earliest project, divides all activities between national and
municipal levels rather than by component types. The other three projects divide activities by
component type. Due to these mixed categories of component activities, the data have been
recategorised to enable useful comparison across projects.
Community police programs and strengthening the criminal justice
system receive around 30 per cent of the budget in Colombia and only
4 per cent Honduras; social awareness and communication is not higher
than 11 per cent (as in El Salvador), but is as low as 2–3 per cent in others
(Honduras and Jamaica). While the size of the project loans suggests these
countries are seriously investing in violence reduction, a gender budget
audit can help ensure that the rhetoric about addressing gender-based violence is implemented in practice.
Concluding Comment: A Note of Caution on Implementation
Here you can’t hit your child because someone may report you. Not to
mention your partner. If you try to beat her, the police will take you away.
There’s more respect here. You get used to the discipline here. The police
officers treat you well. They ask you to show them your documents and
they thank you and even apologise for bothering you. It’s very different
in Ecuador, where they ask you to show your ID and they beat you right
away.
Juan, 35 year old migrant from Guayaquil, Ecuador, to Barcelona, Spain.
Jose has a tough temper, but I ignore him. Men here are macho like in
Ecuador, but here they can’t touch us because we get much support from
the police. Jose can’t raise his hand at me, because I can go straight to the
police and press charges. My husband in Guayaquil sometimes insulted
me and hit me but I never went to the police, never said anything. But it’s
different here; I’ve told Jose that if he ever lays a hand on me he knows
what I’ll do. I don’t put up with that crap over here.
Maria, 28 year old migrant from Guayaquil, Ecuador, to Barcelona, Spain.
These two quotes both come from a longitudinal anthropological study
I have been undertaking in a poor community in Guayaquil, Ecuador, in
which I also tracked the second generation kids that had migrated to Barcelona, Spain (see, for instance, Moser and Felton 2005, 2008; and Moser
2009)��
. Both quotes illustrate the way perceptions of a functional legal structure and associated policing system can change attitudes and tolerance
levels around child and domestic abuse. For Juan, the benefits that Barcelona offers are linked to increased awareness of civic and state responsibilities — with the legal rights to protect children and women backed up by a
credible police system. For Maria, increased knowledge of legal rights has
made her more assertive about the protection against domestic abuse that
a well-functioning state provides.
These quotes highlight the importance of implementation and lead me
to end this paper on a cautionary note. Despite the tremendous achievements to date in developing policies and programmes that mainstream
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gender into safety and security in cities, at the end of the day it is successful implementation that counts. Like many countries, Ecuador has excellent laws on the book, but the daily reality of women’s lives often shows
a very different story, which in turn is reflected in perceptions around insecurity and the lack of safety. And Ecuador is not unique. There is a considerable gap between laws and policies to address different categories of
gender-based violence and their implementation in practice in countries
and cities across the world (see Annex 1).
Just as academics and practitioners alike are concerned to ensure that
gender mainstreaming is implemented in practice, with robust auditing and evaluation tools developed, so too the priority for gender mainstreaming into city safety must now be the same. While some advocate a
return to women-specific interventions, these not only often fail to address
male violence-related concerns, but frequently can only reach small target
groups. Therefore, gender mainstreaming is essential. It clearly identifies
violence as an issue affecting women and men, girls and boys, and can
present opportunities in terms of getting to scale — as illustrated by the
IDB supported citizen security projects. But this also makes it essential to
ensure that in the process of implementing such programmes and projects,
gender-based violence issues do not experience evaporation, invisibilisation or resistance.
Annex 1.
National laws addressing different categories of Gender-based violence
Type
Intimate partner
violence
Country
Costa Rica
Zimbabwe
Ghana
Sexual violence
South Africa
India
Workplace violence
Law
Penal Code,
Article 378
Marital Rape
Law
Marital Rape
Law
Sexual
violence
against
women,
Articles 5, 6
& 16
Indian Penal
Code, Section
375
Bahamas
Sexual offences
& Domestic
Violence Act
Sri Lanka
Penal Code,
Sexual
Harassment
Reality
Law enforcement officials are
reluctant to intervene if rape
occurs between spouses.
Prison sentences are short or
suspended, and fines are minimal
amounts.
Marital rape recognized only
with separated partners.
No cases ever documented as of
1993.
Less than 8 per cent of reported
rapes result in criminal sentence.
Rule of ‘hue & cry’: if reporting
is delayed, it is considered more
likely that the woman is lying.
Character assessments and sexual
history of the woman can be used
to deny rape charges.
In one study, 68 per cent of
judges believed that ‘provocative’
clothes invited sexual assault.
While sexual harassment is
criminalised, no remedies such
as reinstatement are provided to
a woman dismissed as a result of
resistance to sexual harassment.
Three years after its introduction,
only 46 cases had been filed,
despite a sexual harassment rate
of over 80 per cent.
Sources: Armstrong (1990), Ampofo (1993), Clarke (1998), Hayward (2000), Villanueva (1997),
Lukhumalani (1998), Prasad (1996), CRLP (1998). (In Moser and Moser 2005).
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95
Cities, Public Space,
and Peaceful Coexistence
Violence and the Fragmented City
Dr. Rod Burgess
What are we waiting for, assembled in the public square?
The barbarians are to arrive today (...) But night is here and
the barbarians have not come. Some people arrived from the
frontiers and they said there are no longer any barbarians.
And now what shall become of us without any barbarians?
Those people were a kind of solution.
Constantine P. Cavafy, ‘Expecting the Barbarians’
T
he central theme of my paper is the relationship between urban
fragmentation and urban violence. The dominant perception of urban
fragmentation in Latin America and many other countries is strongly focused on the emergence of ‘gated communities’ and the general fortification, enclosure and enhanced surveillance of residential buildings and
neighbourhoods. Explanations of the phenomenon thus usually attach a
high level of significance to the levels and rates of crime and violence and
fear of them. However, as we shall see below, residential fragmentation
of this type can be seen as just one manifestation of a broader process of
urban fragmentation that affects all urban land uses and infrastructure and
which is rapidly restructuring cities, particularly those most open to the
prescriptions of global neoliberalism. The definition of what is and is not
urban violence is also contentious and varies widely in the literature. It
is therefore worthwhile providing at the outset the definitions of the two
phenomena that will be employed in the paper.
The United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (UNCHS 2007: 50)
defines crime as ‘an antisocial act that violates a law and for which pun-
Rod Burgess, senior lecturer at the School of the Built Environment, and research associate in The Oxford Institute for Sustainable Development, Oxford Brookes University, UK. He
has taught at numerous universities and institutions in the UK, Europe and the USA, including the Department of Geography, University College London; the Planning School of the Architectural Association; and the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering,
The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.
Original text in English.
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ishment can be imposed by the state or in the state’s name’. Of course not
all crimes are violent and not all violence is recognised as a crime (as for
example when a state exercises or delegates the use of force). Violence can
be defined as the unlawful exercise of physical force so as to cause death, injury,
restraint or intimidation to a person or damage to and seizure of property. Some
consider it necessary to extend this definition to include animals, ‘human
parts’ (e.g. foetuses) and broader environmental activities. Others using a
concept of ‘structural violence’ would go further and argue that violence in
a direct or indirect way can be embedded in socio-economic and political
systems and is manifested in exploitation, exclusion, injustice, inequality
and discrimination (Salmi 1998). Violence can be perpetrated by or on individuals, social groups and the state itself. It occurs at every spatial scale
at which societies are organised and in this sense urban violence is a social
problem with an urban expression. Others argue that there is something
about cities, urban society and culture that makes them intrinsically violent. The concept of urban violence employed here goes beyond criminal
violence and includes political and communal violence, all of which can be
related to urban fragmentation.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word ‘fragment’ as a ‘broken-off, detached, disjointed or incomplete part’. It defines the word ‘fragmentation’ as ‘the act of breaking or separating into fragments’, ‘the state
of being fragmented’ and ‘the separation into parts, which form new individuals or units’.
In all cases there is something pre-existent which has been fragmented,
although the nature and the consequences of the fragmentation process
can vary. In the case of ‘urban fragmentation’, this entity is of course the
city and systems of cities. However, there is considerable disagreement
about what the ‘city’ is and, therefore, what is actually being fragmented.
Not only do the disciplines of architecture, design and planning have their
own particular spatial focus but there are also deep divisions over the
processes responsible for urban structure and form and the interpretation
of the city’s socio-spatial and cultural complexity. These differences are reflected in the diverse theories of urban fragmentation but they all share the
predominant concept of the social production of space. In this context, it is
perhaps worthwhile limiting the definition of ‘urban fragmentation’ to the
spatial elements and effects of a particular process of the social production
of space. In other words, the ‘pre-existing entity’ that is being fragmented
is the urban structure (understood in terms of land uses or infrastructure
networks) and the urban form. From this we can define urban fragmentation:
Urban fragmentation is a spatial phenomenon that results from the act of
breaking-off, separating or disjointing the pre-existing form and structure of the
city. The question of whether urban fragmentation can best be understood
as the break-down of an existing form or structure or whether it is part of
Rod Burgess / Violence and the Fragmented City
a process that generates a new form and structure lies at the heart of the
urban fragmentation debate and has a critical importance for the implications of urban fragmentation for crime and violence.
The paper is structured into three parts. In the first part we shall analyse current policies for urban crime and violence. In the second part we
shall present a general theory of urban fragmentation that encompasses
all urban land uses, derived from the theories of the ‘network city’ and
‘splintering urbanism’. In the third part we shall analyse the implications
of a broader theory of urban fragmentation for crime and violence and
their prevention and the role of architecture, planning and design in these
policies.
Current Policies for Crime and Violence
The most significant determinant of policies to deal with the prevention
and reduction of crime and violence since the 1980s has been the reformulation of the role of the state and its relationship with the market and civil
society that has been associated with the triumph and consolidation of global neoliberal development strategies. Policy responses have been based
heavily on three approaches — punishment, the application of electronic
control and surveillance techniques, and the privatisation of security.
Punitive measures have consisted in the strengthening of the forces of
law and order and punitive imprisonment based on tougher sentencing
policies (e.g. ‘mandatory sentences’, ‘3 strikes laws’, ‘truth in sentencing’).
The result has been a sharp increase in prison populations. According to
the US Bureau of Justice, the prison population increased five times between 1970 and 1995 in the country. By 2000, the United States had over
2 million people in gaol — around 5 per cent of the world’s population
with 25 per cent of the world’s prisoners. The number of people under
‘correctional supervision’ (parole, probation, prison) tripled between 1980
and 2000 to reach 6.5 million. In the UK, according to the Ministry of Justice, the prison population doubled between 1993 and 2008 and even in
Japan there was a 23 per cent increase in the prison population between
2002 and 2005. Significant differences in rates of incarceration per 100,000
of the population, however, exist between countries. In 1998, according
to the Council of Europe, the US (645) and Russia (685) were imprisoning
between six to seven times as many people proportionately as the average European country and over sixteen times as many as Japan (40). Very
high rates of imprisonment were also to be found in South Africa (386).
The effectiveness of these policies is seriously in doubt. The doubling of
the prison population of the UK since the early 1990s has produced only a
small drop in overall crime and, according to the UNCHS (2007), the global recidivism rate now stands at around 60 per cent. Overcrowding and
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the high costs of prisons are both serious problems. The US was spending
$7.0 billion per annum on new prisons in the 1990s and the annual prison
bill was running at $35 billion by 2000.
Although some states have tried to reassert their monopoly over the
use of force through stricter laws on gun control, in many cases this monopoly was relaxed in the 1980s and 1990s. The legalisation of self-defence
groups in Colombia, which subsequently became paramilitary forces, and
the rash of laws allowing concealed handguns in the United States are two
cases in point. Attempts in some countries (e.g. Colombia, Brazil) to claw
back controls on the use of small arms in the current decade have proven
to be very difficult.
A second widely used strategy has been the increasing reliance on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and electronic control
and surveillance technologies in city centres and public and semi-public
spaces. At a global level, given the rapid growth in urban populations,
governments have struggled to maintain their policing levels, particularly
in developing countries. These and other pressures, including the prioritisation of punitive approaches, have occurred in the context of neoliberal
economic strategies that are geared towards generating economic growth
through the privatisation of the public sector; the search for increased labour and urban productivity; the lowering of income tax levels and the
stabilisation of government budgets and the reduction of their deficits.
In developing countries, where the World Bank and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) have largely imposed these policies as structural
adjustment conditionalities, the result has been significant reductions in
policing levels, the rapid deterioration of police wages and conditions of
employment and the growing adoption of electronic control and surveillance technologies. In developed countries, with high labour costs and serious budget deficits, the adoption of these technologies has occurred at a
startling rate leading to serious concern about their human rights and civil
liberty implications.
The use and spread of Security Camera Video Surveillance (Closed
Circuit Television [CCTV] systems) into public spaces, shopping centres,
car parks and even residential areas has been particularly controversial.
The systems have been widely used as part of spatial strategies to constrain social problems such as homelessness, rowdy youth and vandalism
(‘anti-social behaviour dispersal zones’), prostitution (‘controlled prostitution zones’), drugs (‘drug control zones’) and alcohol-fuelled violence
(‘alcohol-disorder zones’). Often, as in the UK, these systems are implemented as part of Town Centre Management schemes. In the US, South
Africa and elsewhere they have been widely used as part of public/private
institutional arrangements such as Business Improvement Districts (BIDs)
and City Improvement Districts (CIDs) to filter out people labelled as antisocials and deviants from public spaces (e.g. beggars, street children, racial
minorities). Given the legal status of the operators, usually working under
private contractual relations, concerns have arisen that unaccountable and
prejudiced CCTV operators are attempting to impose their own ‘normative space/time ecology’ on the area surveilled. The use of CCTV systems
in social housing areas has become a growing civil rights issue in the US.
In the UK, concern was recently raised about attempts by local authorities to identify and prosecute litter-throwers and dog-foulers using CCTV
footage. There have also been suggestions there that loudspeaker systems
should be installed alongside the cameras to warn people off offending!
George Orwell, the author of 1984, must be turning in his grave. Serious
doubts have also been raised about their effectiveness for crime prevention: that they do not eliminate fear of crime or even deter it (merely allowing easier arrest) and, more worryingly, that they encourage displacement
of crime to other areas, raising the spectre of total urban surveillance.
The third neoliberal strategy for combating urban violence has been
the privatisation of the police and criminal justice systems in line with
the theory of market enablement. A wide range of public security functions has been ‘offloaded’ onto the private sector including those in prisons, customs, transport, government offices, airports, nuclear installations
and even courts. Christian Parenti’s report ‘Lockdown America’ (1999)
revealed that the private sector in the US ran more than 100 correctional
facilities holding more than 100,000 inmates. The annual growth rate of
privatisation of security in developed countries is running at around 30
per cent per annum and 8 per cent per annum in developing countries
(UNCHS 2007: 14). Complex public/private security relations have been
established through the ‘civilianisation’ of former police functions (e.g. fingerprinting); the development of ‘joint-policing’, ‘hybrid’ agencies and the
direct hiring of police by private businesses. Along with the growing use
of private security by businesses and the rich, this now means that there
are two or three times as many private guards as police officers in many
developed countries. In Russia and South Africa there are over ten times
as many. In South Africa the number of private security guards increased
by 150 per cent between 1997 and 2006 and the number of police decreased
by 2.2 per cent (UNCHS 2007; 14). Some attribute these trends to the emergence of ‘mass private property’ (e.g. shopping malls, gated communities,
privatised installations) which has confused the long-established legal distinction between private and public space.
Criticisms of these policies include their general ineffectiveness; concern over the proliferation of armed, poorly-trained and vetted personnel;
the fear that the private sector has become the senior partner determining
the priorities and direction of policing efforts; concern over the lack of legal clarity surrounding private deterrence and surveillance functions; and
fears that police protection has become a commodity rather than a right.
In the current decade, there has been a major reorientation of the po-
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lice and criminal justice systems more towards the goals and objectives
of political and community enablement rather than just market enablement — though the latter undoubtedly remains the dominant strategy
(Burgess 1998). There are several reasons for this reorientation. The loss
of public confidence in the ability of the authorities to deal with growing
urban crime and violence has been recognised as a major factor behind the
privatisation of security and public space, residential fragmentation and
the increase in vigilantism in low-income neighbourhoods (e.g. in Rio and
Sao Paulo, Kingston, Nairobi, Kano, Johannesburg, Durban and Karachi).
The deleterious economic effects of high rates of urban crime and violence
in the age of global neoliberalism have also been recognised. The repelling
of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), the lowering of property values, the
discouragement of international tourism, and the weakening of urban productivity and global competitiveness have all contributed significantly to
the prioritisation of security issues. Awareness and fear of urban terrorism
have also played their part.
Attempts to make the formal criminal justice, penal and police systems
‘fit for purpose’ have focused on improving wage and welfare conditions
of the police, addressing manpower and skills shortages, providing training and capacity-building, and dealing with the lack of co-ordination
between and within public bodies. There has also been an increased emphasis on the struggle against corruption, public impunity and police and
prison brutality in order to re-establish public confidence in the systems.
Nonetheless, the resources dedicated to these ends generally remain woefully inadequate.
However, the growing trend has been to embrace new approaches to
urban crime and violence that are based on the participation of the population and the state organisations nearest to civil society. The argument
has been that policies should be based more on political and community
enablement involving the devolution of power to local authorities and
community and neighbourhood organisations. This approach has been
developed within the framework of a shift towards ‘governance’ rather
than ‘government’ based on the involvement of ‘both formal and informal
actors in conflict management, the establishment of norms, the protection
of common interests and the pursuit of common welfare’ (UNCHS 2007:
40). In terms of political enablement, it has involved the application of the
‘3Ds’ — democratisation, decentralisation and deregulation.
At a national level, the government would or should: re-establish the
state’s monopoly over the use of force, debureaucratise the justice system,
and provide adequate resources to deal with the structural causes of violence (e.g. poverty alleviation, job training, education, and service delivery). In addition, it would decentralise power to and democratise local
authorities, legitimise community organisations, strengthen constitutional
guarantees of civil rights and the ability of citizens to pursue them, and
increase the rehabilitation elements of social and penal policy. Finally, it
would stimulate a culture of solidarity, tolerance and mutual respect in the
context of ‘markets and democracy’.
At the local level, local authorities would become the central focus for
fighting violence through public/private partnerships and committees
funded by central government. These would bring together and co-ordinate all the ‘stakeholders’ involved in crime and violence issues: the state
and municipal authorities concerned with planning, welfare and rehabilitation; the police and criminal justice organisations; private sector developers, businesses and chambers of commerce; community and neighbourhood-based organisations, NGOs and civil society organisations. In
the 1990s, interest was focused on the Municipal Security Councils and
Community Police Forums that emerged in many South American and
African cities (e.g. Cali, Medellin, Cordoba, Johannesburg and Durban)
and initiatives to restore confidence in the urban justice system, including the increased use of local ombudsmen (e.g. Dakar), ‘penal mediation’
and the establishment of a cadre of legal counsellors for small disputes
settlements. More recently, given the shift towards strategic planning as
the dominant planning style, the emphasis has moved towards the need
for these bodies to develop, in a consensual and inclusive manner, comprehensive and integrated programmes for urban safety and security that
are based on long-term strategies that embody clear goals and objectives.
These programmes would avoid ad-hoc responses and the vagaries of the
political cycle and would be realised through the development of local
community, neighbourhood or transport safety and security action plans
that would be thoroughly evaluated by all concerned.
These approaches are not without their critics. There are complaints
about ‘mandates without resources’, weak police capacity because of the
fragmentation of municipal jurisdictions, problems with co-ordinating
safety and security bodies at different spatial scales, the reluctance of some
organisations (e.g. police, planners and developers) to share information,
and the unequal and exclusive nature of decision making and participation by different stakeholders within the bodies involved.
Measures to encourage community participation in crime prevention
and reduction strategies have taken different forms in different countries.
Police forces have moved in general from a formal ‘command and control’
and top-down approach to a more socially-oriented and softer approach
that supports community-based policing, neighbourhood police stations
(such as Japan’s ‘koban‘ system) and closer connections with local schools,
businesses, residents and community and neighbourhood organisations.
The UNCHS Safer Cities Programme in Africa argues that crime prevention measures should be ‘done with’, rather than ‘done to’, local communities and can be used to build up the social capital and future resilience of
communities to crime and violence.
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The influence of traditional and informal cultural norms, customs, conventions and sanctions on those involved in crime and violence has been
recognised and has led to an increasing use of informal, uniformed volunteer support groups under police supervision (e.g. neighbourhood watch
schemes, community support officers and citizens’ patrols). These have
spread rapidly in low-income settlements in Africa and Latin America.
Informal and traditional cultural practices for conflict resolution, mediation, conciliation and arbitration are similarly being encouraged. Restorative justice based on traditional, tribal or clan-based cultures has grown
and often been encouraged or partially institutionalised. The popularity,
cheapness and efficiency of neighbourhood tribunals such as the Maori
family meetings in New Zealand, the Barangay courts of the Philippines,
Uganda’s Resistance Councils and China’s Popular Conciliation Tribunals
have been noted.
Again, these policies have been criticised based on three main concerns.
Firstly, where public confidence in the authorities is low and the culture
of fear pronounced, these groups can slip into vigilantism and criminal
violence geared to personal or political gain. Secondly, traditional notions
of justice and punishment can blatantly contradict official positions particularly in relation to women and children’s behaviour, domestic violence
and property and family disputes. Finally, it is often very difficult to define
communities by area given their often-great heterogeneity and the diversity of interests within them.
Preoccupations about crime and violence and urban fragmentation
have also led to growing interest in the role of physical, spatial and environmental factors and policies in creating or diminishing social pathologies of crime and violence and the opportunities to commit them. Much
of this interest is rooted in the earlier work of Jane Jacobs (1961) on ‘urban
vitality’ and ‘natural surveillance’ (‘eyes on the street’); Oscar Newman’s
theory of ‘defensible space’ (1972); situational crime approaches developed
in the 1970s (Coleman 1990; Clarke and Mayhew 1980; Clarke 1997); environmental criminology (Brantingham and Brantingham 1991), and Crime
Prevention Through Environmental Design Policies (CPTED) (Colquhoun
2004; Schneider and Kitchen 2007).
The basic argument is that poor urban planning, design and management have increased physical vulnerability to death, injury and loss of
property by creating built environments that generate opportunities for
crime and violence; routine circulation flows for criminals and their victims; extra policing costs and diminished possibilities of arrest. It follows
that good planning design and management polices can enhance urban
safety and security by manipulating the built environment in order to reduce criminal opportunities, police costs and expensive retrofitting in the
future. Spatial and physical factors that are seen to create or reduce opportunities for crime and violence include land use juxtapositions, street
layouts and widths, building and site design, location and spacing of
transport stops and facilities, infrastructure availability and maintenance
(especially lighting), landscaping, and activity and space scheduling.
The planning system is seen to be critical for this endeavour because
urban development is or should be mediated through it. Planning strategies and spatial policy measures that create neighbourhoods based on
urban vitality, informal surveillance opportunities, mixed income groups
and land uses and densities that encourage safety should be encouraged.
Different models have been developed to realise these goals. Urban Integration Plans that integrate crime prevention measures have been developed in South African cities by municipalities in collaboration with communities and neighbourhoods. There, and elsewhere, the private sector
has played a major role in developing plans for restructuring streets, public
space and infrastructure in order to combat crime and violence (e.g. Florida’s Safe Neighbourhood Plans, Business Improvement Districts and City
Improvement Districts). Communities have also received tacit or explicit
planning approval for the gating of developments and the privatisation of
public spaces and streets (e.g. Capetown and Johannesburg). In the UK, a
top-down planning initiative has encouraged local authorities to draw up
development plans that force developers to incorporate security measures
into their proposed developments. Here, strategic planning guidelines are
believed to be more effective than the use of proscriptive regulations and
standards.
The urban design of buildings, projects, spaces and landscapes, it is
argued, should not just be concerned with sustainability, functionality and
aesthetics, but also safety. This means embracing CPTED and situational
crime prevention measures that encourage the natural surveillance of
streets, facilities and open spaces; target hardening; defensible space based
on clear definitions of ownership and use; the lighting of streets, parks and
pathways and landscaping that avoids areas of seclusion and isolation.
Similarly, urban management should consider crime prevention issues in
the maintenance and management of infrastructure and facilities, public
spaces, markets, streets, traffic, parking, waste removal, etcetera.
The importance of locational factors for the incidence of crime and violence has also been recognised — most urban crime is highly localised. The
significance of the ‘where?’ was brilliantly explored by Jorge Luis Borges
in his short story ‘Death and the Compass’. The police detective hero in
pursuit of a master criminal was successfully able to triangulate in advance the precise location of his next crime from the location of his previous crimes — only to find on arrival that it was he who was the intended
victim! The targeting of crime-prone areas and of groups that are at a high
risk of committing or being a victim of crime (particularly women and
young males) has also become more widespread. These measures have
included social prevention policies aimed at extending basic human rights
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for women, the empowerment of women in decision-making, and the
participation of women in local crime prevention measures that recognise
their vulnerabilities (e.g., women’s safety audits). The Toronto Community
Safety Plan (2004) identified and targeted 13 ‘at risk’ neighbourhoods in the
city and developed participatory, holistic and multi-sectoral programmes
addressed to social prevention issues, particularly those of young males.
These included employment-training, provision of youth services, youth
challenge funds, cultural and sports activities, etcetera.
Many of these initiatives in urban crime and violence have been supported or even driven (through aid-leverage) by international organisations. The World Bank, some of the regional development banks and
national aid agencies have tended to favour market enablement, institutional capacity building, anti-corruption and good governance approaches
which have been deeply influenced by neoliberal economic and political
philosophy. The various agencies of the UN, on the other hand, have tended to prioritise recent political and community enablement approaches to
crime and violence using a human rights approach to development and
security that has been strongly influenced by the work of Amartya Sen
(2000). Human security means protecting and expanding the fundamental
freedom of individuals and with it, their capacity to satisfy their material
and nonmaterial needs (development). Under these circumstances, human
security can be considered to be both a human right and a public good.
The UNCHS has expanded this approach to urban crime and violence
(particularly in the Safer Cities Programme) using a framework based on
the concepts of risk analysis (Beck 1999), vulnerability, social capital, good
governance based on local authorities and communities, urban solidarity
and social inclusion. The UNCHS’s Global Campaign on Urban Governance stresses ‘the idea of the inclusive city where all urban inhabitants regardless of economic means, gender, race, ethnicity or religion are able to
participate fully in the social, economic and political opportunities that
cities have to offer’ (UNCHS 2007: 104).
Questions then arise as to whether these two approaches are complementary or contradictory; whether human rights and public good
approaches to urban security can be realised in the context of neoliberal
development strategies and whether all of the policies reviewed here can
diminish or even encourage urban fragmentation.
Urban Fragmentation and the Network City
A wide range of theories has been proposed to explain the process of urban fragmentation and its effects. These theories often differ over what is
meant by or conceived of as the ‘urban’ and therefore what is identified as
being fragmented: the urban structure, the urban form, the system of land
uses, public or private space, the system of cities or the socio-economic and
cultural integrity of the ��
city. Despite these differences three theoretical interpretations of urban fragmentation can be recognised according to their
basic presuppositions about what is ultimately driving socio-economic, political and cultural change and changes to the organisation of urban space:
the first is based on ‘technologically deterministic’ positions; the second
on socio-economic and political explanations and the third elaborates its
explanations for the phenomenon in cultural terms. In reality all three aspects — technology, political economy and culture — are interlinked in
the city but the question of which of them is dominant and determinant
lies at the heart of disagreements over the causes of urban fragmentation.
Currently the most widely discussed and accepted of these theories are the
‘technologically deterministic’ positions associated with Manuel Castells
and the concept of ‘the network city’ (Castells 1989; 1997–1998) and with
Graham and Marvin in their path breaking work ‘Splintering Urbanism’
(2001). I shall briefly outline their main arguments but a fuller analysis
and critique of their position can be found in earlier papers (Burgess 2005;
2006).
Their central contention is that the urban structures and forms inherited from earlier periods are fragmenting and splintering as the spatial
model appropriate for Modernism and Modernization (‘the city as machine’) becomes dysfunctional for the requirements of the emerging global
‘network society’. The new spatial model that emerges (‘the network city’)
is one that fragments and disjoints the single function land use zones and
the multiple hierarchies of networks, grids and public spaces in order to
create a model where land uses and networks are reconfigured according
to the complementarities of the nodes and synergies they generate.
The monocentric and well defined city of single function land uses organised into sectors and rings around a specialised CBD undergoes a sort
of ‘liquefaction’ (Woodroffe et al. 1994) and crystallisation as the old elements, networks and spaces are fragmented, splintered, unbundled and
reconfigured into the spatial model that is functional for the development
of the global network society. In this model the principal structural elements are the spatial nodes interconnected by selected infrastructure ‘circuits’ that guarantee the all-important flows, exchanges and mobility.
The monocentric city fragments in what one observer has called ‘a generalised explosion of urban spaces’ (Lefebvre 1979), and is transformed
into a decentralised polycentric region — a collage of highly-differentiated
zones and spaces which have an ‘enclave’ like character with sharply-defined boundaries and edges. High quality infrastructure systems that run
through vast, relatively disconnected, downgraded or obsolescent areas interconnect them. These are ignored or quickly dealt with when they stand
in the way of the extension of the ‘network city’. This is often achieved by
means of a parallel process of political-administrative fragmentation (ur-
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ban development agencies, town centre management, business, city and
community improvement districts, strategic project zones, etcetera). The
emerging ‘network city’ (understood as a city that is being reconfigured as
a network) has a decidedly ‘lumpy’ and ‘stringy’ character. This has been
called a ‘dumplings and noodles’ model, the emergence of a ‘galactic metropolis’ (Lewis 1983) or the ‘archipelago city’ (Veltz 2000).
The resulting cellular landscape is characterised by the growing intensity and volume of flows between the nodes and enclave spaces and
increased local disconnection and physical differentiation from the ‘problematical’ areas. Although some high-level service functions remain in
the CBD there is a dispersal of activities to peripheral locations linked by
arterial and radial motorways to each other and to ports, railways and
airports. These spaces are served by the highest quality energy, water and
telecommunications infrastructure.
Although these fragmented and enclosed spaces have a specialised
character they are not monofunctional but rather carefully packaged ‘total environments’ that bundle together those uses, services and activities
required to meet the needs of firms, institutions, communities and visitors
locked into the ‘network society’.
On the periphery a landscape of ever larger enclave spaces emerges:
gated, elite housing and condominium complexes; satellite and new
towns; giant shopping malls with packaged residential and work facilities; administrative districts; entertainment, leisure and resort complexes;
office and business parks and logistical zones.
In the inner city the same dialectic of infrastructure unbundling and
rebundling of uses and activities also leads to a process of urban fragmentation. Here the reconstruction of the fragments into introspective enclaves
takes the form of ‘megaproject’ developments produced by international
real estate, architecture, design and planning practices often in public/
private partnerships with local authorities using a ‘project by project’ approach to urban planning. Increasingly they take the form of large strategic projects delivering packaged ‘total environments’ involving atriumed
plaza-style developments and ‘macro-building’ complexes that combine
offices, retail, leisure and cultural activities with gated condominiums or
residential areas. These projects are carefully differentiated from the surrounding city by ‘bypass’ infrastructure connections (electronically-tolled
highways, express train connections); customised high quality telecommunications, energy and water links; universal air-conditioning; private
systems of interconnected skywalks and tunnels and the ubiquitous systems of private security and electronic surveillance.
Thus, in both the inner and outer city these developments involve the
creation of intra-urban spatial barriers that attempt to hermetically seal the
spaces of the new ‘value-added’ individuals and businesses from the ‘low
value’ contiguous urban areas. In these settlements, the integrated and
bundled infrastructure networks have been splintered to provide differential service levels and the existing lay-outs and grids have been laddered
and eroded by the superimposition of limited access highways connecting
the various nodes, clusters and fragmented spaces.
There is another vital dimension to the process of urban fragmentation
associated with the ‘network society’ — and that is its global character.
The emergence of the ‘network society’ (i.e. a society that is increasingly
configured as a network) is identified as a global process. It follows from
this that as the globalisation process deepens and increasingly draws all
parts of the globe into its orbit, then so too does the dialectic of fragmentation and integration occur at all spatial scales. What drives the process at
the local level has a fundamentally global logic — in many cases the new
fragments and enclaves are so completely integrated into the global social
and spatial division of labour that the movement, flows and exchanges
between themselves and the distant nodes and spaces may be greater than
those with the contiguous urban spaces and regional hinterlands. The result is a polynuclear metropolis with sharply defined enclave spaces that
have intensive global economic, social and cultural articulations. These too
are specialised spaces that have been packaged with other uses and differentiated in the manner described above. They include : inner city global financial enclaves; multimedia ‘cyber-districts’; high technology innovation
clusters; export-processing and free trade zones; e-commerce and dataprocessing business parks and global logistics zones around airports, ports
and teleports that are increasingly being built as ‘cities within cities’.
In some developing countries and particularly in East and South East
Asia several of these functions have been spatially bundled together into
huge inner city or peripheral mega-development projects that provide global standard infrastructure and services that allow global lifestyles and
work patterns for the new global class of ‘telemediated digerati’. Everywhere they have been planned with a very sharply defined spatial profile, and in may cases they have been organised to extend the city in the
form of planned corridors along the ‘glocal’ infrastructure connections. In
some cases the result can be a form of spatial ‘bifurcation’ of the urban
structure with the new developments demanding the reorientation of the
whole city’s infrastructure networks (e.g. the Saigon South City development, Pudong in Shanghai).
It is also argued that urban fragmentation has had a profound effect on
the urban form. Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the
development of the capitalist city was intent on breaking out of the nested enclosures of the medieval and feudal cities with their circumferential
walls and ramparts and their enclosed neighbourhoods based on religious,
ethnic and kinship identities. However, the result was also to perpetuate
and consolidate the idea of the city as a ‘bounded spatial container’ with a
clearly-defined edge. No matter whether cities were understood as ‘organ-
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isms’ or ‘machines’ the fact that they were or should be bounded entities
with a clearly defined edge was not in dispute. But under Modernism the
urban form was to be defined by the extension of infrastructure networks
organised as integrated technical monopolies providing a mass, standardised good. Functional land use zoning, master planning and infrastructure
provision planned around the grid would stitch societies together in space
and would impart order, coherence and integrity to the urban form.
With the emergence of the new space-adjusting technologies of the network society and the splintering of the technical monopolies, the notion
of the ‘bounded city’ and the city as a ‘spatial container’ is undermined.
Urban development focuses on the new clusters and their connecting
infrastructures. The cohesion of the city is now derived not from a firm
bounding edge but rather from the connecting tissue. The parts are connected but not as a whole and the form of the city changes. In some cases
radio-centric cities take on a linear or tentacular form (e.g. Curitiba), but
in many cases the result is the creation of regional scale polycentric urban
areas often strung out like beads on transnational corridors which have
an amorphous quality and are no longer ‘bounded’. They become cities
of ‘hubs and spokes’ with a weakened territorial identity with infrastructure put to the service of ‘connectivity’ more than enclosure. As the new
spaces and fragments are connected up to the global hubs and spokes of
the network society the fragmentation of national urban systems occurs as
they are progressively reconfigured and integrated either into an incipient
global urban system or into the emerging urban systems of global trade
blocs.
However, at the local level as global connectivity increases a new cellular form is imported to the urban structure as the global hubs and spokes
attempt to separate and exclude themselves from the surrounding nonglobal spaces. The new hard edges are to be found at this scale — around
the gated communities, self-contained megaprojects, macro buildings and
electronically tolled highways. The city now becomes fragmented by walls,
gates, limited access motorways, private security arrangements and electronic surveillance. Public space becomes privatised, and the ‘void’ areas
residualised and stigmatised as the realm of fear, crime and deviancy only
to be encountered through the car, computer or television screen.
The Implications of Urban Fragmentation for Urban Violence
There have been few attempts to understand urban fragmentation, and
urban crime and violence, in terms of a general theory rooted in globalisation, the network city and the fragmentation of infrastructure. Indeed, the
very issue of urban fragmentation has largely been explained in terms of
crime and violence, and the fear of it. In this interpretation, focused exclusively on residential fragmentation and the fortification and securitisation
of residential space, crime and violence are seen as being dysfunctional
and largely responsible for the creation of a dysfunctional spatial structure.
If you can get rid of or palliate the violence through policy measures, then
you can get rid of or palliate the urban fragmentation. But the broader concept of urban fragmentation associated with the network city and splintering urbanism approaches suggest alternative explanations and scenarios.
In this interpretation, the principal forces responsible for urban fragmentation are the technological, economic, social, cultural, and political processes associated with globalisation and global neoliberalism. These two
forces — globalisation and global neoliberalism — oblige all societies to
adjust the spatial organisation of their cities to accommodate them. Rather
than being dysfunctional, the fragmentation associated with the new spatial model (‘the network city’) is actually functional to the emerging ‘global
network society’. Under these circumstances, how is the relationship between the fragmentation process and urban violence to be understood and
what are the implications for effective crime prevention polices?
Three alternative interpretations suggest themselves. The first is that
crime and violence are in fact reinforcing the evolution of a spatial model
that is functional and must be considered as an inevitable feature of this
spatial reordering (i.e. that networked cities are characterised by a sense
of ‘ambient fear’). The second interpretation is that the crime and violence
associated with urban fragmentation are a temporary phenomenon associated with the spatial transition of the modernist to the global postmodernist city. Finally, the third is that the crime and violence associated
with urban fragmentation are a dysfunctional byproduct of the process of
fragmentation represent a response to it by those who are excluded from
its benefits. Whatever the case, the question of the functionality or not of
urban fragmentation and its significance for social policy is in serious need
of research.
The theory that urban fragmentation is largely a result of crime rates,
and fear of crime and violence, has its inconsistencies. However, there can
be no dispute that these are an important contributory factor particularly
to residential fragmentation. Some of these inconsistencies have been alluded to already, i.e. that enclosure, fortification and surveillance occur in
cities with wide variations in their rates and levels of crime and violence;
that crime rates in the suburbs are low and the differences with non-gated
communities are negligible; that crime and violence are not diminished but
rather displaced; that the reduction of crime is a short-term benefit which
diminishes over time as offenders adjust; that gating and the privatisation
of space have counterintuitive impacts, increasing crime and the psychology and culture of fear. According to Gumpert and Drucker (1998: 429),
‘the more we detach from our immediate surroundings, the more we rely
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on the surveillance of that environment’. However, it offers little by way
of explanation of what lies behind the rising rates, levels and fear of crime
and violence, and focuses on the perceptions, attitudes and values of victims and perpetrators rather than their structural determinants. Moreover,
residential fragmentation of this type is just one element of a broader process of urban fragmentation that affects all land uses and which is rapidly
restructuring cities, particularly those most open to global neoliberalism.
Indeed, the one characteristic that is common to all societies experiencing
urban fragmentation is their exposure to global neoliberalism. To what
extent can the rates, levels and fear of crime be explained in terms of global
neoliberalism?
I should make it clear at the outset that what I call global neoliberalism,
others call globalisation. It is a mistake with serious political and ideological consequences to identify global neoliberalism as the only possible
model for organising globalisation, and then to present the deleterious
consequences of this specific form of political economy as a justification
for attacking globalisation in general. Global neoliberalism is merely one
possible way of organising globalisation. It is equally as wrong to reify globalisation as some blind, abstract, external force that mysteriously forces
cities to do its bidding (similar if you like to Adam Smith’s concept of the
‘hidden hand of the market’). Rather, globalisation (currently in the form
of global neoliberalism) mediates the economic, social, cultural and political forces and factors which have long been held to determine spatial
structures and processes and social and spatial behaviour.
Violence is an historical phenomenon relating to a wide range of psychological, economic, social, political, and cultural processes. As the locus
for these diverse processes, urban conflicts are generally the result of their
combination. Some observers distinguish between ‘structural’ and ‘situational’ factors to explain the great variations in levels of violence globally.
Many believe that the growth in urban poverty and income inequality
are structural determinants of urban crime and violence. Extreme poverty,
overcrowding, widespread homelessness, unemployment and job instability create a context where conflicts are more likely to become violent.
However, poverty does not automatically lead to violence — it can equally
lead to apathy and despair, and many poor societies are less violent than
rich ones.
A stronger causal relationship probably exists with the widening of income inequality that has accompanied neoliberal adjustment policies. A
positive correlation has been noted between the Gini coefficient level and
the incidence of urban crime and violence. The growth of income inequalities since the triumph of global neoliberalism in the 1980s has been startling and nowhere more so than in the cities. In developed countries this
has reversed thirty years of annual declines in these inequalities under the
influence of the Keynesian welfare state and mixed economy models. The
inordinate concentration of wealth in the hands of the top 1 per cent in the
income distribution system is probably the single most significant factor
explaining the ‘auto-exclusion’ of the elites. Where the resulting economic
inequalities correspond to racial, ethnic, religious or cultural differences,
levels of crime and violence can be particularly high. With the highest levels of violent crime and theft occurring amongst the poorest and richest
groups, it has been aptly remarked by one observer that ‘inequality causes
crimes of poverty motivated by need and crimes of wealth motivated by
greed’.
The key problem can be stated as follows: global neoliberalism claims
to be able to solve the problem of poverty by generating a higher rate
of economic growth. This higher rate of growth is based on the creation
of ever-greater inequalities in the distribution of income and assets (or,
as neoliberals put it, through the creation of ‘incentives’). It argues that
poverty is the greater evil and as long as there is socio-economic mobility,
these inequalities are unimportant. Outside of the fact that growth rates
have remained sluggish outside of Asia (where the ‘Asian model’ has prevailed), that the absolute numbers living in poverty have not fallen (now
around 1.4 billion) and that intergenerational social mobility appears to
be slowing down in many developed countries, this is a short-sighted and
fundamentally incorrect assumption. As Alexis de Tocqueville (1835) remarked on the French Revolution: ‘It is not always by going from bad to
worse that a country falls into a revolution. It happens most frequently
that a people that had supported the most crushing laws without complaint throws them off with violence as soon as the burden begins to be
diminished (...). The evils which were endured with patience so long as
they were inevitable seem intolerable as soon as a hope can be entertained
of escaping from them’
Poverty, inequality and the associated injustice in the past have led
to riots, rebellions and revolutions and in the current period are leading
to crime, violence and antisocial behaviour and to racial, ethnic and religious conflicts in those cases where these economic inequalities closely
correspond to these divisions. And outside of the moral issues involved,
the economic consequences of their outbreak are hardly conducive to the
fulfilment of neoliberal economic goals, as so much recent World Bank research has shown.
One line of enquiry argues that violence and a lack of solidarity occur when the pattern and processes of social integration breakdown or
are changing. Proponents of this view look to the way in which neoliberal
policies have undermined the basic social networks and value systems
responsible for social integration (families, households, kinship groups,
communities, neighbourhoods, state and civil society organisations). The
forces recognised to have weakened the socialisation process include the
modification of family structures, particularly the ‘implosion’ of the nu-
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clear family and kinship systems, and the impact of migration on family structures. There has also been the assertion of extreme individualism
and social competition (reflected in Thatcher’s statement that ‘there is no
such thing as society’), manifested in the growing trend to atomisation
and isolation. The effects of unemployment, flexible labour markets and
growing informalisation on class loyalties and organisations has also been
noticed and, indeed, some have argued that the ‘class embedding’ process
has been disrupted to produce ‘chronically disembedded individuals’ full
of class and status anxieties (Bauman 2001, Calhoun 2001). Others point to
the way in which global neoliberalism has generated new class allegiances
in global cities that transcend the ‘national’ definition of class interests —
transnational elites and professional groups, transnational diasporas and
transnational civil society movements (Robinson and Harris 2000; Ben
Rafael 2001). Others identify the rise of urban crime and violence as being associated with a decline in the belief of the legitimacy of the state as
a result of the neoliberal attack on welfarism, its prioritisation of private
business interests, the privatisation of public assets, widespread corruption and the growing inefficiency of its organisational model. According to
some, the trend towards democratisation has increased racial, ethnic and
religious conflicts through the creation of ‘vote-banks’. All of these trends
have made the question of ‘identity’ and its relationship to conflict and
violence the dominant discourse in society, law, and culture and politics in
the current period (Ben Rafael and Sternberg 2001).
Others prefer to see a link between relative deprivation and the cultural
value systems transmitted by global neoliberalism as the main cause of violence. Attention has centred on unequal access to a culture of ‘conspicuous
consumption’ fortified by the cult of celebrity. The absence of horizons, the
profusion of the images and symbols of mass consumption, the increase in
the levels of personal competition and the weakening of community ties
lead frustrated youths to use violence to acquire consumer goods to build
self-esteem and to court respect from peer-groups. Some observers think
this has led to the emergence of a ‘culture of violence’.
Concern has also been expressed about the effects of the promotion of
violence and developed country’s consumption standards by the increasingly globalised mass media. It has been calculated that a child completing
primary school in the US has seen on average 100,000 violent acts and 8,000
murders on TV. Some see a far more pernicious influence of the globalised
media on inducing a psychology and culture of fear: as the cities fragment and space becomes increasingly privatised, ‘the city of the spectacle’
emerges where social experiences are increasingly telemediated, leaving
both victims and offenders ever more dependent on sensationalised reporting and media stereotypes for their understanding of the ‘other’.
Other observers focus on situational factors to explain variations in the
incidence and growth of urban violence, including the availability of al-
cohol, drugs and firearms; differences in levels of protection and policing
methods; and the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. It is in this
theoretical framework that the new spatial initiatives for crime prevention
and the enhanced role of architecture, planning and design within them
are largely being discussed.
Urban Spatial Models and Urban Violence
The broader theory of urban fragmentation brings up a number of spatial
issues that are important for social policymaking and architectural design
and planning practice that are oriented towards crime prevention. The importance given to structural factors as an explanation for the fragmentation process would seem to urge a note of caution regarding the ability
of the more voluntaristic approaches to deal with the issue. On the other
hand, an equal measure of caution must be applied to those ‘quasi-metaphysical’ explanations that suggest that the utility-maximising rationality
of the ‘hidden hand of the global market’ will sort everything out in the
best interests of all, without the need for explicit political action. Cities are
the product of the social organisation of space and they reflect in their spatial structure and dynamics the socio-economic structures and processes
that create them. As societies change, so too does the organisation of space,
and this is essentially what network city interpretations of urban fragmentation assert. Human beings always have and will have the capacity to
change their societies and cities — for better or for worse, but increasingly
within narrower and narrower environmental parameters.
What does seem advisable currently is that we should reconsider in
some depth the significance of the evolving urban forms and structures
associated with urban fragmentation for our understanding of crime and
violence and the policies based on it. There has always been strong conceptual links between our understanding of crime and violence and the sociospatial structures and processes of the city. One thinks here of the influence
of Robert Park and the Chicago School of Urban Ecology (Park et al. 1925).
But the suggestion has been made that thinking about cities in terms of
monocentric, monofunctional zones, rings and sectors no longer offers an
adequate understanding of a city that is increasingly being configured in
terms of polycentricity, corridors, nodes, enclaves, infrastructure circuits
and fragments. What are the implications of these new spatial models for
urban crime and violence and its prevention? This brings up a number of
issues that are relevant for the exploration of this subject:
• The nature of spatial segregation in the fragmented city.
• The significance of density trends for urban crime and violence.
• The question of social exclusion and inclusion in the fragmented city
and the role of human rights based approaches to crime prevention.
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• The significance of urban political and fiscal fragmentation for the
effectiveness of crime prevention policies.
Urban Fragmentation and Spatial Segregation
In this article we have argued for the characterisation of ‘urban fragmentation’ as a spatial phenomenon or process. In this context, it is important to
clarify its relationship to the concepts and realities of socio-spatial segregation. Spatial segregation refers to situations where members of one social
group (races, ethnicities, classes, etcetera) are not distributed uniformly
over space in relation to the rest of the population. The most common indicator is the index of dissimilarity, which is similar to the Gini coefficient of
inequality and produces a theoretical range of values from 0 (no segregation) to 100 (complete segregation).
Urban fragmentation is not coterminous with social and spatial segregation. Spatial segregation existed prior to urban fragmentation and exists
without it. Urban fragmentation probably represents an extreme case of
spatial segregation — it is the current form under which spatial segregation increasingly manifests itself. The sensitivity of the index of dissimilarity depends on the scale of the areal units recognised. Urban fragmentation results in fine-grained segregation. What were once gradients have
now become boundaries. But urban fragmentation cannot be reduced to
residential and areal segregation alone as it affects the totality of urban
land uses and activities and has a dramatic effect also on spatial mobility
and spatial behaviour.
The relationship between socio-spatial segregation and urban fragmentation can also be conceived in terms of the relationship between social and
spatial distance. Tentatively, it can be proposed that in the pre-industrial
city, the social distance was great but the spatial distance was small (e.g.
colonial slave-owning societies). In the industrial city the social distance
became smaller (with the formation of the middle class), but the spatial distance greater (with the rise of socio-spatial segregation). In the fragmented
post-industrial city the social distance has become greater (with greater
income inequality) and the spatial distance has become less. However, the
relationship between accessibility and proximity has broken down under
conditions of urban fragmentation. Urban fragmentation is associated
with physical obstacles and enclosure and ‘lines have been drawn around
spaces that matter’.
An important question that needs to be answered here is whether the
process of segregation in the fragmented city has intensified the segregation of racial and ethnic groups and social classes compared to the pattern established prior to the fragmentation process. Is there a correlation
between the widely reported increases in the indices of dissimilarity and
Gini coefficients and the rate of urban fragmentation? It has been argued
that behind the feelings of personal insecurity and fear of violence that
drive upper and middle class groups into ‘voluntary segregation’ there lie
the sentiments of xenophobia, racism, religious and class prejudices. Cities
become an aggregate of ‘segregated small worlds’ where people can learn
about differences but not from them.
Here the functionality of the urban fragmentation process can be called
into question, but this functionality can only be considered in its own socio-economic and cultural contexts. Similar spatial processes in different
contexts can produce different results. Cellular fragmentation can have
different consequences in a city where ethnic and class relations are expressed in multi-class ethnic columns and spaces (the cultural pluralism
model) than in one where relations are organised on the basis of single
classes and a somatic norm (black or white). Or take the case of what is being fragmented — the pre-existing city. The urban fragmentation school,
revealing its ‘western’ ideological bias, generally takes this as being the
‘modernist city’. But what happens, as in Asia and Africa, when the preexisting city is already based on a set of (often nested) enclosures of neighbourhoods based on religions, ethnic, and kinship identities? Under these
circumstances, the same cellular fragmentation process, rather than being a
dysfunctional rupture, could acquire a greater functionality and be a manifestation of continuity. In China, for example, enclosed neighbourhoods
and walled enclaves have been the traditional settlement pattern for millennia — whether in the form of the ‘jiefang’ system of walled and guarded courtyard housing complexes for extended families and clans or in the
‘dai wei’ system of enclosed ‘work-unit‘ compounds for state employees
during the Maoist period. To these have now been added the gated villa
and condominium complexes for the beneficiaries of ‘market socialism’, in
what appears to be a seamless continuity (Low 2005).
However, one wonders about the wisdom of some network city analysts in identifying the results of fragmentation as a new form of spatial
and social dualism. The contrast is raised between two worlds, which can
be described as a contrast between ‘the happiness in the shadow of a strong
arm’ versus ‘the broken windows’ syndromes. On the one hand, a world
of domesticity, leisure, consumption and global connectivity protected by
walls, locks, gates and surveillance is counterposed to a world of squalor,
danger, poverty and instability in the burgeoning slums and squatter settlements on the other.
The concepts that underpin the notion of spatial dualism are those of
spatial and social polarisation. The concept of spatial polarisation sits rather uneasily with the concept of the ‘network’, and the accuracy of the social
polarisation process as a description of current social trends can be questioned. It was, after all, what Karl Marx argued in the nineteenth century
and it has still yet to happen. There is indeed a huge and widening gap
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growing between the top and bottom of the income distribution system,
but the pattern is more complex than that suggested by the notion of social
polarisation. It is a pattern of the enormous concentration of wealth in the
hands of the top 1 per cent and to a lesser extent the top 10 per cent, the
steady decline in the share of national income going to sections of the middle class and working class, and the growing impoverishment of the rapidly expanding underclass. The new conditions emerging for the middle
class raise the prospect in the near future that they will not be able to afford
the newly-privatised security, education and health services to which they
previously had access.
But, does urban fragmentation lead to the creation of dual cities? In the
1960s and 1970s, the concept of spatial dualism was widely discredited as
being inadequate theoretically (because of its spatial determinism), methodologically (because of the use of ideal types), and empirically (because
of the lack of recognition of articulations). The question is: to what extent
does the revival of dualistic concepts associated with urban fragmentation
(global city/local city) repeat the errors of the past (colonial/native city,
traditional/modern city)?
Urban Fragmentation, Densities and Urban Violence
The relationship between urban densities and social pathologies, including crime and violence, has been discussed continuously since the 1920s.
It has been argued that high densities are closely correlated with rates of
crime and violence, though currently the importance of socio-economic,
cultural and governance conditions has been stressed as being of equal or
greater importance. Some say the most important variable is not so much
density levels as levels of overcrowding. The importance of cultural norms
governing socially acceptable levels of privacy and density is revealed in
the fact that East and South East Asian cities with some of the highest urban densities in the world also have the lowest rates of crime and violence.
There are compelling arguments in the current period to encourage studies
on urban density trends not only because of their significance for urban social policy, but also because densities have a critical importance for energy
use and urban sustainability.
Little is currently known about the relationship between urban fragmentation and these trends. A recent study of Cordoba, Argentina, in the
1990s (Marengo 2008), has demonstrated the relationship between urban
sprawl and the proliferation of large gated communities in the northwest of
the city. Between 1970 and 2001, consumption of land in the city increased
from 130 to 250 square metres per capita and densities as low as 3.6 inhabitants per hectare were recorded for gated communities. Arizaga (2005)
has revealed that in metropolitan Buenos Aires in 2000, 434 private gated
communities housed 500,000 people on 323 square kilometres of land, an
area 1.6 times greater than the Federal District, which houses over 3 million people. Shlomo Angel’s study of global urban density trends revealed
a general process of urban de-densification in the 1990s (Angel et al. 2005).
However, much (including criminal opportunities) depends on the residential typologies used and the amount of open and public space that has
been enclosed. What we need to know is whether the specific process of
fragmented sprawl involves lower or higher densities than ‘open’ sprawl.
A second issue, which could be important for explanations of crime and
violence rates within the barrios and favelas, is whether the general trend
in de-densification (based on averages) conceals a picture where the upper
and middle-income groups are living at ever lower gross densities and the
lowest income groups at ever higher densities.
Urban Fragmentation and Social Exclusion and Inclusion
Increasingly, the concepts of social exclusion and inclusion have been used
to analyse the relationship between urban fragmentation and crime and
violence, and to formulate policies for crime prevention. Social exclusion
can be defined as ‘the lack or denial of resources, rights, goods and services
and the inability to participate in the normal relationships and activities
available to the majority of people in society, whether in the economic,
social, cultural or political arenas’ (Levitas et al. 2006). The conclusion has
been drawn that the fragmented city is a city that is based on exclusionary
practices with deleterious effects to the quality of life of individuals, and
social equity and cohesion.
Urban fragmentation encourages social discrimination and spatial
exclusion in pursuit of a sanitised world of public and privatised spaces
where identity is asserted by regulating out ethnic and social diversity and
difference. In gated communities, this is achieved through the mechanisms
of prices, surveillance, design, rules and regulations, and tax levies. Blakely
and Synder (1997) argue that a major difference between the gated and the
open suburbs is that the former ‘can exclude not only undesirable new
residents, but even passers-by and neighbours from surrounding areas’. In
the enclosed nodes, shopping malls, and business and communal spaces,
security is used as a means to exclude those labelled as undesirable, antisocial and deviant (informal hawkers, the homeless, beggars, street children, racial and ethnic minorities). As one commentator puts it: ‘invisibility
is a crucial feature of modern inequality’ (Wilson 1995).
The consequences of these exclusionary practices, although they have
a rational individual logic, are largely negative for the city as a whole. Reduced access to the use of enclosed and privatised public space has caused
growing concern, and more studies quantifying the extent of its capture are
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required. More than this, urban fragmentation implies the abandonment
of the ideal of the city as a place of encounter, democratic exchange and
universal service provision and its replacement by a world of commodified spaces and networks provided through social competition rather than
in the interests of social cooperation and solidarity. The closure, privatisation and internalisation of the fragmented city undermines the principles
of free openness and circulation. On this basis one could use the theory
of social inclusion/exclusion to provide a definition of urban fragmentation as follows: A spatially fragmented city is one in which the ability to use
and traverse space is dominated by the principle of exclusivity and a reduction in
the number of places of universal encounter. A spatially integrated city is one in
which the ability to use and traverse space is facilitated by the principle of inclusion and the places are conceived as places of universal encounter.
Urban fragmentation blocks opportunities for social encounters with
other groups in public and social spaces. According to the World Bank,
social trust decays with the lack of social interaction and, at a certain point,
this can turn into crime and violence. Others point to the effects of social
and spatial exclusion on social capital and network formation, particularly
in those areas stigmatised as high-risk crime areas (Moser and Lister 1999,
Portes 1998, Putnam 2000).
A considerable body of opinion (including the various UN agencies
concerned with settlement processes) argues for the need for crime prevention policies that are based on the concept of social inclusion involving
‘the elimination of all undesirable forms of social polarisation, discrimination and exclusion’ (Balbo et al. 2003). This goal is to be realised through
recognition of the indivisibility of human rights, including the right to nondiscrimination and the right to an adequate standard of living for all. This
position, although laudable and undisputable, has its own difficulties. The
assertion that ‘cities will not work if they are not inclusive’ (UNCHS 2007:
13) has to confront the question of the long-term functionality or not of
the fragmented network city. There are also no guarantees that increasing
community participation in security issues will not result in a duplication
of the ‘free-riding’ and exclusionary attitudes of the elites and the middle
classes towards their own defensible space and those who they think are a
risk (e.g. migrant workers). And then there is the very serious problem of
how these inclusionary policies are expected to be realised by those who
are so intent on maintaining the neoliberal structural conditions that underpin the fragmented and exclusive city. As Pieterse (2004: 7) has aptly
remarked: ‘It would be a grave error to think that urban integration is not
fundamentally about altering the balance of power between opposing interests in the city’.
Some believe that this can best be achieved by empowering those who
claim rights and entitlements through participatory democracy. Given that
commodified, privatised and unequal access to security threatens the ideal
of equality of treatment, a firm case could be made for the assertion of
‘spatial rights’ to access and use of the city. Unequal access to security is a
form of spatial injustice because it involves the displacement of insecurity
to neighbouring areas. In the fragmented city, the creation of ‘zero tolerance areas’ is inextricably linked to that of ‘no-go’ areas.
Political and Fiscal Fragmentation and Urban Violence
One significant element that has accompanied and facilitated the process
of urban fragmentation has been the political and fiscal fragmentation of
cities, a process that in turn has made it more difficult to formulate and
implement effective crime prevention policies.
This process is not exclusively associated with fragmentation per se.
But spatial fragmentation has created new forms of political and fiscal
fragmentation, which have complemented and complicated the already
serious problems associated with the municipal fragmentation of the postwar period linked to suburbanisation and urban sprawl. In the US, for
example, between 1942 and 1992 the number of autonomous municipalities and special districts doubled from 24,500 to 50,834. In 1950 there were
168 metropolitan areas (defined in terms of census tracts) governed by 193
municipal organisations. By 1990 these same 168 metropolitan areas were
governed by 9,600 municipal organisations and the total number of metropolitan areas had increased to 320 (Powell and Graham 2002: 80). As the
process of suburban sprawl unfolded, the states authorised the creation
of thousands of individual, autonomous local governments with powers
to establish their own boundaries and to formulate and implement land
use, taxation, education, and service provision policies. A similar process
of municipal fragmentation has characterised post-war urban growth in
cities around the world and has become a major problem for effective urban planning. It has also generated its own problems as local authorities
have sought to expand their tax base, to externalise social costs and to
exclude racial and ethnic minorities. In the US, the ‘local power to exclude’
through manipulation of local zoning and land use codes (minimum lot
sizes and bans on multifamily housing) has been described as ‘the most
significant obstacle to the achievement of full civil rights for African-Americans’ (Powell and Graham 2002: 80). By 1990, two thirds of whites were
living in the suburbs and two thirds of African-Americans in central city
locations, which became areas of concentrated poverty. Suburbanisation
was thus inextricably linked to the creation of the ghetto and the slum, and
the greater the degree of political fragmentation, the greater the economic
and ethnic segregation.
To this pattern of municipal fragmentation there has now been added a
completely new layer of political and fiscal fragmentation associated with
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neoliberal governance policies related to the new process of fragmented
urban development. These include the official or ‘de facto’ recognition
of the transfer of powers to residents’ associations in gated communities
in areas such as security and taxation for local improvements. There has
also been the rapid growth of Business Improvement Districts (BIDs), Safe
Neighbourhoods, City Improvement Districts, Common Interest Developments, Transport Improvement Districts, etcetera, where local property
owners and businessmen, sometimes operating in the form of public/private partnerships, are allowed to take over local security and local service
provision by raising local levies initially in the inner city, but increasingly
also in suburban areas. There have also been developed new institutional
forms such as Urban Development Corporations and Agencies, which
have abrogated the powers of local authorities to develop and benefit from
often-huge strategic urban projects in their areas.
The long-term consequences of this process of fiscal and political fragmentation have yet to be revealed, but a number of concerns have been
raised. These include the creation of streetscapes that modify public spaces,
streets, street furniture and utilities in ways that symbolise the secession
of powers; the development of secessionary infrastructure networks that
facilitate the interests of private companies intent on splintering the infrastructure, in order to maximise profits; and the sanitisation of city centres
(‘malls without walls’) by private or semi-public groups intent on displacing ‘undesirables’ from public spaces. The delegation of powers to community and private groups can quickly get out of control as neighbouring
areas, often suffering from the displacement effects of their neighbours’
actions, claim similar rights (the ‘snowball effect’). In addition, communities that have acquired security powers frequently delegate these powers
to large private security firms controlling large parts of the city, which are
now distanced even further from public accountability.
The granting of powers to local communities to raise tax levies for local improvements and the increasing reliance on local ‘project-based’ taxes
(e.g. plusvalia taxes in strategic urban projects) have raised fears of the collapse of the ‘one city, one tax base’ principle as local communities opt out
of local taxation.
Finally, the ability to create integrated multisectoral municipal plans to
deal with issues such as security becomes more and more difficult as the
number of self-interested jurisdictions increases. Equally as challenging is
the creation of metropolitan-wide governments necessary for rational and
effective planning and law enforcement.
My paper has tried to explore some aspects of the network city approach to urban fragmentation for crime and violence and clearly there is a
need to develop research in this field further in several areas. One research
avenue that immediately suggests itself is the significance of urban fragmentation and the attendant pattern of crime and violence for the position
of women in the city and for concepts such as the gendered city. It is hoped
that this paper can help those willing to pursue these research goals.
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Without Violence against Women, Would Cities Be Safe for All?
Lia Zanotta Machado
T
he lack of safety and increasing violence characteristic of contemporary modern societies have become constant features of almost all
cities in the world, although unevenly distributed among regions. Often,
there is no correlation between perceptions of insecurity and actual levels
of violence; however, there are occasions when fear and the possibility of
being a victim of some form of violence are more directly linked. Violence
occurs daily in different guises and, as such, constitutes a challenge regarding the future of modern societies and the prospects of citizens’ right
to safe cities.
Traditional Forms of Violence
and Their Persistence through Time
Currently, violence exists not only in its most traditional manifestations,
but also in new forms of ‘ultra-violence’ that are infiltrating the urban
landscape. There are numerous examples of these modern-day varieties
of ‘ultra-violence’. Firstly, there is the violence associated with organised
crime and drug trafficking at local, national and international levels. Secondly, there is the continuous use of illegitimate violence by state security
bodies as a function of different degrees of collusion with organised crime;
this despite the fact that these security bodies are precisely those responsible for the use of legitimate physical force. A third example is those forms
of violence stemming from the proliferation of security networks. Finally,
there are manifestations of individual or group violence characterised by
Lia Zanotta Machado is senior lecturer at the Human Sciences Institute, Department of
Anthropology, University of Brasilia, and researcher in the Study and Research Nucleus on
Women, Brazil. A member of the Feminist National Network of Health, Sexual Rights and Reproductive Rights (Rede Nacional Feminista de Saúde, Direitos Sexuais e Direitos Reprodutivos), Ms Machado specialises in the areas of gender, violence and feminist studies.
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an indiscriminate search for victims or, conversely, by the selection of targets considered to be strategic in terms of gaining visibility, creating spectacle or generating submissiveness through fear. Examples of these are
mass killings in subways, schools, movie theatres and malls, all of which
may be seen as the end result of new, impersonal forms of sociability that
have trivialised violence, precisely because they have distorted perceptions of the Other.
Despite these new manifestations of ‘ultra-violence’, it should be recognized that in all of Latin America and the Caribbean, violence endures
in its traditional forms, which are still highly tolerated. Such is the case
regarding those acts and behaviours labelled as ‘violence against women’,
especially those in the private realm that were formerly accepted as legitimate and legal modes for male household heads to ‘correct’ their wives
or mistresses. To reiterate, these forms of violence were not just condoned
by common sense; rather, they were legally inscribed in the Portuguese
Manueline Ordinances (sixteenth century) and Philippine Ordinances
(seventeenth century) of colonial Brazil, just to cite one example. Likewise,
men were justified in murdering women accused of infidelity or fighting
duels in response to the slightest defamation or slander based on codes of
honour that were highly valued in the past. Thus, if on the one hand there
is a legacy of masculine challenges of honour and disputes regarding family heritage, on the other, there is the reality that women are subordinated
by their husbands or intimate partners. Even today, ‘crimes of passion’ are
frequently committed and accepted by men, and the traditional forms of
violence mentioned above continue to enjoy a high degree of social and
state tolerance. Despite the fact that the data to be cited in this text correspond to Brazilian cases, to a greater or lesser degree, they reflect situations that are common to all of Latin America.
The persistence of traditional forms of interpersonal violence is at the
root of the significant amount of aggressive acts (bodily injuries, threats
and verbal abuse) commonly inflicted upon women in the private, domestic, family-oriented sphere. Nevertheless, these offences are deemed
irrelevant by the police and judicial system, and, as such, are integrated as
common sense by a great part of society. Meanwhile, according to research
carried out in 2001 by the Perseo Abramo Foundation in 187 Brazilian municipalities, every fifteen minutes a woman is victim of violence.
It is well known that the greater vulnerability and lack of safety that
women experience take place in the private sphere. When feminicides
occur, they are carried out within the domestic sphere by husbands, lovers,
boyfriends, or former lovers or boyfriends. Research conducted by the National Movement of Human Rights (Movimento Nacional de Direitos Humanos, MNDH) on newspaper articles published in Brazilian capital cities
between 1995 and 1996 demonstrated that husbands, intimate partners,
lovers, boyfriends, and all manner of exes, represented 66.29 per cent of
Lia Zanotta Machado / Without Violence against Women...
the total number of defendants in cases with female victims. The accused
were blood relatives or in-laws in 16.19 per cent of the cases, and 14.80 per
cent were people ‘known’ to the victim: bosses, employees, co-workers,
rivals, neighbours, friends or foes. Among the accused, only 2.71 per cent
were ‘people unknown to the victims’. During those two years, female represented 10 per cent of the total number of homicide victims (Oliveira et al.
1998; Machado 1998).
Interpersonal violence based on traditional forms of conflict resolution is common in homicides perpetrated by people known to the victim
and has a high incidence among men. Referring again to the research by
MNDH (1995–1996), of the 90 per cent of homicides involving men, 46.19
per cent (of which there is information regarding the aggressors) were performed by people known to the victims.
Men represent both the highest percentage of homicide victims (90 percent) and perpetrators (97 per cent of the total). Young men in particular are those who kill and die the most. In general, male homicides take
place in public space. According to MNDH research, while 12.34 per cent
of the total murders (including male and female homicides) occurred in
residences, the remaining 78.01 per cent took place in public spaces (streets,
buildings, work places, and uninhabited sites with difficult access that, on
their own, accounted for 5.86 per cent). In 9.56 per cent of the cases there
was no information available.
The research using newspaper articles made it possible to simultaneously observe tendencies related to both defendants and victims. Also
highly valuable are data from Brazil’s Ministry of Health, which can be
used to record increases of victimisation in the country. Based on information regarding the total number of homicides documented in the Mortality Information System (Sistema de Informação sobre Mortalidade, SIM),
and provided by DATASUS (Database of Brazil’s public healthcare system,
Sistema Único de Saúde, SUS), in 2003 there were 28.9 deaths for every
100,000 people. In western European countries, the figure was three intentional deaths for every 100,000 inhabitants; and in the United States, five
to six for each 100,000 inhabitants. According to the statistics on the total
number of deaths caused by external causes (including all types of accidents and suicides), it can be inferred that violence and a lack of safety increased in Brazilian cities. From 1980 to 2003, deaths due to external causes
rose from 59.0 per 100,000 inhabitants to 71.6.
During 2003, the data on mortality in Brazil’s capital cities indicate
similar tendencies regarding the rates of victimisation causing death for
men and women, that is, markedly higher mortality rates for men than for
women (Souza and Carvalho de Lima 2006). Female mortality in the capitals of the Northern region varies from 3.1 (Belém) to 7.3 (Porto Velho) for
every 100,000 inhabitants, while male mortality ranges between 39.5 (Palmas) and 93.6 (Porto Velho). In Brazil’s Northeast, homicides of women
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fluctuate between 1.8 (João Pessoa) and 7.0 (Recife), whereas those of men
fall, between 37.2 (Natal) and 134.6 (Recife). In the Southeast region, the
figures for women vary between 5.3 (Vitoria) and 6.9 (Belo Horizonte),
and for men between 91.7 (Sao Paulo) and 111.3 (Vitoria). In the Southern
region, the range for homicides of women is between 2.1 (Florianopolis)
and 4.4 (Curitiba), and for those of men from 52.1 (Florianopolis) to 58.0
(Porto Alegre). In Central-western Brazil, homicides of women go from
3.9 (Campo Grande) to 8.4 (Cuiabá), and of men from 53.4 (Goiania) to
86.0 (Cuiabá). Although the highest rates of homicides of men and women
sometimes occur in the same cities, violence rates vary greatly among regions, and even within them. This variability corroborates the idea that the
causes of violence are multiple and multifactorial.
The data cited above confirm the strong, crosscutting presence of what
I call ‘traditional interpersonal violence’. This is founded in subjective cultural values regarding long-term gender relations that have built and rebuilt male and female identities according to an ethos that legitimates and
tolerates the resolution of interpersonal conflict through violence. Within
this culture, men are expected to challenge each other and control ‘their’
women. From another viewpoint, a comparison of statistics on intentional
deaths in European and Latin American countries shows that, in the
former, the use of traditional forms of violence to solve personal conflicts
is less frequent (probably due to a more consolidated history of citizenship
related to the Welfare State). Likewise, organised crime and trafficking in
drugs and persons have a relatively lesser impact in European countries,
and the use of institutionalised violence in cities is also less predominant.
In the Latin American cities of modernity, the legitimacy attributed to
challenges of honour between men and that associated with the physical
discipline used by men to ‘correct’ women is equated with the masculine
values of courage, audacity, and power. These values have spread and
flourished in public and private spaces, both fuelling and fuelled by new
forms of violence characteristic of organised crime and the often brutal reactions of police forces. Currently, interpersonal challenges of honour take
place within corporations, businesses and rings of organised crime and
trafficking in drugs and persons. In regards to drug trafficking, women
not only assist their male companions, they are also considered to be ‘war
trophies’ and, thus, are the preferred victims of body injury and sexual
assault for the enemies of their male counterparts. In human trafficking
organisations, women are both accomplices in ‘the recruitment, transportation, and/or harbouring of persons for the purpose of exploitation, typically for sexual exploitation or forced labour’,1 and victims or victimised
1 Department of Justice, Canada, ‘Trafficking in Persons. What is Human Trafficking’,
http://www.justice.gc.ca (accessed 27 August 2009).
‘commodities’. In their role as mothers of traffickers, they become the object of their offspring’s threats and responsible for their children’s sons and
daughters.
A Lack of Safety and Violence
In the economically underprivileged countries of the so-called global
south, a lack of safety, or the ‘culture of fear’, is treated as a direct response
to the forms of aggression that exist. Nonetheless, the culture of fear is
also a social construct based on a symbolic imaginary that is not always
addressed in reports of violence or observable when incidents of violence
take place (Izumino and Neme 2002).
Maps of urban violence serve to pinpoint the most violent neighbourhoods and districts in an area, and, as a result, they also label them as places controlled by a lack of safety and fear. Statistically, these maps show the
uneven distribution of charges filed for serious crimes both against people
(homicides, thefts, rapes and other forms of sexual aggression) and against
material property. However, this uneven distribution of crimes and crime
reports in different cities and neighbourhoods is not duly linked with urban density, poverty, human development indexes, social inequality or
social disorganisation. Sociological explanations have never been clearly
established and comparative research in different metropolitan regions
produces varied results, proof of the multifactorial nature of the various
types of violence that exist. (See, among others, Soares 2004.)
However, I believe the most productive correlation that maps of violence could explore, which is not currently prioritised, is the relationship
between a well developed infrastructure of public services (education,
health care, sports and recreational activities), better working conditions,
and lower rates of violence. I deem this line of inquiry to be more productive because it could contribute to the creation of public policies that lead
to a reduction in violence and unsafe conditions.
Maps showing the spatial distribution of different types of urban crime,
more specifically, those that have been disaggregated according to homicides and thefts, indicate that although robbery is prevalent in all areas of
Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia and other capital cities, it is especially
common in regions and localities that are better off socio-economically.
Conversely, homicides are concentrated in areas characterised by a lower
socio-economic level. This sort of less precise, generic mapping is capable
of illustrating the disproportionate vulnerability of different areas, as evidenced by the statistical comparison of murders in ‘wealthy’ and ‘poor’
neighbourhoods.
The widespread ‘culture of fear’ embedded in common sense is not
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always related to the places where crimes actually happen. The culture
of fear indiscriminately identifies all poor neighbourhoods as dangerous
places. In particular, it emphasises those neighbourhoods that have a recent history (are newly formed) and are spatially disorganised. Places distinguished by difficult access, isolation from densely inhabited districts
and poor lighting are treated as the prototypical unsafe location. However,
analysis demonstrates that homicides of men do not solely occur in isolated places, but also in public places. Homicides of women, on the other
hand, most frequently occur in their homes and are committed by family
members. The relative consistence between feelings of fear and actual experiences of violence, crime and other legal offences must be understood
as a warning signal and carefully heeded, given that some truly violent
and dangerous places are not treated as such, while others are considered
to be highly unsafe without actually demonstrating a high incidence of
violence.
Violence against women who are not known to the offender apparently
takes place more often during the night in places of difficult access that
are uninhabited and scarcely lit and, therefore, in public sites. However,
as mentioned before, it must be remembered that most feminicides, rapes
by people known to the victim, as well as body injures and all manner
of verbal abuse and insults, take place in the private sphere. Residential
spaces associated with the family have become increasingly important in
this regard. Nevertheless, we cannot conclude that public spaces are safe
for women just because homicide rates of females are relatively low. The
reality is that public spaces are so unsafe for women that many are deterred from being out at certain hours, or from using certain places at any
time of the day. It is women who suffer the most restrictions to their use
of space. Thus, according to a hegemonic perspective of safety/a lack of
safety based on the unequal construction of feminine and masculine identities, the argument is that it is often not, and sometimes never, appropriate
for women to be out at night.
In the mental maps that women construct of their neighbourhoods
and cities as a means to identify safe routes for themselves, their children
and relatives, they are more sensitive to the distinctive characteristics and
impacts of spatial distribution than is the case with men. This is a consequence of the fact that women are still almost exclusively responsible
for domestic tasks, which requires that services are available in the near
vicinity of their homes and that they have adequate access to said services.
Considered from the viewpoint of safety, this means that the routines demanded by their duties make women more able than men to draw maps
of public services that would make their neighbourhoods safer places. In
essence, when it comes to safety, male and female perspectives translate
into different sensibilities related to the issue. On one hand, there is the culture of women as ‘caretakers’, protectors of themselves and their children
in the face of needs and dangers. On the other hand, men are supposed
to be ‘courageous’, with the result that they are less sensitive towards the
danger of some streets and alleys, or the lack of urban infrastructure or
facilities close to their homes.
The common sense born from the ‘culture of fear’ erroneously maintains that poverty produces violence. However, it is true that, in most cases,
both poor and impoverished neighbourhoods are typified by a lack of urban infrastructure in terms of schools, health care services, police stations,
support centres for women, social assistance centres, illuminated streets,
public transport at different times of day with known stops and routes,
street signs, state institutions. Moreover, a deficiency in any of these conditions favours a lack of safety and increased violence.
Urban transformations lead to impersonal relationships and to a nostalgic yearning for traditional forms of social cohesion that ignores the violence against women and among men that permeated traditional social
relations. Often it is expected that by virtue of being organised, a community will be able to prevent violence. However, neither abstract forms
of violence, nor uniform communities actually exist. The forms of violence
that impact local communities are diverse, as are the political interests and
wills opposing them. Moreover, these forms of violence do not affect the
entire community in the same way; rather, they have differentiated effects
on community relations. For instance, different groups might reach consensus regarding the search for alternatives to cope with drug use and
trafficking; however, they could disagree on actions proposed to prevent
robbery, solve interpersonal conflicts, obtain certain public services for
neighbourhoods and localities, or even deter violence against women.
In contemporary Latin American cities, different cultural and moral
logics intertwine and overlap, manifesting themselves as distinct ‘temporalities’: the traditional, social relations-based world of honour versus
the modern and individualistic world of rights. The latter is based on the
notions of individual rights and democracy, which are unevenly distributed among different social classes, and fosters the ultra modern values
of freedom, production of self-image and the short–term fulfilment of ‘the
pleasures of the senses and success’. However, these values, which have
been most successfully achieved in the ‘developed’ societies of the North
via the constitution of subjects of rights and ‘interiorised’ subjects, seem
to be in danger. What jeopardises them is a process of ever-increasing desensitisation in relation to difference and the self-exaltation of individuals
seeking to identify themselves with spectacular images. The positive value
ascribed to the ‘warrior ethos’ fuels the underlying tradition that links, on
the one hand, places of masculinity and power with, on the other, control
of the feminine through a type of male rivalry that exalts action and aggression in the ‘relational world of honour’. The twofold nature of genderbased violence, i.e. as violence against women and violence between men
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in the form of challenges (recalling, for instance, medieval duels), cultivates
and structures other forms of violence and legitimates this warrior ethos.
This ethos is also present in the culture of demonstrating strength, and in
the organisation of small or large groups marginally involved in crime,
as well as those clearly implicated in illegal activities related to drug trafficking. These are the same groups that nowadays control both small and
large areas in a number of Latin American cities (Machado 2004). Thus,
the concept of virility ingrained in imaginaries related to rape and codes
of honour since time immemorial, is now emerging in new forms and in
accordance with new possibilities. The glorified exteriorsation of subjectivities is a contributing factor to the emergence of a hard and theatrical/
dramatised form of violence. Many young men wear masks of aggressiveness and violence as if they themselves were not involved, and their acts
were merely part of an elaborately staged event.
Violence against women is still not addressed in policies targeted at
preventing violence in cities. In order to confront domestic violence, it is
necessary to include institutions such as qualified social assistance centres,
police forces and judicial bodies. There is also the need for institutions capable of engendering the rejection of violence against women among the
general population and organisations responsible for advocacy that take
on these issues in urban areas. All of these entities must be coordinated
and include the participation of women’s associations, women’s groups at
the neighbourhood level, and feminist movements.
It is possible that a belief in equal rights for all and the search for new
forms of partnership, of coming together, of recognition and solidarity will engender better strategies for dealing both with different forms
of violence, as well as gender inequality. Precisely because gender-based
violence is tolerated and practically legitimated, it fuels, shapes and links
different manifestations of urban violence, both traditional and modern. It
will only be possible to create safer cities for all if values related to unequal
gender relations and the glorification of violence as a proof of masculinity
are dealt with directly.
References
Briceño-León, Roberto. 2002. La nueva violencia urbana de América Latina. Sociologias (Porto Alegre) 4(8) (July/Dec.): 34–51.
Izumino, Wânia Pasinato, and Cristina Neme. 2002. Violência urbana e
graves violações de direitos humanos. Revista Ciência e Cultura (São
Paulo) 54(1) (July/Sept.): 46–49.
Machado, Lia Zanotta. 1998. Matar e morrer no masculino e no feminino.
In Oliveira, Geraldes, Barbosa de Lima 1998: 96–121.
————. 2004. Masculinidades e violências. Genero e mal-estar na sociedade contemporânea. In Masculinidades, org. Mônica Raisa Schpun.
São Paulo: Boitempo. Also in Série Antropológica 290, pp. 1–33, Departamento de Antropologia, Instituto de Ciências Sociais, Universidade de Brasilia, 2001.
Oliveira, Djaci David, Elen Cristina Geraldes, and Ricardo Barbosa de
Lima, orgs. 1998. Primavera já partiu. Retrato dos homicídios femininos no
Brasil. Brasilia: Movimento Nacional de Direitos Humanos (mndh) / Ed.
Vozes.
Soares, Maurílio José Barbosa. 2004. Relação entre desigualdades sócioeconômicas e a violência urbana: o caso das Regiões Metropolitanas
da Baixada Santista e de Campinas. XIV Encontro Nacional de Estudos
Populacionais. Caxambu, Associação Brasileira de Estudos Populacionais
(abep).
Souza, Edinilsa Ramos de, and Maria Luiza Carvalho de Lima. 2006. Panorama da violência urbana no Brasil e suas capitais. Ciência & Saúde
Coletiva (Rio de Janeiro) 11(002) (April/June): 363–373.
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.
Regaining Trust, Recovering the City
Marta Román Rivas
I
have always been somewhat reluctant to talk about safety, feeling
like you do upon entering a maze where what appear to be exits are
nothing but blind alleys or false doors. I wonder how to focus attention on
safety without playing along with those who want to instil fear in people
and obsess them with the idea of cities devastated by a lack of safety. Does
it not seem suspicious that the most conservative voices adopt the word
‘safety’ as a battle cry, sacrificing basic rights in its name?
Before discussing how urban planning can contribute to collective safety, I need to redefine and broaden the concept of safety itself. As María
Naredo (2001) writes, allies of safety, such as trust, freedom and solidarity must be recovered, thereby distancing oneself from those who reduce
safety to the struggle against criminality with the effect of limiting possible
solutions and circumscribing the actions of those actors involved.
Women should thoroughly review all constructs regarding safety, because fear has been an efficient tool for oppression and control that has
paralysed them and undermined their freedom and autonomy.
Following an analysis of the spatial segregation of Muslim girls and
women, Cindi Katz (1993) concluded that fear serves the same purpose
in the Western world as the purdha1 does in Muslim countries: it restricts
women’s and girl’s free access to public space. The perverse aspect of this
restriction in the West is that it does not actually constitute an explicit prohibition, as in Muslim societies. Rather, it is assumed to be an individual
sacrifice and withdrawal, thus occluding its collective nature and consequently women’s capacity to participate in the public sphere.
Marta Román is a geographer and co-founder of the Women Urban Planners Group, Madrid. She is an expert in gender studies, participatory social processes and environmental issues, with experience in research projects on women at work and the role of children in cities.
She has carried out projects aimed at incorporating gender mainstreaming in urban planning,
in collaboration with both women’s associations and public administrations.
1 “Purdha” is a word of Persian origin that signifies ‘curtain’ and that makes reference
to the physical concealment and spatial segregation of women in Muslim societies.
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Fear is a paralysing poison introduced gradually in small doses throughout childhood by way of loving messages such as ‘be careful’, ‘never trust
strangers’, and that, from time to time, takes the form of shock treatments
via frightening news. Fear acts as an echo chamber for that ancestral discourse according to which the association woman/street refers to those
who are in the wrong place or at the wrong time in regards to what befits
them. With this in mind, a project on safety that took place in Ondarroa
(Basque Country) is illuminating. Of all the women who participated, it
was those working in the fish processing industry out in the city at dawn
who were the only ones to claim they felt no fear, versus the majority of
women who said they would be afraid walking through those same places
at the same hours (Alonso 2008). Could it be that the act of labouring in
a socially acceptable activity legitimates their presence in the streets, and
thus contributes to reducing fear? Or, in other words, are we afraid because
we have come to accept that there are places where we do not belong?
Entrance into the Public World
Since we were very young, we women have entered urban space in compliance with the internalised norm that our safety substantially depends
on our behaviour, from the way we dress to the places we frequent and
the times of day we are out. The strategies we adopt for the sake of safety
are often as victimising as crime itself: locking ourselves inside, avoiding
particular places or not going where we would like.
The difference between being a girl versus being a boy translates directly to how children are familiarised with the streets of the city. Research
on the subject shows that parents are much more permissive with boys
than with girls. At an earlier age, boys are allowed to go out by themselves,
return home later or go farther away from home. A study on child mobility showed that one in three nine-year-old boys is allowed to ride his bike
alone, while the same applies to only one in nine girls (Hillman, Adams,
and Whitelegg 1990). This is not related to any difference in the physical
or sensorial capacities of boys and girls, but to the different perceptions
of danger on the part of adults and society as a whole. The fear of girls
being sexually assaulted is one of the main factors limiting their freedom.
Although the kind of games that boys play often put them at great risk of
being run over, participating in fights, falling and getting bruised, etcetera,
and although they can also be victims of sexual assaults, girls continue to
be more controlled and protected than boys.
Marta Román Rivas / Regaining Trust, Recovering the City
Bedtime Stories to Keep You Awake at Night
It would seem, then, that fear is not rooted in real data or facts; instead, it
is fuelled by collective myths that should be scrutinised under a new light.
The fear of strangers, of unknown people, of the ‘wolves’ and monsters
mentioned in fairy tales does not correlate with the greater risks of aggression faced by women in their immediate surroundings. The truth is that
assaults on women often come from those they are closest to and in the
‘refuge’ of their own homes, not in the streets where they feel unsafe.
While discussing the concealment of violence in the domestic sphere,
Teresa del Valle (2006) questions the sacralised image of the family as an
institution: ‘It is very difficult for women to talk about abuse: to reveal
aggression is to break away from the generally accepted notion of family
as the place where affection and unconditional support prevail (…). It is
easier to make violence visible in the more neutral space of the street’. Not
only is it easier; when the domestication of women is the issue, it is much
more efficient to exaggerate the dangers in public space, and play down or
conceal violence that takes place behind closed doors. These two processes
are not unconnected, they complement and fuel each another.
Without references and narratives that help to unmask the wolves hidden behind known faces, faces intermingled with myths of romantic love,
many women who suffer violence at home find it difficult to recognise
abuse as such. They end up doubting their own perceptions and accepting that they are the cause of the problem, instead of identifying a reality
so vastly different from everything they have been told. Indeed, there is
not only a cloak of invisibility covering abuse on the level of narrative, but
mistreatment also becomes invisible on a physical level — the extreme privatisation of life, the compartmentalisation of spaces, and the loss of places
for socialising and developing social relations all favour this dissimulation. If the social environment breaks down, if public space is emptied of
its substance and if all you can count on are private relations, insecurity
becomes devastating when these fail. There are no external sources of help
to turn to, or it becomes harder for the social sphere to exert a healthy form
of control, since this is considered an intrusion into others’ lives.
Danger and Risk
This overview of meanings regarding safety must include a differentiation between two notions that are often misconstrued: danger and risk.
The example of children and city traffic is enlightening, as demonstrated
by the triangular or rhomboidal traffic sign that depicts a boy and a girl.
According to established codes for road safety, this is a warning sign that
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indicates the existence of danger or unforeseen threats related to the proximity of minors. By combining in the same sign the concepts of danger, as
that which can produce damage, loss or pain, and risk, as the probability
of injury, damage or loss, victims are ultimately considered to be at fault.
To put the focus on a sixty-pound child running after a ball, or a couple of
children carrying their book bags, instead of on a one-ton steel machine
moving at full speed, is to divert the origin of the problem and to encourage the idea that children should not walk the streets freely, because they
are considered to be a ‘hazard’.
According to this same logic, women are frequently considered to be
guilty after being assaulted, on the grounds that they were wearing ‘provocative clothes’2 or were in ‘unsuitable’ places at the wrong time of day.
If female victims are to be believed, they must have a record of flawless
behaviour, since they will only be considered as victims if they have put up
the strongest resistance to the perpetrator and have irreproachable morals.
A paradigmatic example of the above tendency is the case of prostitutes
who, being deemed ‘public women’, become free game and are relegated
to the margins of established safety systems.
Broadening the Concept of Safety
A broadened concept of safety clearly distinguishes between sources of
danger and situations of risk, and never attributes blame to the victim.
Furthermore, it includes aspects that go beyond criminality, such as those
related to environmental quality and freedom of movement in space for all
citizens, not only for adults with cars. From this viewpoint, safety comprises a wide range of closely related issues. It does not simply imply not being
robbed or bothered in the street; safety is also about being able to breathe
comfortably because you are not being poisoned by city air, and walking
the streets at your own pace without the risk of being run over.
The seizure of our streets from large collectives of individuals who cannot cope with traffic has occurred quietly and surreptitiously. Autonomy
and freedom of movement have been drastically reduced for children living in urban environments, and things permitted thirty years ago for those
under seven, are now postponed until they are ten (Hillman, Adams, and
Whitelegg 1990). Older people and those challenged in any way also confront a hostile environment that greatly hinders their autonomy. Traffic
represents a danger particularly for older people, and although this group
2 Sadly, the ‘miniskirt ruling’ is a famous example of blaming the victim. A court ruled
that the 17-year-old girl who had been assaulted ‘might have provoked, albeit innocently,
businessman J.F. with her clothing’.
represents 16 percent of the total population in Spain, 46 percent of pedestrians killed in urban areas are older than 65.3
Cities cannot, without suffering repercussions, do without the presence
of children and of all those who, incapable of moving safely in the middle
of traffic, find themselves excluded from urban life. The point is not only
to safeguard a fundamental right of those excluded groups, but also to protect the very essence of city. The expulsion of vulnerable groups from our
streets is closely related to a collective lack of safety and insecurity.
The bustle of urban life, the predominance of cars and the scarcity of
places to socialise are obstacles to the creation of social relations and networks. Since no one presently uses sidewalks as a place to sit down, chat,
run or jump, streets are almost exclusively becoming spaces for transit.
Nobody enjoys or appropriates them, and concomitantly, social control
over public space is on the decline, as is collective safety. The dominance
of cars constitutes a downward spiral that must be reversed. Paradoxically,
danger associated with traffic often leads to a more intense use of automobiles, which only engenders more hazardous situations. Since walking,
cycling or just being in the streets is increasingly unpleasant, the use of
public spaces such as the street is diminishing. As a result, individual decisions aimed at self-protection are leading to greater insecurity and less
habitable cities.
John Adams (1995) offers a completely new perspective on street safety. He suggests that all self-protection systems in vehicles (airbags, ABS
brakes, seat belts, and so on) lead to riskier behaviours that not only reduce
the possible benefits of those devices for drivers and passengers, but also
represent greater dangers for people using the street without the protection of a car. According to this notion, if the behaviour of those responsible
for generating danger in the streets is to be changed, they must become
aware of the risks they generate. Hence, his proposal for an automobile
safety system consists of replacing seat belts with a sharp device in the
steering wheel aimed at the driver’s heart. This would be a means to force
drivers to change their habits, as they would clearly be much more cautious with this new system. Although it seems brutal and provocative, this
manner of confronting safety based on assuming risks opens up a greatly
inspiring line of discussion.
Private Safety vs. Collective Safety
Adams shows that all forms of self-protection, far from being a source of
safety, tend to diminish the same. Indeed, not only does private safety fail
3
Dirección General del Tráfico, Spain (2000).
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to enhance collective safety, it actually diminishes it. Mechanisms of selfprotection implemented to fight a lack of safety in cities end up fuelling
insecurity. The ‘other’ and things ‘out there’ are seen as dangerous and
all components of private protection — fences, bars, surveillance cameras,
electronic alarms — are reinforced, thus destroying the roots of safety in
the streets, which is based on trust and a healthy form of social control
and, absolutely fundamental, a dialogue between house and street, the
‘outside’ and the ‘inside’. It is impossible to feel more unsafe than when
walking alongside a cloistered, fortress-like building whose sole presence
is threatening — places where nobody will hear or see you or, even worse,
care or dare to help if something bad happens.
The conclusions of a study carried out in three cities in Northern Italy
by the University of Perugia on women’s perceptions of danger demonstrate that increased safety is associated with the assumption of risks, not
their avoidance. ’Women that behave more self-assuredly are those who
feel more in control of themselves and their lives. Indeed, confidence was
built upon economic, cultural and social resources, but it was also cultivated and reinforced by women’s ability and willingness to take risks instead
of avoiding them. Risk-taking creates confidence instead of diminishing
it, especially a generalised form of confidence’ (Pitch 2008). However, far
from prioritising confidence and trust, and the recuperation of social links
and networks, the so-called solutions to insecurity and a lack of safety that
are being implemented do just the opposite: they fuel suspicion and mistrust, lead to the privatisation of solutions and inhibit shared responsibility for common spaces and goods.
Another factor that plays a part in this process of collective disabling is
the professionalisation of safety and security at the hands of state security
entities and private companies. Security would be one of the economic
activities that Iván Illich (1981) defines as ‘disabling professions’, because
these diminish people’s power in areas that greatly affect their lives, depriving them of autonomy and a capacity for action. Gradually, it becomes
commonplace to believe that the only ones with the power and the right to
intervene in conflicts are security ‘professionals’, and people cease to run
after the thief who has snatched a purse and no one even considers breaking up a fight. Ultimately, all of us are becoming more vulnerable.
State security entities play a significant role in the provision of security,
but they must do so with the support of society and in conjunction with
social forms of control. Such an important task cannot be left solely in their
hands. Their function is analogous to that of the antibiotic that is used
when there is already an infection, when there is already harm done and a
dramatic response is essential. Yet this type of treatment is not only useless
for small ailments; if incorrectly utilised, it leads to resistance and side effects. Along these lines, it would not only be impossible — given high costs
or the real incapacity of state entities — to have someone standing guard at
every corner, but it would be highly undesirable. Police intervention is not
the best mechanism to reinstate peaceful coexistence in a neighbourhood.
Furthermore, constant police presence tends to sterilise common space,
which comes to be perceived as a place of conflict. Continuing with the
metaphor, the antibiotic eliminates all bacteria, those that attack the body
and those that are beneficial. These must therefore be used with caution.
The Role of Urban Space in the Construction of Safety
It seems necessary to leave this ‘maze of insecurity and a lack of safety’,
and to start broadening the concept in order to integrate other agents and
elements into the formation of safety. ��
Safety and security, as all basic human needs, demand complex answers and cannot be commodified or left
in the hands of only one agent or sphere. They cannot be left only in private hands or exclusively to the capabilities and authority of the state. It
must be recognised that safety is also a collective matter.
Space is the scaffolding for all activities, and we need to distance the
term from the experience of fear, and recreate the association with freedom and trust in others. Urban design can actively contribute to creating conditions of safety and security, in a process whereby the recovery
of public space as a place for relationships, social encounters, knowledge
and collective trust is of paramount importance. We must break this vicious circle of insecurity that is fuelled by the fear of difference, anchored
in the privatisation and professionalisation of responses, and culminates
in collective apathy or inhibition when faced with violence, and so on in
an infinite loop. This rupture must be initiated from different perspectives
and in different spheres. Urban planning alone cannot generate safety, nor
is it possible to advocate for improvements related to coexistence in a community if there are no places for socialising and relationships. It must be
remembered that space is not a mere setting for urban life — it plays an
active role for the same, given its capacity to either promote equality and
trust, or to undermine them.
Armed with our knowledge of urban design tools, their potential and
shortcomings, we can take part in the production of cities based on these
convictions and promote safety for all, in the broadest possible sense of the
word. Safety is not cultivated behind bars or under surveillance cameras,
but based on the sort of collective social control generated by the peaceful coexistence of different people. Quoting Jane Jacobs (1961: 31–32), ‘the
first thing to understand is that the public peace — the sidewalk and street
peace – of cities is not kept primarily by the police, necessary as the police
are. It is primarily kept by an intricate, almost unconscious, network of
voluntary controls and standards among the people themselves, and enforced by the people themselves’.
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References
Adams, John. 1995. Risk. London: University College London Press.
Alonso, Ane (member of Hiria Kolektiboa, Basque Country). La ciudad
prohibida. Conferencia celebrada en el Curso de Verano de la Universidad de La Coruña, ‘Reflexiones y propuestas sobre la ciudad y el
paisaje: una cuestión de género’ (Director: Pascuala Campos de Michelena). La Coruña, July 2008.
Del Valle, Teresa. 2006. Seguridad y convivencia: hacia nuevas formas de
transitar y de habitar. Presented at Congreso ‘Urbanismo y Género,
Una Visión Necesaria para Todos’. Diputación de Barcelona, Spain.
Hillman, Mayer; John Adams, and John Whitelegg. 1990. One False Move…
A study of children’s independent mobility. London: PSI Publications.
Illich, Iván et al. 1981. Profesiones inhabilitantes. Madrid: H. Blume Ediciones.
Jacobs, Jane. 1961. The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York:
Random House and Vintage Books.
Katz, Cindi. 1993. Growing Girls/Closing Circles. Limits on the spaces of
knowing in rural Sudan and United States cities. In Full Circles. Geographies of Women over the Life Course, eds. C. Katz and J. Monk, 88–106.
London, New York: Routledge. Reprinted with a new epilogue in Gendered Modernities: Ethnographic Perspectivas, ed. D. L. Hodgson. New
York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001.
Naredo, María. 2001. Seguridad urbana y miedo al crimen. Polis. Revista
de la Universidad Bolivariana (Santiago, Chile) 01(002).
Pitch, Tamar. 2008. El género de la seguridad urbana. Universidad de Perugia. In www.ejgv.euskadi.net/r53-2291/es/contenidos/informacion/
sare2007/es_berdingu/adjuntos/pitch.t_07_cast.pdf (accessed August
14, 2009).
Coexisting in Diversity: Public Space from a Gender Perspective
Olga Segovia
T
he complexity of urban social life has increased in the last decades to an extent previously unknown, particularly related to social interactions, the use of time, forms of mobility and communication systems.
Among these transformations, perhaps the most remarkable and emblematic, according to Remedi (2000), is that of public space. Remedi highlights
that the spatial organisation of inequalities has resulted in cities fractured
into sections inhabited almost exclusively by members of a single social
class or a particular culture. This, the author adds, has led to the creation
of insurmountable barriers — actual and mental — that preclude people
from seeing, meeting, and imagining each other, and from thinking of each
other as peers, neighbours, and fellow citizens.
The processes mentioned above, however generalised, have not produced univocal realities. As such, many Latin American cities experience
a tension between deep‑seated forms of tradition that tie them to the past
and a form of modernisation manifest in a leap across scales regarding
multiple aspects of urban life. Nonetheless, this development has its dark
side in a sharp increase of social inequalities.1 Nowadays cities seem ‘less
Olga Segovia is an architect and researcher at SUR Corporación de Estudios Sociales y
Educación in Santiago, Chile. She has developed projects on political spaces, urban development, urban safety, and gender for the Chilean National Fund for Research and Technology
(FONDECYT), the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC),
and the European Union. She coordinated UNIFEM’s Regional Programme ‘Cities without
Violence against Women, Safe Cities for All’ from 2006 to 2009. She is a member of the Women
and Habitat Network of Latin America, and UNDP’s Associate Experts Network. An earlier
version of this article was presented at the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) Congress held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2009).
1 With a Gini coefficient of .52, Latin America stands out as one of the most unequal
regions in the world. Some 2007 values for Latin American countries are reported as follows:
Guatemala, 59.9; Brazil, 56.7; Colombia, 53.8; Chile, 53.8; El Salvador, 52. (Gini Index by Country, from Nation Master, http://www.nationmaster.com). The value that corresponds to the
distribution of years of education in Latin America is approximately .42, while in developed
countries it is near .27 (The World Bank, Latin America and the Caribbean Region; Office of
the Regional Chief Economist, February 2008).
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embraceable, less decipherable, more unknown and, hence, the source of
fears and differences that seem to be irreconcilable’ (Segovia 2007: 16).
That is, they appear as places of violence. According to the analysis of several
international organisations, urban violence has become one of the major
scourges affecting Latin American countries, which have the highest rates
of homicide in the world (PNUD 2006, UN-HABITAT 2007). This reality
forces us to confront the need for policies related to safety. However, when
talking about these policies, what exactly do we mean by safety? To begin
with, we do not limit its meaning to the prevention and prosecution of
crime. Rather, what we are calling to mind is a notion of safety that includes the possibility of living and coexisting in cities.
Public and Private Space: Safety, Gender, and Coexistence
Based on their analysis of safety policies, a central conclusion of experts
has been that safety must be a collective endeavour. This is the basis for
distinguishing between the notion of ‘citizen safety’, and what has traditionally been called ‘public safety’. Franz Vanderschueren (2008) proposes
that the defining feature of citizen safety is the need for, and responsibility
of, all actors concerned to jointly produce safety, including state and civil
society actors. This approach presupposes a thorough decentralisation of
safety initiatives and an emphasis on prevention at the local level. Nevertheless, Vanderschueren points out that the role of the state continues to
be primary as the ‘provider of financial and human resources, in the monitoring and formulation of the central guidelines of policies related to the
prevention of crimes, and in the facilitation of exchanges of experiences
between domestic cities or with those from abroad. The definition of the
central axes of a public policy offers a general framework within which local governments and civil society can operate creatively’.
Gomáriz and García (2003) point out that the term ‘citizen safety’ often
appears in debates on democratic governance in reference to the political
process that deals with conflicts within society and between society and
the state through institutional means. In this regard, they raise an important point: ‘The problem in Latin America is that there is a paradox between the democratisation of the idea of safety and actual increases in the
insecurity of citizens, and this demands considerable efforts on the part
of public powers in order to adequately address the challenges to engendering citizen safety. Overcrowded judicial systems and detention centres,
police forces with little professional training, among other facts, are daily
proof of the existing shortcomings’.
In a report on local governance, coexistence and citizen safety (PNUD
2006), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) makes refer-
Olga Segovia / Coexisting in Diversity: Public Space from a Gender Perspective
ence to the debate on the concepts to be used in identifying a public policy
aimed at preventing and reducing rates of violence and crime in society.
In this vein, it states that a more comprehensive notion of coexistence and
citizen safety, as opposed to one focused on violence and criminality, has
begun to be applied in some countries. It is possible that this conceptualisation has generated sceptical reactions from people who fear this might
lead to a vision limited to prevention with extremely long-term results.
Annette Backhaus (1999) argues that the inclusion of gender perspective in approaches to citizen safety helps to identify and correlate multiple
dimensions of social life, thus contributing to a better understanding of
safety in general and to a more efficient treatment of the issue. She asserts
the need to ‘approach citizen safety from a gender perspective that renders
visible how current notions of masculinity become risks to the safety of all
citizens, how changes in these notions would also benefit men, and how
to develop educational and preventive strategies that are more successful’.
Giulia Tamayo (2002) maintains that gender mainstreaming would ’make
gender equity a crosscutting dimension of all safety policies, such that
men and women are considered to be equally meaningful and valuable as
recipients of institutional actions’. As a corollary, gender-equal participation would guarantee that agencies in charge of managing safety respond
sensitively and effectively to people’s needs regarding protection, without
arbitrary distinctions.
Indeed, the conceptual debate that associates notions of coexistence,
urban safety, and gender makes it possible to include new distinctions in
the analysis of current urban issues, and to address these issues in a more
complex and comprehensive manner. A key aspect of this debate is the
distinction between, and redefinition of, the terms public and private.
Generally, the concept of citizen safety has been understood as synonymous with safety in the public space. This perspective stresses the idea that
it is in public space where violence and a lack of safety exist, while home
is a welcoming, violence-free refuge. Yet, a number of studies show that
the home turns out to be among the least safe places for the female population, and that women are targets of systematic violence in the sphere
of the household. Tamayo (2002) underlines how, ‘without exception, the
greatest risk of violence for a woman has its origins not in the dangers presented by unknown men, but by men she is acquainted with’.
The failure to recognise the household as the main locus of insecurity
for women has had significant consequences in terms of the responses to
gender-based violence offered by policies on citizen safety. Frequently, an
implicit tenet of these responses is that if violence happens in the private
sphere, it is considered to be a private problem, alien and marginal to public and political debate and responsibility. In addition, the oversight of
the household on the level of policy implies a failure to acknowledge that
violent acts or conduct, and the lack of safety that results, are intertwined
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with the conditions and imaginaries of social coexistence, particularly those
based on traditional gender relations in all of their complexity.
In my opinion, the notion of coexistence — living in the company of
others — adds an interesting dimension to the concept of citizen safety,
that of an absence of violence in interpersonal and social relations. According to this perspective, the objective of public policy on ‘citizen coexistence’ will clearly be to modify the behavioural norms dictating those
relations, in order to decrease rates of violence. The notion of coexistence
also stresses the idea of living amidst difference, especially relevant in our
heterogeneous and multicultural contemporary societies. In this vein, it is
relevant to highlight the observations of Virginia Vargas (2006) related to
power relations. She remarks that ’power relations that constitute the web
of exclusion are complex. Exclusion is not only material, it is also subjective
and symbolic; and struggles against exclusion depend not only on equality,
but on the acknowledgement of differences’. Vargas argues for the need of
a new paradigm of citizenship, one that ‘addresses the complexities of current social life and confronts dynamics of exclusion from the perspective of
class, race, ethnicity, gender, sex, age, and sexual orientation’. Along these
lines, Vargas proposes to include issues concerning women and gender
relations as part of democratic agendas, not solely as issues exclusively
concerning women. This is the only way, she adds, ‘to begin to understand
the linkage between gender discrimination and all other discriminations,
and to more effectively confront not just one manifestation of exclusion,
but the very foundation that makes exclusion possible’.
Confronting Urban Violence from a Perspective of Coexistence
Confronting violence in cities from the perspective of coexistence demands
the recognition of an underlying tension in current debates: the contradiction between preserving and strengthening the social fabric in the city, on
the one hand, and a tendency towards the ‘privatisation’ of social life, on
the other. This contradiction — characterised by the issues of a lack of safety and violence — is particularly relevant to women’s lives and, therefore,
in the development of ways of life capable of maximising the possibilities
for autonomy and for the self‑realisation of individuals, women and men.
Life in cities is increasingly focused on the private sphere, the individual, one’s own space, exclusivity. It is as if people accept that the contents
of one’s house and immediate surroundings are enough to make life satisfying. Borja (2005) maintains that a fear of Others and the tendency to
take refuge in private life cater to the model of globalised urbanism. From
this perspective, the idea that it is possible to enclose the world within the
house and neighbourhood, as well as in extensions of spaces such as the
highway and the automobile, is, simultaneously, the cause and result of a
new way of organising and relating to urban space.
It is a fact that people feel threatened and unsafe in many large, Latin
American cities. A ‘natural’ reaction to this situation, which increases levels of fear and alarm, is to avoid going out and exposing oneself to any
risks, seeking refuge in private places: a well-locked car, a house behind
bars, gated communities with surveillance and poor suburbs located at
a distance ��
(Davis 2001). In this context of the social construction of insecurity, public space is abandoned, and solidarity, concern and respect for
Others are lost. Perceptions of a lack of safety and the desertion of public
space in its physical, social, and symbolic dimensions function as a circular
and cumulative process (Segovia and Dascal 2000). Anthropologist Néstor García Canclini (2000) phrases this concept as follows: ‘Streets become
forsaken public spaces, symptoms of de-urbanisation and a disregard for
those modern ideals of openness, equality and community. Instead of the
universality of rights, there is a disconnection between different, supposedly irreconcilable sectors that do not want to be seen or to see others.
However, one of the conditions key to developing community is the existence of public space, a place for coming together and for gathering. Therefore, a core question is how to protect collective places of socialisation instead of destroying them as a result of fear. By what means can we foster a
form of coexistence among citizens that keeps away the (real or imaginary)
ghosts of fear. Ultimately, what framework of social and physical spaces
would be conducive to the construction of safer lives for women?
It is revealing that we speak of the ‘urban fabric’ when referring to
cities. Almost by definition, cities are the places where people unknown to
each other meet, interact and become ‘intermeshed’. Furthermore, it is not
by chance that the city has historically been the natural ‘scenario’ for citizens as social ‘actors’. Remedi (2000) suggests that citizenship is associated
with experiencing the city and participating in a network or ‘web’ of social
spaces, organisations, and mobilisations of diverse character and meaning,
open and available to citizens.
Often people refer, in a political, spatial and psychological sense, to the
‘public’ and the ‘private’, to what is open and what is closed. Moreover,
these schemas have traditionally been linked to the categories of man and
woman. The realm of discovery and conquest is understood as masculine,
whereas the household, the space for protection and securing daily needs
is designated as feminine (Segovia 1992). This domestic space, considered
women’s territory, is treated as the sphere for privacy and personal identity, the privileged setting for intimacy and introspection. As Bachelard
(1965) remarks, ‘all truly inhabited spaces bear the essence of the notion of
the house and home’. This is true, but the house can also signify seclusion,
confinement, restrictions, and violence. In fact, women’s feelings of a lack
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of safety are strongly associated with high rates of violence in the domestic
sphere. In addition, their subordination in patriarchal cultures has had a
strong influence on the way women relate to space (particularly public
space) and time. When they feel afraid, women abandon public spaces,
capitalise on what the city offers to a lesser extent, and change their routes
through the city. That is, they redefine and restrict the times and spaces
for exchange and interaction. In relation to this reality, in her book From
Present City to the Inhabitable City (1998), the architect Anna Bofill proposes
that although we should consider ‘the population in all of its diversity as
beneficiaries of the urban surroundings’, the key is to conceive ‘the city
from a gender perspective so as to tailor urban spaces to the needs of daily
life and make the city a liveable place’.
This is the topic that I now wish to elaborate.
Public Space: Agora and Plaza
Public space has physical, social, cultural, and political dimensions. Yet beyond formal differentiations, what truly defines its nature is how it is used.
The concept of public space presupposes a public domain, collective social
use, and a diversity of activities (Segovia and Dascal 2000). It is a site for relating to and identifying with others, political protests, contact among people, urban activities, and expressions of community. Beyond its physical
functions, public space constitutes a site where imagination and creativity
can unfold. It is a place for celebration (where communication between
all is recuperated), a symbolic place that all can identify with, a place of
games, monuments, religion (Viviescas 1997). In this sense, the quality of
public space can be assessed based on the intensity and the value of the
social relations it enables, its capacity to welcome and encourage a mixture
of different groups and behaviours, and its potential for fostering mutual
identification on a symbolic level, cultural expression and integration.
Along the same lines, Joseph (1999) thinks of public space as a setting
for action to the extent that it is a space conceived for accommodating particular events, i.e. actions taken by citizens. From this standpoint, public
space is the arena for protests and social encounters, and for addressing
collective urban needs that transcend the individual interests of citizens.
A discussion of the origins of public space, in the sense of the ‘public
sphere’ proposed by Habermas, reinforces the notion that it is a social and
urban product. This is closely related to the significance of cities, where
exchanges and encounters with the anonymous Other are fundamental
elements that contribute to the very essence of urban space. Habermas
acknowledges the existence of the ‘public sphere’ as the field where the
bourgeoisie of the eighteenth century negotiated with the state, i.e. every
site or arena where the community (or bourgeoisie) can express itself and
confront the state. This includes everything from coffeehouses or concert
theatres, to the press and public opinion (Neira 2007).
Regardless of whether they are traditional in nature, general tendencies or sporadic events, the types of activities and habits carried out in
public places are an excellent gauge for identifying the degree of social
integration, the strength of a collective sense of belonging, the capacity to
reappropriate public realms, and the levels of democracy that have been
attained in a neighbourhood, district or city. Indeed, Viviescas (1997) argues that it is virtually impossible to create any of these conditions outside
of public space.
Although public space is characterised by this non-spatial social and
political dimension to which we have been referring — as a sphere for the
interaction of ideas, discourses, social projects, that is, the agora — that
dimension is always rooted in physical space, that is, the plaza. Therefore,
it is important to pose the following questions: What is the significance of
public places as a factor in cultural heritage and identity and their contribution to safeguarding social capital? How is it possible to use public
space to foment the density and diversity of social relations in the city?
Public Space: Identity and Diversity
In large cities of Latin America, as well as in cities in the United States and
Europe, there is a tendency towards a form of localism that is indicative
of something very revealing. When young immigrants in France, for example, are asked ‘where are you from’, the answer is ‘I am from such and
such area, housing development X, apartment building Y, and I have nothing to do with those morons from tower N’ (Touraine 1998). This example
illustrates how children and young people, men and women in some lowincome groups have a paradoxical relationship with the space in which
they live, in the sense that it is a relationship formed as if they were inhabitants of a ghetto. The logic is as follows: ‘I am from here (or come from
X area), and you are from there (or come from another area); therefore, I
am different and better than you are’. This reasoning also functions on a
more collective level: ‘I belong to the young people’s organisation; thus,
those from the neighbourhood council are my enemies’. These expressions
of identity are a sign of a type of belonging to a place based on exclusion:
‘I live in or I am from a particular building, street, neighbourhood, or area
so I do not associate myself with, nor do I define my identify based on a
territory shared with others’. As such, I cease to be a citizen and to belong
to a city where others are included just as I am (Segovia 2005b).
When fragmentation — physical and social — is prevalent, how is it
possible to forward proposals that foster heterogeneity and diversity, both
attributes that are associated with public space? Carrión (2004) argues that
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what could halt the tendency towards urban fragmentation is public space
as the setting for learning about alterity. To an important extent, greater
social integration entails the organisation of local diversity, that is, the establishment, preservation, and promotion of communication between different groups of actors living in the same place, i.e. young people, women,
seniors, athletes, and so forth. In many respects, the best place to cultivate
this diversity is public space. It is through this process of linking seemingly
separate biographies, interests, and needs that a sense of collective heritage is generated and preserved.
Throughout the history of cities, public spaces have offered the conditions conducive for the existence of heterogeneous elements. In addition
to those who already belong, they have welcomed the stranger, the outsider, and provided the possibility for positive encounters between all, a
key aspect of learning about alterity (Ghorra-Gobin 2001). A space open
to exchanges has the capacity to link individual and collective desires and
objectives. For instance, studies on the formation of popular neighbourhoods in Buenos Aires during the first half of the twentieth century show
that micro-social components of urban life — the club, the café, the public
library, the political committee — organised the identity of migrants and
natives, relating their lives to those global transformations pursued by society and the state (García Canclini 2000).
Public Space: A Sense of Belonging and Collective Trust
How do public spaces of a city or a neighbourhood relate to collective trust,
i.e. to that sense of spatial and social belonging that encompasses, yet goes
beyond the individual, community or local levels?
A number of experiences show that the degree of sociability and integration present in the public spaces of a neighbourhood is a reflection
of the level of collective trust that has been built, which, in turn, affects
perceptions of safety. Therefore, individuals’ assessments of their personal
and social lives are linked to the extent to which they self-identify with the
public spaces in their urban environments.
In Latin American cities there has been a wide range of experiences in
terms of land occupation, illegal or legal settlements, and formal or informal processes of ‘conquering’ public spaces. In most cases, the territory in
question is perceived as the product of a history that is personal and familial, as well as collective. These are histories of taking ownership of space
and establishing roots, and through this process, inhabitants discover and
represent themselves as actors with the initiative and capacity to succeed
at anything they put their minds to. Accordingly, these collective projects
that make cooperation possible are key elements in the construction of a
sense of territorial and spatial belonging.
In contrast, the opposite tendency also occurs at the level of the city
That is, the nature of ghettos in both poor and wealthy areas leads to the
severing of relations in and with public places and the interactions that do
take place are either neutral or based on conflict and insecurity. Paradigmatic of this disconnection is the fragmentation of urban life, often caused
by the domination of space by social groups and projects that exclude others. According to Salcedo (2002), there are two prototypical examples of
this tendency: the mall as a site devoted exclusively to consumption, and
gated communities. Both of these settings are targeted at homogeneous
social groups, with the inevitable effect of collective perceptions that safety
has not increased substantially.
For example, in some Chilean low-income neighbourhoods, the exclusionary use of a place by groups of young people, or for a single function,
converts that place into one of social stigmatisation or restriction such that
those who do not belong choose not to enter, or do not feel invited. This
situation has been documented in a study on the use of public spaces by
different groups in three social housing projects in Santiago, Chile (Segovia 2005b). The data compiled reveals the following patterns: boys and
girls up to three years old are not present in public spaces; teenagers, particularly males, are the group with the largest presence; elderly people do
not frequent public places, and the number of men is significantly greater
than the number of women.
With regard to poverty and urban precariousness, Robinson, Siles,
and Schmid (2003) emphasise the need to ‘create affective values in urban
areas’. They argue that a place acquires this value when it is the setting for
positive experiences — everything from parades and local celebrations,
to neighbourhood improvement initiatives and the maintenance of public
spaces, and the creation of institutional and legal conditions necessary for
the installation of businesses that offer jobs in the vicinity of residents.
Public Space: Risk and Fear
Experiences in Latin America show that crime impacts disadvantaged
sectors more severely than it does their well‑off counterparts. It prevents
them from establishing a presence in public spaces or transforms their already segregated neighbourhoods into areas of great vulnerability. Hence,
fostering a peaceful coexistence in safe public places, both at the level of
the neighbourhood and the city as a whole, represents a challenge for urban planning and for housing, social, and cultural policies. A proactive
policy for quality public spaces — one that advances and supports an intensive and diversified use of places and promotes positive actions related
to vulnerable groups — is an effective contribution to the creation of a safe
environment. An optimal public space is a mechanism that is essential if
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the city is to fulfil its function of stimulating the socialisation of children,
teenagers, and young adults belonging to groups considered to be marginal or ‘at risk’ (Borja 2005b). Public spaces constitute social and cultural
territories. Therefore, managing them is a priority in the effort to combat
a lack of safety. Urban planners such as Oscar Newman (1996) and Bill
Hillier (1996) have highlighted the importance of public spaces as a ‘natural’ means of social control. According to Newman, social control of public space — ‘defensible space’ — is fundamental to solving the problem
of the vulnerability of residential spaces, of families and of individuals.
Hillier believes that one of the most crucial aspects of developing a healthy
community is the existence of public spaces for people to interact and be
together. The natural control of public space arises from the presence of
people in the streets, plazas, and alleys, among others places.
Urban planning can contribute to reinforcing integrative social
dynamics. It can define spatial territories on a symbolic level and encourage a form of architecture dedicated to multiple uses that strengthens collective life and favours social diversity. These ideas do not constitute a new
argument in favour of combining the city’s functions. Rather, they have a
long history in contemporary urbanism. In 1961, the legendary expert on
cities Jane Jacobs was already arguing that safety is more likely to be preserved in spaces where a diversity of uses prevails.
What is the significance of the fact that women and children are absent
from the public spaces near their homes?
Using the case of Santiago, Chile as an example once again, the perception of risk conveyed by women is linked both to the physical conditions
of social housing projects, as well as to the social environment. As such,
the emotion of fear determines the behaviour of adults and leads them to
relegate children to the manageable and restricted space of the home (��
Segovia 2005b). The corollary of fear is confinement, a loss of freedom, and
restrictions regarding children’s possibilities for play and leisure. Their opportunities for discovering ‘the world’ are therefore curtailed, as is that
openness to others that goes hand in hand with the exploration of one’s
surroundings and facilitates the development of sociability.2
In the city of San Salvador, gangs (maras) formed by teenagers, and even
by children of both sexes, have become a serious problem (Carranza 2004).
The accounts of women and young people from both Santiago and San
Salvador reveal a dissatisfaction that undoubtedly undermines the possibility of individuals and groups reflecting positively on themselves in
2 A clear indication of these families’ perceptions of a lack of safety is the proliferation of bars as a security measure: there are bars closing off the entryways of all alleys and
buildings, around staircases, and on the windows of each house or apartment. In many cases,
there is fence after fence that function as successive barriers protecting empty lots often used
as sites for dumping garbage and debris.
their private worlds as well as in their relations with others. A generalised
malaise regarding one’s environment is also a serious obstacle to producing the sociability, social links and integration required to combat violence
and a lack of safety. Under these circumstances, gang culture offers young
people a form of socialisation and constitutes an alternative to the lack of
opportunities for social participation, and social exclusion.
Experience shows that joint projects that motivate cooperation are key
components in the construction of collective identity, and contribute in
many ways to a spatial and territorial sense of belonging (Segovia 2008).
Therefore, activities oriented towards the recuperation of historical memory, the celebration of festivities and anniversaries and the naming of plazas
and streets, add to a type of intangible heritage that must be strengthened.
A good example of this type of project is the Regional Programme ‘Cities
without Violence against Women, Safe Cities for All’, implemented by the
Women and Habitat Network of Latin America in different Latin American cities. In Bogotá, Colombia, and in Rosario, Argentina, actions have
included the occupation of public places by women’s groups, campaigns
against violence, safety audits to identify unsafe places, and the painting
of murals in different neighbourhoods. In Santiago, Chile, public spaces
have been designed with the participation of women who have presented
their opinions and demands.
Public Space: The Expansion of the Private Sphere
Public space favours life in the private sphere: this was one of the conclusions of a research project entitled ‘Urban public spaces and the construction of social capital: Case studies in Chilean cities’.3 In every case analysed,
it appears that the existence of public spaces has been a contributing factor
to the sociability of residents from the area and of users in general. According to the people interviewed, public spaces helped to establish links
with people known and unknown, to facilitate situations of closeness with
members of the family or with acquaintances that cannot take place easily
within the domestic space, and to increase self-esteem. In combination, all
of these conditions are highly conducive to raising demands and initiating
dialogue with authorities.
3 Project N° 1030155, National Fund for Science and Technology (FONDECYT, Chile).
The purpose of the research was to contribute to technical and political debate regarding
coexistence in cities. It was based on the analysis of the perceptions and expectations of users
of public spaces and of those living in their surroundings. The sites considered in the study
were two parks in the city of Santiago, and a small plaza in the city of Calama (northern Chile,
approx. 140,000 inhabitants), designed and built in a participatory manner.
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This vision of public space as filled with potential is sharply opposed
to the image disseminated by the media, in which public space is depicted
as a sort of enemy against which we must protect ourselves by buttressing
the barriers that surround domestic space. However, domestic space can
be equally or even more dangerous than public space. In addition, public
space may provide an outlet for some of the consequences of the overcrowding and forced cohabitation that can characterise domestic spaces.
This contradicts an idea that has become embedded as common sense, that
is, that the use of public space is antagonistic to family life (protection versus danger, coexistence versus dispersion) (Segovia and Neira 2005).
From a similar perspective, Ana Boffil (1998) argues for the need to destroy the barriers between public and private space. According to Boffil,
they are concepts born from the masculine morals of the nineteenth century that linked the social and the domestic spheres to the roles assigned
to men and women. Space, both private and public, is experienced by all
persons and must be inhabitable for everyone.
In short, satisfaction regarding public spaces depends upon how the
private and the public spheres are interconnected, how they come together
and move apart, as well as the experiences and abilities acquired or practiced in each.
Thus, to design urban spaces from a gender perspective means designing spaces that recognise and encourage diversity, places for being alone
and for building community.
Lessons Learned
What lessons learned and new strategies can be identified in relation to
preventing gender-based violence and reducing the impact of violence
and a lack of safety upon women?
Based on a brief review of the conditions that have contributed to the
success of some initiatives related to urban safety developed in the region
(Segovia 2005a), the following conclusions can be identified:
• The most successful initiatives subscribe to a holistic, preventative
approach. This means that the strategies applied were not only focused on the prevention and control of situations producing a lack
of safety, but that they also tackled some of the risk factors associated with these situations, e.g. drug use, unemployment, some individual and psychological traits, school drop-out rates, the culture
of violence, etcetera.
• These initiatives are characterised by the fact that they are coordinated by different institutions and agencies connected by virtue of
their roles in addressing citizen safety, i.e. policy
��
making, imple-
mentation and/or evaluation. Furthermore, these actors mobilise
public (national and local) resources, as well as private and international funds.
• An important feature of these initiatives is that most have been car-
ried out in local spaces, with the participation of the community
and the recruitment of key local actors experienced in safety issues
(non-governmental and social organisations).
• Another vital component of successful initiatives is that they have
invested in powerful public awareness campaigns. Mass media
have been used to support initiatives and to overcome social stigmatisation. Programmes aimed at young people, in particular those
from low-income sectors, are a key example.
The guidebook Tools for the Promotion of Safe Cities from a Gender Perspective (Rainero, Rodigou and Pérez, 2006) makes a substantial contribution
to gender mainstreaming in local governments. It identifies the following
strategies:
• Integrality. Town councils should simultaneously address situ-
ations of exclusion or vulnerability affecting women so as to improve their quality of life and the services they require and receive,
and also the position of women in local society.
• Affirmative actions. These are corrective actions aimed at overcom-
ing situations of discrimination and inequality faced by women as
regards their needs and rights.
• Training. All policy implementation requires the training of the
agents responsible for the writing of such policies.
• Gender mainstreaming. Gender equity should transverse the mu-
nicipal agenda at all levels. This does not exclude the existence of
gender-specific policies, which are essential to guaranteeing that
gender mainstreaming is actually put into practice.
• Coordination. The effectiveness of local gender equity policies re-
quires collaboration between the different areas of local government as well as between different local governments, and, at the
same time, with the central or federal government.
• Institutionalisation. This entails the inclusion of the gender perspec-
tive and women’s rights in municipal regulations and local governments’ organisational structures.
• Promotion of women’s participation. Another absolutely essential cri-
terion for the formulation and implementation of public policies is
the promotion of women’s participation. This entails creating and
assuring conditions and mechanisms that facilitate women’s access
to different participatory spaces.
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According to Alejandra Massolo (2007), local governments have a central role in relation to women’s safety in cities, given their new institutional
profile and greater array of abilities, functions, innovations and good practices. Massolo considers local governments as essential to the implementation of initiatives to prevent violence and crime, and suggests that they
should play a coordinating role among the different actors involved in this
field.
When discussing the potential and limits of local governments with regard to gender-based violence, Eve Gilberti (2008) stresses the gap between
awareness and action. She writes, ‘The shift from thought to action among
those responsible for decision making is often lacking. What is the meaning and scope of international agreements for local governments? There
are two problems: i) Municipalities do not feel bound by international human rights agreements such as the Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Convention of Belém do Pará); ii) There is a belief
that the obligations delineated by these agreements are mandatory only
for the Executive Power, and not for the other two powers that conform
republican governments — the Legislative and the Judiciary branches’.
Doreen Massey (1994) argued that spaces and places are gendered, ‘at
once reflecting and affecting how gender is understood’. A decade later,
we can say that urban life has deteriorated as a result of shortcomings,
both old and new, in the form of inequalities that are economical, cultural and political in character, as well as persistent asymmetries between
women and men. These gender-based inequalities include, but are not limited to physical violence, as they also manifest as material deprivation and
symbolic disadvantage. Increasing violence and lack of safety in our cities
undoubtedly affects the possibilities for peaceful coexistence on a collective level, but it is experienced differently by men and women (Falú and
Segovia 2007).
I conclude this presentation by inviting us all to continue to work towards a better form of coexistence based on diversity. This form of coexistence means building places, territories and relationships that are more
inclusive and equitable, and, therefore, safer for all. It also implies cultivating greater trust in public and private space, in our urban imaginaries and
in our daily lives.
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A Contribution to the Debate on the City, Public Space,
and Safety from a Feminist Perspective
Liliana Rainero
P
revious studies by the Women and Habitat Network of Latin
America serve as the foundation for these reflections regarding the
lack of safety that women experience in cities, the subsequent impacts on
their daily lives, and risk factors linked to the social inequalities that are
manifest in urban territories and fuel gender-based violence. The issues
addressed in these studies are the precursor and motivation for the current
Regional Programme ‘Cities without Violence against Women, Safe Cities
for All’, coordinated by the United Nations Development Fund for Women
(UNIFEM) and implemented by institutions belonging to the Women and
Habitat Network in different Latin American cities.1
The first of these studies examines the use of public space by women
and men in five cities of the Southern Cone: Montevideo, Uruguay; Asuncion, Paraguay; Mendoza and Rosario, Argentina and Talca, Chile. The
study reveals the persistence of cultural patterns rooted in society that attribute different roles and rights to men and women with regard to public
space, and highlights the gender‑differentiated effects of fear in everyday
lives.
Liliana Rainero is an architect, as well as a professor and researcher with the Faculty of
Architecture, Urban Planning and Design at the National University of Cordoba. She is Director of the Centre for Exchange and Services for the Southern Cone, Argentina (CISCSA),
which acts as the Regional Coordinator of the Women and Habitat Network of Latin America,
as well as being a member of the Coordinating Committee of both the Huairou Commission
and Women and Cities International (WICI).
1 Active since 2007, the UNIFEM Regional Programme ‘Cities without Violence against
Women, Safe Cities for All’, is being implemented in Rosario (Argentina), Santiago (Chile),
and Bogotá (Colombia) and it is currently being expanded to Guatemala and El Salvador.
In addition, there are actions linked to the Programme being carried out in Brazil and Peru.
In Bogotá, together with the Women and Habitat Network, the National Women’s Network
(Red Nacional de Mujeres) is also participating in the implementation of the Programme.
Other regional networks, such as the Popular Education Network of Women (Red de Educación Popular entre Mujeres, REPEM) and the Latin American and Caribbean Committee
for the Defence of Women’s Rights (Comité de América Latina y el Caribe para la Defensa
de los Derechos de la Mujer, CLADEM), contribute to the Programme based on their specific
experience and expertise. See http://www.redmujer.org.ar.
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The second study, sponsored by the UN Trust Fund in Support of Actions to Eliminate Violence against Women, focuses on forms of violence
suffered by women that are linked to territories, and the ways society
renders these forms of violence invisible. The study was conducted in districts of Lima, Peru and in the city of Rosario, Argentina.2
Reference will also be made to studies realised in non-Latin American
contexts. Of particular interest is one study that sought to test feminist hypotheses regarding violence against women, specifically rape, conducted
in US cities with populations over 100,000. The hypotheses discussed are
primarily those based on mainstream currents of political thought regarding gender-based violence, i.e. Marxist, liberal, socialist, and radical feminism.
As a means to illustrate these issues in greater detail, the article concludes by highlighting some of the results of the Regional Programme currently being implemented in Argentina, Chile, and Colombia.
The Gender‑differentiated Impacts of a Lack of Safety in Cities
The World Charter on the Right to the City3 defines the right to the city
as the guaranteed access to economic, social, political, and cultural opportunities offered by urban life. This right has been included not only in
the agendas of national and international social organisations, but also in
those of United Nations agencies and local governments. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), for instance, uses the Urban Human Development Index to promote a model of the city that allows for the
strengthening of individual capacities in a world like ours, where the prevailing form of social organisation is urban agglomeration (PNUD 2006).
In this context, safety for all citizens, men and women, is undoubtedly an
2 Regional Project ‘Cities without Violence against Women, Safe Cities for All’ (2004),
developed within UNIFEM’s Trust Fund to support measures to eliminate violence against
women, and coordinated by the Flora Tristán Centre in Peru, and in Argentina by CISCSA,
which coordinates the Woman and Habitat Network of Latin America and the Caribbean.
3 ‘… urban organizations and movements linking together since the First World
Social Forum (2001) have discussed and assumed the challenge to build a sustainable model
of society and urban life, based on the principles of solidarity, freedom, equity, dignity, and
social justice, and founded in respect for different urban cultures and balance between the urban and the rural. Since then, an integrated group of popular movements, nongovernmental
organizations, professional associations, forums, and national and international civil society
networks, committed to the social struggles for just, democratic, humane and sustainable cities, has worked to build a World Charter for the Right to the City. The Charter aims to gather
the commitments and measures that must be assumed by civil society, local and national
governments, members of parliament, and international organizations, so that all people may
live with dignity in our cities’. “Preamble”, World Charter on the Right to the City. In http://
www.hic-net.org/document.php?pid=2422 (accessed 1 Sept. 2009).
Liliana Rainero / A Contribution to the Debate on the City...
essential pre-condition of human development. ‘The first step in human
development is human safety. Accordingly, the first duty of the State is to
protect the lives and physical integrity of its citizens; this is the basic pact
of citizenship’ (Moro 2008: 7).
In its report on the state of world cities (2008), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) adopts the concept of ‘harmonic cities’ to refer to an approach that fosters understanding of the
present urban world and to a tool that functions to confront the main challenges existing in urban areas. The ��
report states that cities have experienced both economic growth as well as increased inequalities that have
had serious impacts on all aspects of human development.
In general, cities have been and continue to be objects of extensive anal��
ysis and research. However, urban studies and those focused on urban
safety have traditionally tended to disregard issues related to women’s
daily lives, which have indeed been acknowledged by feminist contributions. For this reason, since the 1980s and 1990s, an array of issues related
to women’s experiences in cities have been prioritised in processes related
to the production of knowledge, the development of tools, capacity building, and advocacy related to housing and urban planning policies (Falú
and Rainero 1994: 167). The following is a list, albeit not exhaustive, of
some of these issues: women’s right to land, housing and urban services;
women’s contribution to building human settlements; the use of time and
the impact that spatial/territorial planning based on a traditional version
of the sexual division of labour has on women’s lives.
Feminist researchers coming form different parts of the world and various disciplines, including Sociology, Anthropology and Geography, have
contributed a number of scholarly studies that have enriched this field.
However, these theoretical advances are not duly reflected in urban studies in general, and less still in public policies related to urban planning and
citizen safety. The approaches that most commonly inform public policies,
as well as many studies, ignore or deny the conflict underlying gender relations, that is, the fact that they are based on the subordination of women
and the exercise of power by men, whose ultimate expression is violence.
The notion of gender is not understood in its relational dimension; ‘gender’ is associated with ‘women’ and, accordingly, power relations are not
challenged. Efforts are made to improve some conditions of women’s lives
or the most obvious manifestations of inequality without addressing their
structural causes. However, as Teresa del Valle (2006) notes, both fear and
safety have different referents and meanings for men and for women. The
methodology introduced by feminist criticism draws attention to this difference: it is not the same to think of fear as a widespread social phenomenon as to contemplate it more exclusively in terms of women’s realities.
For this reason, and many others, it becomes necessary to strengthen the
case in favour of including the theoretical contributions of feminism into
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the analysis of reality and life in cities, and to transform the knowledge
produced into political action. This, then, is the logic behind reviewing
the two studies conducted by the Women and Habitat Network of Latin
America mentioned above. Both offer examples of the contribution to be
gained from a feminist approach to the issues of safety and a lack thereof,
as well as the diverse forms of violence that women experience in cities.
Use of Public Space by Men and Women in Five Cities of the Southern Cone
The objective of this study was to construct urban indicators of the use of
public space on two analytical levels: indicators related to structural aspects
of public space, based on secondary data; and indicators related to men’s
and women’s perceptions and opinions with regard to the use and enjoyment
of the city. The analysis was based on a survey applied to a representative
sample of the population in Montevideo, Uruguay; Asuncion, Paraguay;
Mendoza and Rosario, Argentina and Talca, Chile. It is observations regarding the second indicator that are of interest to the present paper.
Public space is one of the poles of tension in the public/private dichotomy that marks gender relations. At the same time, public space constitutes
a privileged place for socialisation in cities that is currently under threat
from new urban dynamics characterised by territorial fragmentation and
social exclusion.
Firstly, in a context of cities that demonstrate a tendency towards the
privatisation of public spaces and where social homogenisation functions
through implicit forms of exclusion, such as those based on clothing or
skin colour, the study revealed results that actually countered these
predominant tendencies. For instance, a high percentage of the population
surveyed (more than 80 percent) valued the importance of public spaces
as sites for recreation and socialising, and claimed to use public parks and
plazas. These opinions show the vitality of our cities, in spite of obstacles
related to accessibility, a lack of safety, vandalism or the poor maintenance
of public spaces. This indicates the importance of recovering and promoting
these spaces as a pre-condition for the democratisation of the city.
Neighbourhood streets were mentioned most often as the place where
men and women claimed to feel unsafe. Next came city centers, demonstrating a key transformation in land use, with residential occupation giving way to financial, administrative and commercial functions. The result
of this transformation is the subsequent emptying of those areas at certain
hours of the day and during weekends.
A third place described as unsafe by the people surveyed was their
own residences. Plazas, parks, and public transport were also identified
as places where people felt unsafe, with women signalling public trans-
port more than men did. In general, a significant conclusion of the survey
was that perception of a lack of safety in urban areas was slightly greater among women. The main difference between women and men is that
women modify their daily routines, where they circulate and at what time,
whereas men do not. In short, the study verified the differential impact of
fear on men and women. It is women who, because of fear, limit the extent
to which they use and take ownership of the city. It is women who develop
individual avoidance strategies in relation to certain places in the neighbourhood or in the city. These behaviours become ‘naturalised’ and, as a
result, their causes are made invisible and go unacknowledged even by the
same women that exhibit them. Teresa del Valle (2006) has defined these
behaviours in terms of ‘the spaces we deny ourselves’. These are places
from which women withdraw, or through which they must circulate given
their daily routines, but which are the source of fear.
Another relevant point highlighted by the study was that the sexual
violence suffered by women in cities was practically not mentioned by the
population surveyed as one of the types of violence occurring in the city
or neighbourhood. This is a strong indication of how crimes, i.e. what is
defined as such, are a social construct, according to which, for example,
gender-based violence is not considered to be criminal. Likewise, the nature of this social construct is responsible for the absence of gender-based
violence as an issue addressed by public policies related to a lack of safety,
and the fact that nor is it taken into consideration by civil society, even by
women themselves, who seldom connect gender-based violence (linked
almost exclusively to violence in the private sphere) to macro-policies on
urban safety.
Marta Torres Falcón (2004) points out that every human interaction
takes place in a social context that must be analysed if the phenomenon
of violence is to be understood (based on Galtung 1981). Relations among
individuals are developed in a specific social context, where forms of personal violence (face to face encounters between individuals) and structural violence (stemming from social structures, legislation, health care
and educational systems) coexist. By perpetuating patterns of inequality
(between races, ethnic groups, socioeconomic classes and genders), the resulting structural violence also tends to replicate. In this interconnected
sphere of individual and group relations, the third dimension of Galtung’s
model appears: cultural violence stemming from multiple practices on the
level of community. Cultural violence basically refers to discourses that
crosscut and shape the social imaginary, imposing rigid and exclusionary
images of what women and the feminine are or should be, and what men
and masculine are or should be. According to this outlook, public space
is a universal to which both men and women have access. However, as
pointed out by diverse studies, the reality is that men and women internalise their locations in and relationships with space differently. For example,
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the study that we have been examining thus far revealed opinions and
attitudes of men and women of different ages and social backgrounds regarding the social norms for accepted and expected behaviours of each sex
that ultimately maintain dominant cultural values. Some of these opinions
and attitudes revolved around a feminine and masculine ‘nature’, meaning those traits associated with being a woman or a man ‘biologically’
speaking. Others referred to those behaviours and roles that are assigned
to women and men. Answers were grouped using a scale comprised of
four categories: strong traditionalist, weak traditionalist, weak progressive, and strong progressive.
In terms of the behaviours expected of women in cities, and specifically in public spaces, there were statements such as the following: ‘in
order to ensure they are not assaulted or harassed in the streets, women
should avoid dressing provocatively’, ‘to avoid subjecting themselves to
risks, women should not walk through or stay alone in public spaces’. In
general, progressive stances are relatively rare and men are the most traditional in their responses. Thus, while there are marked differences between
the five cities that make it impossible to prove a correlation between sex
and the stance adopted, i.e. traditionalist or progressive, the trend alluded
to is a significant aspect of urban reality in most of Latin America (Rainero
and Rodigou 2004).
Special emphasis has thus been placed on the perseverance of cultural
norms deeply rooted in society, according to which the causal factors of
violence against women are attributed to women’s behaviour. In this vein,
it is important to recall Segato’s (2003) assertion regarding the distance that
continues to mediate between condemnations of violence as expressed in
the law, and violence inherent to traditional gender dynamics, which is
virtually inseparable from the hierarchical structure of gender relations.
In the words of Segato, ‘the contract that condemns, and the status that
persists’.
Violence Experienced by Women in Cities:
The Cases of Lima, Peru and Rosario, Argentina
The second study used as a foundation for this presentation was conducted in the cities of Lima, Peru, and Rosario, Argentina and was developed
through focal groups with women. In these sessions, the perceptions and
feelings experienced by individuals gained collective meaning, as they
were common to almost all of the participants. Women were able to identify and name the specific forms of violence that they experienced in the
urban environment, recognise how they are naturalised and determine the
mechanisms that lead to their collective ‘invisibilisation’.
Growing awareness produced by the focus group sessions enabled the
women who participated to locate urban territories and public space in a
conceptual framework that treats these places as potential realms of exclusion and settings of daily aggressions perpetrated against women for the
sole reason that they are women. This, in turn, led to the achievement of
two complimentary developments. Firstly, it became possible to link violence in public space and violence in the private sphere in a continuum.
Secondly, it enabled the detection of factors related to neighbourhoods and
cities that foster perceptions of fear to a greater or lesser extent. Factors
conditioning women’s mobility in and use of the city were identified as
the following: socioeconomic status and, by extension, the characteristics
of their place of residence; the streets they use on a daily basis, and public transport. There was a direct correlation between the quality of these
places and perceptions of fear — the lower the quality, the greater were
perceptions of fear and, as a result, the less cities were used.
Another issue that emerged from the study was essential in that it made
differences between women visible. For women belonging to the middle
classes, discourse on the rights that have been won tended to impede their
recognition of the specific forms of violence inflicted upon them for the
sole reason of being women. In contrast, women from lower socioeconomic
sectors identified these forms of violence far more easily.
The same study compares perceptions regarding mechanisms for protection in the city and places considered to be high or low risk with the
experiences of female sex workers. In situations where some women felt
protected, in relations with public institutions for instance, other women
felt threatened. Certain places identified as exclusionary and forbidden by
some women were categorised as natural places to spend time by others.
This awareness of the different realities experienced by women according
to their particular social position led to recognition of the various types of
violence occurring in our cities and to a conception of urban territories and
their resources in terms of social diversity and gender (Rodigou 2003).
The studies discussed above confirm that violence experienced by
women in cities — verbal abuse, invasion of personal space on public
transport, sexual harassment and rape, armed robbery, theft, etcetera —
represents a prevalent aspect of their daily lives. However, the stark reality
of this violence contrasts with the weak social repercussions produced by
the same; instead, it is naturalised and trivialised and perpetrators enjoy
impunity. As argued by Braig (2001), women do not speak out for fear of
becoming victims a second time. Silence, taboos, scandal and impunity are
some of the reactions to violence against women that prevent sexualised
violence from being considered as a social problem.
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What Does the Data Show?
What do different studies and sources of data related to gender-based violence tell us about different realities experienced by women? According to
data provided by Argentina’s National Directorate of Criminal Policy (Dirección Nacional de Política Criminal), there are 250 rapes committed in
the country every month. Of course, the real number is higher, since only
one-third of all sexual assaults are actually reported. Of that third, nine out
of ten go unpunished. The National Survey on Violence against Women
of France (ENVEFF 2000) emphasised that one out of every five women
had suffered harassment, including physical and verbal violence in the
street, on public transport or in public places. Furthermore, a comparison
between data on charges filed and police records showed that only 5 percent of the rapes committed against adult women had been reported.
There is no socioeconomic status, age or physical appearance that
predisposes a woman to being a victim. Rather, merely being a woman
is the main risk factor for sexual assault. Many women who call toll-free
rape victim support lines feel compelled to clarify that they ‘were wearing
trousers when attacked and stopped wearing skirts after the assault’. A
number of authors interpret this data as evidence that society continues to
be dominated by men and that women remain estranged from economic,
social and political life. They explain that violence permeates every layer
of the population, regardless of social or cultural level. Violence originates
with the submission of each individual to his or her role. Data on gender-based
violence in European countries — a statistical field where Nordic countries
lead — initiated debate on the persistence of violence in countries where
comprehensive women rights have been won.
Given the reality of widespread gender-based violence, it is necessary
to pose two key questions. Firstly, is the apparent pervasiveness of genderbased violence a function of the greater number of statistics that now exist?
It should be noted that even if this were the case, the absolute numbers are
still alarming. Alternatively, could this upward trend be the result of the
fact that as women’s achievements grow, the resistance of the patriarchal
system becomes stronger?
In conjunction with these queries, it is important to make reference
to the results of a study conducted in 238 US cities with populations of
over 100,000. The objective of the study was to test predictive hypotheses
concerning rape based on mainstream currents of thought — Marxistfeminist, liberal, socialist, and radical — that positively or negatively link
women’s absolute status and equality to rape rates (Martin, Vieraits, and
Britto 2006).
One of the predictors of rape rates verified by the study results was the
absolute status of women in cities. This is a view fostered by the Marxistfeminist hypothesis, which examined the links between the absolute status
of women and gender equality, on the one hand, and with the higher or
lower number of rape cases, on the other. In cities where women’s income,
level of university studies, labour participation and job prestige were
higher, rape rates were lower. According to the authors, out of all these
factors, it is women’s higher than average incomes and the percentage of
women in management positions that most directly correlate with lower
rape rates.
However, in addition to supporting the Marxist-feminist case for a link
between lower rape rates and the higher absolute status of women, the
studies also backed up the radical-feminist hypothesis, according to which
greater gender equality corresponds to a higher number of rapes. This
would be an example of the ‘backlash effect’, that is, an adverse reaction
on behalf of a patriarchal system that feels threatened by the achievements
of women in certain areas. In accordance with this thesis, this same study
on US cities argues that, as research has shown, women with a university
education postpone marriage and having children. Moreover, from an economic viewpoint, divorce is less problematic for them because their social
capital is higher. This could diminish women’s economic dependence on
men’s earning capacity and thereby alter power relations between them, a
change that could potentially threaten the structure and privileges of the
patriarchal system.
At first glance, given the fact that these two findings support both the
Marxist and the radical hypotheses, these would appear to be contradictory from a theoretical point of view. However, according to the authors,
they are actually complementary when examined using a more holistic
explanatory model. Taken together, the results support the feminist-socialist perspective, which holds that society is structured according to dual
systems of class and gender that place women in a position of cumulative
structural disadvantage.
Other relevant data included in the study suggest that, in relation to
rape, a more critical factor than women’s absolute status is deprivation
of access to resources. In cities with higher poverty levels, rape rates are
also higher. This is consistent with theories that demonstrate a statistically
significant relationship between poverty, inequality, and indices of rape.
These findings also challenge the results from studies that identify economic, ethnic, racial, or gender inequality as the most important predictors of rape, rather than absolute deprivation. In harmony with Marxistfeminist theory, it appears that women’s higher income levels, educational
accomplishments, job status and participation in the labour market are
directly related to lower rape rates.
In summary, the results indicate that absolute status and deprivation of
resources are the two most significant variables to consider in relation to
rape rates.
From another perspective focused on the links between territory and
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levels of safety, our research on Latin American cities underscores the fact
that women with higher income levels live in safer districts with adequate
infrastructure and services, especially those related to safety and security,
and use mass transit less. By means of example, women identify Bogotá’s
mass public transit system (Transmilenio) as a place where they experience sexual harassment. The same is true regarding the subway system in
Mexico City, where the level of complaints has compelled authorities to
designate certain units as “women-only”.
As important as these results are, it should be noted that even the authors of the study conducted in the US acknowledge that the study also
had its limitations. Future research should include a temporal order that is
more clearly delimited and capable of helping to elucidate how the ‘better
status effect’ and the ‘backlash effect’ can coexist in an explanatory model
related to rape. In addition, it should also identify the socioeconomic arenas in which women are achieving greater equality over time (in terms
of education, job status and income). This involves identifying the factors
that are able to explain which gender accomplishments are most threatening to the sustainability of the patriarchal system. It is also necessary
to supplement macro-studies with micro-level studies that reveal, for instance, men’s perceptions regarding women’s accomplishments and provide a more thorough understanding of the persistence not only of rape,
but also of violence against women in big cities.
The non-conclusive studies to which we have been referring reinforce
the idea that in-depth research is necessary regarding the complex causes
that link the various manifestations of violence against women and violence based on social inequalities. That is, attempts should be made to
conduct comprehensive qualitative research that makes it possible to illuminate the links between gender-based violence and other forms of social
violence.
Given the endurance of the gender stereotypes mentioned at the beginning of this work, and to data showing both the persistence of violence
against women and gender inequalities in various countries, it would seem
— as Nancy Fraser (1997) holds — that economic and cultural injustice are
intertwined, and reinforce each other dialectically. Thus, as Fraser states,
justice can only be conceived by identifying the emancipatory possibilities of
those two realities, gender violence and gender inequalities, and integrating them in a single and comprehensive conceptual framework. This is
because cultural differences can only be expressed in a context of freedom
and mediated democratically if there is a foundation of social equality.
In this sense, and following Fraser, there is a need for state policies fostering social equity along with profound cultural transformations in the
form of interpersonal relations that exist and in the value assigned to social
subjects.
Mass media and educational systems should be privileged spheres for
achieving these goals. Governments are indeed responsible for promoting
these changes, but civil society, women’s organisations and feminist movements can also be protagonists in this process.
This is precisely the realm in which territories and how they are organised can offer opportunities for transforming gender relations and preventing the reproduction of gender hierarchies. The International Union
of Local Authorities (IULA) Declaration on Women in Local Government
(1998) stated that ‘women have the right to equal access to the territory
and geographical space of local governments, ranging from the right to
own land, to the right to move freely and without fear in public spaces
and on public transport’ (par. 15), and that governments should ‘devise
and develop methods, policies and strategies that help offset barriers to
women’s participation in local decision-making’ (par. 23). In this regard,
urban planning can make a contribution to inclusive and safer cities and
neighbourhoods by taking into account the conditions of urban surroundings, and by basing its proposals on principles that guarantee access to and
ownership of urban space for all citizens. This demands an equitable distribution of public services in the territory and the participation of citizens
in city design and management.
Selected Results of the Regional Programme
‘Cities without Violence against Women, Safe Cities for All’
The evolution of the Regional Programme allows for some provisional
conclusions. On a state level, it is increasingly more possible to envision alternative and innovative actions to make cities safer for women, with a political commitment to gender equity as a starting point. This commitment
is manifest in the definition of specific areas of government for the promotion of women’s rights. These areas must direct the processes necessary to
accomplish higher levels of gender equity and equality and, at the same
time, advance gender mainstreaming in other governmental spheres, such
as territorial planning departments. The commitment of different government departments converts women’s safety in cities into a shared objective, which may in turn strengthen institutional resources. An example of
this is the Municipal Urban Guard in Rosario, Argentina, an unarmed civil
group that promotes safety and peaceful coexistence through prevention,
education and control. Key to the success of this corps have been its efforts
to integrate issues related to gender-based violence with its preventive actions and to coordinate its actions with the Office of Women’s Affairs in the
city of Rosario.
The process of women’s empowerment connected to the Regional Programme is a joint effort with other women and organisations. Its goal is
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that women acknowledge the specific forms of violence that affect them
in cities and the causes related to their lack of recognition as subjects of
rights. This has led to proactive actions designed to change the conditions of their neighbourhoods originating from women themselves. They
are now aware that they have the right to participate in decision-making
processes that may be relevant to their daily lives and communities, such
as those pertaining to the production and management of territories. The
streets they travel, the means of transportation, the state of repair and distribution of bus stops are all matters that involve and affect women in
particular. Socioeconomic inequalities are embodied in actual territories
and reinforce gender-related forms of exclusion and inequity. In this sense,
territorial organisation is no stranger to women’s prospects regarding mobility and their ability to take ownership of the city. Women living in the
neighbourhoods of Rosario, Bogotá and Santiago, where the Regional Programme is being implemented are aware of their right to take ownership
of urban space, meaning their right to use space and to participation as an
essential condition of the former.
Women have been excluded, but they have also excluded themselves
from the decision-making process concerning urban territories. The dichotomy between private/public space and the assignment of space based
on gender have been questioned by the women’s rights movement since
its very beginnings. Furthermore, women have participated, and still
take part in struggles for better human settlements and access to housing
and public services. Nonetheless, their demands have remained strongly
linked to their role as care-takers in the private sphere, and not to their condition as citizens and their right to the city. This being the case, women’s
interventions in public spaces in the cities where the Regional Programme
is operating evidence a new meaning of collective action: it can transform
individual interrelations based on women’s knowledge and recognition of
themselves and others, and lead to a renewed social contract. At the same
time, the approach to dialogue with state actors becomes one of active citizenship that questions the partial and technocratic view of the urban planning discipline.
Governments cannot evade their responsibility with regard to the implementation of holistic policies that prioritise solid cultural transformations in gender relations, take into consideration possible spheres of advocacy — education, mass media, access to justice — and include women’s
voices in public actions and policies. To this effect, decisions related to the
production of urban territories at different levels, as well as safe access to
and re-appropriation of the territory, must be a part of the new designations of shared power. In addition, women, their organisations and the
women’s rights agenda should include these as components of their political and social transformation demands.
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This book was composed using the
Palatino and Optima typefaces created by
Hermann Zapf for the Stempel foundry.
Printed in Chile by LOM Ediciones,
January 2010.

Women in the City: On Violence and Rights

Transcription

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