Violence Against Women & Access to Justice: hearings

Meeting report

JOINT MONITORING COMMITTEE ON THE IMPROVEMENT OF THE QUALITY OF LIFE AND THE STATUS OF WOMEN
15 November 1999
VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN & ACCESS TO JUSTICE: HEARINGS

Documents handed out
"Access to justice for rural women: special focus on violence
against women" by Institute of Criminology, University of Cape Town
Judicial colloquium on the application of international human rights law at the domestic level held in Vienna from 27 - 29 October 1999 (by Judge K O’Regan) (Appendix 1 - attached to end of minutes)
Centre for Rural Legal Studies submission
Presentation from CERSA (Women’s Health): Medical Research Council (Appendix 2 - attached to end of minutes)
Community Law Centre document available at end of week

SUMMARY
Morning session
The Medical Research Council, Community Law Centre, Judicial Services Commission, and Constitutional Court Judge Kate O’Regan, briefed the committee on: Access to justice in the context of ending violence in the home and in the rest of society.

Afternoon session:
Ms Nokuzola Mgidlana from the Transkei branch of Ilitha Labantu, focused on issues and instances of violence against women in rural Transkei. She related individual cases of violence against women in some detail and focused on the shortcomings of the criminal justice system in particular in dealing with the violence and abuse.

Ms Lillian Artz from the Gender Law and Development Project, Institute of Criminology, focused on rural women’s access to justice . She spoke about the various problems around service delivery in the rural areas, developmental issues which needed addressing, and the key problems of rural women.

MINUTES
Morning Session
CERSA (Women’s Health): Medical Research Council
Ms N Abrahams of CERSA informed the committee of the results of the research undertaken on the topic, ’Men’s relationships with and abuse of women’. (See attached report)

Discussion
Ms E Lubidla (ANC, Northern Cape) noted that there are religions where abuse is not openly discussed and in some instances not encouraged to be reported to the police. Ms Lubidla then asked whether this was taken into account in the study.

Ms Abrahams said that they are aware of the tendency of certain religious leaders to conceal abuse and this is something that is being and must be looked at.

There was a question regarding statistics showing that the Western Cape has the highest amount of abuse - how much of the research was conducted on women in rural areas.

Ms Abrahams said her study only deals with men in urban areas, but other studies done by the Medical Research Council do include rural women. These studies have shown that rural women are at a disadvantage and are heavily affected by abuse.

Community Law Centre
Ms H Combrinck, senior researcher from the Community Law Centre, addressed the committee on issues in which the Community Law Centre could be instrumental in changing. The Community Law Centre is a legal research project, which looks at issues surrounding women in law. A most recent study was conducted on the position of women in the Free State, which is largely rural. Ms Combrinck said the provision that provides for the sentence of life imprisonment for serious sexual offences, also provides for an exception. The exception applies where the judge finds "substantial and compelling circumstances", which according to Ms Combrinck creates the difficulties.

Ms Combrinck expressed the view that in the consideration by judges of what is "substantial and compelling circumstances", the following factors should not be taken into account:
- whether the complainant has been sexually active,
- the complainant and accused knowing each other or being related,
- no real physical injury sustained by complainant.
Ms Combrinck believes that the problem does not only lie with the judges, but also the lack of resources, especially regarding the prosecution of offenders. Prosecutors are believed to be ill prepared, because of large workloads. A proposal was made to appoint more prosecutors to look specifically into cases relating to abuse.

Discussion
Ms E Lubidla (ANC, Northern Cape) asked whether the research was conducted across racial lines.

Ms Combrinck said that cases were not selected on basis of race or gender, but rather in looking at the judgements of courts and on that basis was cases selected.

On Ms Combrinck’s remark that not many cases were applicable and of assistance in the research, Mr A Marais (ANC, Free State) asked whether South African law precedence, especially in the area of rape, is non existent.

Ms Combrinck responded that because this law only came into operation last year there are not many cases to compare it with.

Judge O’Regan
Judge Kate O’Regan gave a report on a judicial colloquium on the application of international human rights law at the domestic level held in Vienna in October 1999 (see report.)

Discussion
Ms S Camerer (NNP) said that in an earlier submission by Ms Combrinck a proposal was made for parliament to set out guidelines for judges to follow when making judgments. She then asked to what extend might the guidelines be an "invisible barrier".

In response Judge O’ Regan said that there are complex constitutional aspects relating to this issue and would rather refrain from making comments thereon.

Ms N Botha (ANC) expressed the view that South Africa has a system that provides for ongoing necessary training for judges, but because of the voluntary nature of the training it is not well attended and accepted by judges. She then went on to ask how other countries handle this problem with judges.

Judge O’ Regan responded that judicial education is widely employed in other countries and generally it is under the auspices of the judiciary. The reason being that judges prefer to hear from other judges on how to deal with certain matters and how to develop the law.

Mr A Marais (ANC, Free State) asked Judge O’ Regan on her view of the secondary role of women, as set out in the Bible.

Judge O’ Regan responded that "it is clear that the rights of women are to be seen as universal human rights, despite religious background".

A member remarked that there are different stakeholders in the implementation process and therefore there are bound to be clashes between the judiciary and legislature. She then asked whether this was touched on at the convention.

Judge O’ Regan said that there was no specific discussion on this issue, but several countries indicated that there is insufficient independence of the judiciary. She expressed the view that there are no simple answers to the question.

Judicial Services Commission
Adv J de Lange gave a briefing on the Judicial Services Commission (the Commission), in his capacity personal capacity, and not as a representative of the Commission. The main function of the Commission, as provided for in the Constitution, is to advise the national government on any matter relating to the judiciary or the administration of justice and to submit names of suitable candidates for the appointment as judicial officers. The Commission comprises of 23 permanent members and when considering appointment of judges use two additional members. S 174 of the Constitution set out the main guiding principles, to be taken into consideration, in the appointment of judicial officers. Adv de Lange said that before 1994 there was a major imbalance in the appointment of judges, which resulted in mainly white male judges being appointed, and S174 is setting out to balance things. Things have changed since the introduction of the Constitution and at present there are 17 women and 38 black judges on the bench. Adv de Lange said that at present new appointments do not reflect real changes in gender, but quite dramatic changes in race.

In the appointment of judges the following principles and criteria are taken into consideration:
- racial and gender criteria;
- integrity (which probably weights the strongest);
- competency, in which both technical experience (qualifications and
legal experience) and experience in the involvement in society, are
considered;
- intellectual transformation ethics; and
- potential.
Adv de Lange said that in theory it looks easy to make the judiciary more balanced taking into consideration the constitutional principles and the criteria, but in practice it becomes difficult. Reason being, in order to make appointments of judges, a position must become vacant or be created, which is very difficult considering that judges have a lifetime span on the bench. However, the appointment of Acting Judges take place at regular intervals. Also in order to get a more balanced judiciary it is important that those people catered for in the Constitution apply or are nominated to these positions. The numbers of relevant people who are nominated are very limited and therefore it is important for people to be encouraged to apply.

Discussion
There was a question as to how one can ensure that all judges are gender sensitive.

Adv J de Lange responded that Judges should undergo training, especially with regard to gender sensitive programmes. He went on to say that these programmes should not be voluntary, but should rather be compulsory legal training.

There were no further questions or comments.

Afternoon session
Ilitha Labantu
Ms Nokuzola Mgidlana focused on the issue and instances of violence against women in rural Transkei. She said that the rate of rape in the rural Transkei area was higher than in the urban areas. She focused on a variety of individual cases that highlighted the difficult position in which women find themselves in accessing justice.

She said that rural women were extremely marginalised, voiceless women and it seemed as though women were not protected by the law there. She suggested that Magistrates, Prosecutors and District Surgeons in the Transkei rural areas needed to have workshops around the issues of violence against women to open their eyes to what was going on. She said that gang rape was rife in these areas and the police services are inadequate to properly deal with it. To add insult to injury she said that the hospitals are more concerned with whether their was "physical injury" when prioritising patients. She said that they do not categorise rape as a violent crime – simply because there is no visible evidence of physical injury. Thus she said that the victim was victimised twice.

She cited unsympathetic prosecutors as well as the issue of missing dockets that seem to disappear mysteriously as being problems common to the Transkei rural areas.

Questions and comments by committee
The chairperson, Ms P Govender, said that there was clearly a weakness in ensuring the participation of rural women in hearings in parliament. She suggested that in future perhaps hearings in rural areas such as in Transkei should be considered.

In response to a query on the success of any cases, which had come before the courts, involving any rape or gender based violence, Ms Mgidlana said that a major problem was that lots of rural women did not even know the procedure involved in the reporting of rape cases. There was very little assistance from an almost non-existent police service.

There was a request for a list or a profile of those cases in the Transkei involving violence against women, which have been reported but which have been struck off the roll.

Ms Mgidlana said that she would in fact be collecting a profile of those cases later that day from Ilitha Labantu. She said that this would be with case numbers as well. She said that government assistance was needed in order to get these matters heard by the courts. She added that it appeared as if magistrates in the Transkei did not even understand the duty men had to support their children in terms of maintenance.

Gender Law and Development Project, Institute of Criminology
Ms Lillian Artz's focus was also on rural women’s access to justice. She said that in national policy and even in legislation rural women were not part of the equation. Because of poverty and limited access to services in the rural areas she said that at various levels the issues of service delivery in rural areas had to be flagged.

She referred to interviews conducted with about 200 rural women in the Southern Cape for a research report. These interviews covered issues of access to justice, violence against women, areas of justice in their communities which they felt were important and significant to them. She said that it was assumed that violence against women within this was the key issue within the rural communities but the research showed the violence against women "plays into many, many other development based issues." It was concluded that violence against women was a key inhibitor to development within rural communities – particularly for rural women.

She said that what was important in the debates around the issue of violence against women were the voices of women articulating their experiences that organisations such as Ilitha Labanthu brought into the open. The key issue was that of development within those communities. Rural women were amongst the most underprivileged and the support structures and kinship structures in the rural communities were extremely fragmented and limited. She said that the CBOs in these rural areas have been built up, deconstructed and reconstructed and re-profiled. There was inconsistency in terms of the access to basic community based support services that women were accessing.

She noted that emerging policies and legislation, for example the Domestic Violence Act and the development of a Sexual Offences Act were
wonderful pieces of legislation, but it was not certain how this would be played out in the rural areas especially as in many of the rural areas there were not even any permanent police stations. There were only mobile satellite stations which would be there one day and gone the next day. Therefore just in terms of the consistency of basic policing services, they were not available for women. She was therefore curious as to how applying for an interdict would play out. According to her research three days were spent travelling to the police station and the courts just to apply for the interdict. Thus three days of wages (if they were working) would be forfeited. In addition women also struggled with sheriff’s fees and transport merely to get to the Police Stations to report the abuses they are experiencing. This was secondary victimisation.

The Department of Welfare was found to be extremely uncooperative with women who were experiencing violence. They focused on issues of violence only if it was in the context of child abuse so that they focused on the family unit but refused to separate the issue of violence aqainst women. They also gave women very little information on how to secure the limited amount of services that were actually out there. Medical – Legal services for rape victims were scarce. During visits for research purposes to some clinics in the Southern Cape some were found not to be open during office hours and some of the nursing sisters available were drunk at the time. There were long queues and no assistants to pick up on issues of violence against women. There were no materials to inform women of where they could seek help and legal remedy.

The issue of domestic violence was quite a problem because women were told that domestic violence happens to women when they are bad wives or mothers or if they are alcoholics. She said that there was a whole element of provocation that happens in their understanding of the violence in their lives.
In terms of family support, many of the women who she spoke to during the research said that they were obligated to speak to their partner’s family first about the violence. The next step was to speak to their own families. They experienced tremendous alienation from their in-laws around the abuses they were experiencing. They were told that they were bad wives and that if they were good this would not happen. Even within the family – community dynamic there was very limited support for women especially those in very traditional communities where there is a solid kinship structure. It was assumed that these kinship structures were a support structure but in the case of violence and rape it was found that this was not the case.

The key problems were the following:
Women in rural areas lacked nearby services.Costs of transportation decreased their ability to leave violent situations or even to seek assistance to deal with the problem.If women were unemployed they had to secure funds some place in order to get the money for the 2 hour ride to the town centre.
Had to take time off to take the 2 km walk to the clinic etc. Developmentally she said that these issues had to be focused. There were fears of community gossip or alienation – where people were called traitors to the others in their community when exposing domestic violence. They had little option but to remain in the home with the offender as there were no safehouses or shelters. Women remained powerless over alcoholism in their communities. Shebeens remain completely unregulated in the rural areas. Girls aged 13 or 14 got excessively drunk as a result. The Shebeens were seen as the hub of the recreational activity. The other main recreational facility was the home – where there was a domestic violence rate of 80%, therefore the kids did not like spending too much time at home. Unfortunately there were very few normal recreational facilities such as community centres where children could go and play. There was limited access to public and private health and welfare services. There was systemic discrimination against rural women particularly in relation to language – the fact that if police officers needed to get in touch with women especially in rape cases, they did not have contactable numbers or addresses or people they could get hold of. Police were reluctant to go into those communities to find women to continue investigations, particularly in Rape cases. The taxi services were limited and there was a complete monopoly with regard to the taxi services therefore it was expensive. There were no bus services. Women were therefore confined to the home. Thus on the one hand they saw it as a safe place on the other hand, because of domestic violence it could be rather dangerous.

In the white paper on safety and security violence against women and the development of women is seen as an economic issue. Any form of development is couched in capacity building, and economic empowerment. She said that it was needed to take a step back and look at what the RDP had to say about women and development. It had to be looked at to see what it meant. She said that women thus had to be tracked through the health, welfare and justice systems to identify what the gaps were and what the resource restructuring might look like in light of women who were getting limited access in those areas.

She doubted whether the issue of development had been addressed very systematically. She said that it had to be remembered that development issues for women were different to development issues for men. Women had very different needs, skills and abilities. She said that the "feminisation of poverty" had to be critically looked at when there was policy - making. She said that the Black Sash and other organisations had been doing this for years. They had also looked at the welfare system, which she said was incredibly tight and inaccessible.

Another problem experienced in relation to development work was that the development debates assumed that the family unit in a community was a healthy sight from which to work. She said that many of the rural communities were extremely disintegrated economically and emotionally that this could not be assumed. In terms of the development programs in Africa and internationally, women were not seen as agents of social change but she was simply a passive recipient. So the solution for economic and social empowerment was to write a cheque, or make sure that there was a certain allotment or a certain number of bricks to build. She said that people had to move away from this and look at more social empowerment initiatives. She said that the statistics of violence against women in rural areas were available in the report of the institute.

She however said that she did not come to give detailed statistics in respect of violence against women. As a feminist, methodologist, and researcher she said that people had to try and move away from the "pie chart" approach to violence against women to the "grand scale policy, - legal reform" type of approach and start drawing in on gaps, work on local governments by getting women involved, making those systems accessible in local communities.

Questions and comments by committee
The chairperson commented that rural women’s access to justice was a problem which stemmed from a gross historical reality. Over 85% of police stations in 1994 were in previously white areas. Police stations were critical entry points for access to justice. She said that to ensure access to justice this had to begin with the redistribution of resources. She was not sure to what extent those resources had been shifted sufficiently but said that the results of Ms Artz’s research had suggested that there was still much to be done in this regard in the rural areas.

An ANC member wanted clarity on whether the research done by the Institute of Criminology was done in terms of "rural" women in the true sense of the word, or in terms of informal rural settlements or farm labourers. She said that the project looked at rural women in the Western Cape but she said she did not know the rural set-up in the Western Cape. She did feel that the project was more relevant in the truly rural provinces.

Ms Artz said that the research was done from Swellendam to Port Elizabeth. This included isolated fishing and forestry communities. It also included farming communities and informal settlements. She said that it was a comprehensive section of what is seen in the Western Cape. When liaising with reseachers in the Eastern Cape and Kwazulu Natal she learnt that while the profile of women is different when they come from the kinship structures and the customary issues that they are tied into are also different, the experiences of violence against women and all kinds of other developmental issues in terms of isolation and limited access to resources, were very much the same. She said that the difference was the way violence against women was dealt with in kinship structures.

Another ANC member wanted to know whether the research was going to be conducted on a larger scale than in the Western Cape. She also felt that the truly rural areas should be targeted.

Ms Artz said that they were exploring setting up similar research projects in other provinces. She said that the problem was that there were very few NGOs and CBOs to work with.

Ms Govender said that it would be useful if certain women whom the Institute interviewed during their research could in fact be empowered to participate in a presentation to parliament. The meeting was adjourned.

Appendix 1
Kate O'Regan Judge,Constitutional Court
Judicial colloquium on the application of international human rights law at the domestic level held in Vienna from 27 - 29 October 1999.

I wish to thank Pregs Govender, the chairperson of this committee for inviting me to address you on the judicial colloquium recently held under the auspices of the United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women. The colloquium was concerned with the application of international human rights law at the domestic level. It was held in Vienna from 27 - 29 October and was attended by 90 judges from more than 70 countries. Three South Africans were present, myself, Judge Navi Pillay, the President of the ]nternational Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and Ms Belinda Molamu, a regional magistrate from Justice College, Pretoria. Ms Molamu's and my attendance was made possible by the generous support of the Canada-South Africa Justice Linkage Project.

The key international conventions under consideration were the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the International Convention on the Rights of the Child. Indeed the colloquium was held to mark the 20^th anniversary of the first, which I shall for ease refer to as CEDAW, and the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the second, which I shall refer to as the Rights of the Child. These two conventions are the UN conventions which have the most ratifications. 191 countries have ratified the Rights of the Child, while 165 have ratified CEDAW. As you know, South Africa ratified both conventions during 1995 and, indeed, this committee is the parliamentary committee appointed to monitor the implementation of CEDAW in South Africa. Because this committee is primarily concerned with the rights of women and the implementation of CEDAW, I shall limit the remarks I make today to the discussion at the colloquium of the application of CEDAW at the domestic level.

I understand from my discussions with Ms Govender that this committee considers that the primary focus of its work during the current parliamentary term to be the implementation of rights for women, as opposed to the focus on the preparation and drafting of new legislation which I gather was the primary focus of this committee during the last parliamentary term. The commitment to women's rights are to be found in the Constitution, in legislation and in the self-executing provisions of international conventions ratified by South Africa.

In many ways, the primary focus of the judicial colloquium in Vienna was implementation of CEDAW rights. Indeed it was concerned with a specific form of implementation, that is through the application of international human rights norms at the domestic level. As most of the participants were judges, the primary discussion related to the application through judicial decisions although there was also some discussion of legislative initiatives to implement CEDAW obligations.

I left the colloquium with the indelible impression that implementation of CEDAW obligations in a manner that will make a real difference to the lives of women is not a short-term or easy task. It requires changing attitudes and the social, cultural and economic practices which disadvantage women. Although such attitudes and practices vary from country to country, and indeed within countries, there seem to be no societies where they are absent. The variety of those attitudes and practices, however, probably means that uniform responses will be ineffectual. Remedies need to be designed to fit the specific problem. Designing the remedy requires a detailed understanding of the problem.

The colloquium took place against the background of the adoption of an optional Protocol to CEDAW by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 15 October 1999. This protocol provides that an individual may seek relief from the Committee where she or he claims to be a victim of a violation of a right set forth in the Convention have been breached and all domestic remedies have fruitlessly been exhausted. The optional Protocol will come into force three months after the date of the l0th ratification.

The colloquium addressed itself to three themes - all with relevance to South Africa. The first considered the application of CEDAW to the areas of nationality, marriage law and family relations. The second considered the application to the area of violence against women, and the third to the area of women's work.

In each case, there was considerable diversity in the manner in which countries had sought to give effect to their international obligations under CEDAW. The socioeconomic and cultural context of the countries concerned varies significantly as well. Despite this, it was significant that at the end of the colloquium, the participants unanimously adopted a communique which, amongst other things, confirmed "that the human rights of women and the girl-child are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of universal human rights and that the eradication of all forms of discrimination on grounds of sex and gender is a priority objective of the international community". The communique also stated that "these human rights principles are applicable in all countries and in all cultural contexts and emphasised that no pretext of culture, custom or religious considerations should be allowed to undermine these principles."

The discussion in the field of nationality law indicated that at least fifteen states had reservations on article 9 of CEDAW which provides that women shall have equal rights with men to acquire, change or retain their nationality. It was pointed out that one country when filing its reservation had explained as follows:

"This is in order to prevent a child's acquisition of two nationalities where his parents are of different nationalities, since this may be prejudicial to his future. It is clear that the child's acquisition of his father's nationality is the procedure most suitable for the child and that this does not infringe upon the principle of equality between men and women, since it is customary for a woman to agree, upon marrying an alien, that her children shall be of the father's nationality."

The Committee has issued a general recommendation (13^th session, 1992) indicating the importance of article 9 and encouraging adoption of it.

A discussion of family law also highlighted different cultural, religious and customary practices many of which are disadvantageous to women. Of particular interest were presentations and comments from Islamic countries who have adopted Muslim personal law. For example, Tunisia has abolished polygamy and extra-judicial divorce while other countries applying sharia law have not.

In the area of violence against women a wide range of different forms of violence against women were acknowledged. There were papers on rape, sexual harassment, domestic violence and state violence. In relation to the last matter, Navi Pillay gave a fascinating account of the work of the International Criminal Tribunals, both for the former Yugoslavia, and for Rwanda, concerning rape as a crime against humanity. She noted that there is a dearth of express provisions in international conventions dealing with violence against women.

The discussion of women in the workplace gave place to a lively discussion on the scope of affirmative action under CEDAW and the appropriate principles relevant to it. There were also presentations from individual countries identifying the manner in which CEDAW had been relied upon by domestic courts or tribunals in developing jurisprudence relating to non-discrimination in the workplace. The experience of those participating appeared to have the most common ground in relation to this theme of the colloquium.

Throughout the colloquium, there was discussion of the need to make the judicial system responsive to women. Perhaps the most important message that I gained was the need to identify and understand the specific problems before seeking to provide remedies. A Supreme Court judge from Puerto Rico gave an interesting account of the research undertaken in her country to identity the real problems faced by women both in gaining access to the legal system and in the courts once access was gained. After an intensive inquiry had been undertaken measures to ameliorate the problems identified were formulated.

The colloquium ended as stated above with the adoption of a communique. In it, the following issues were raised.

(a) the need for countries to seek ways to ensure access to the justice system for women
(b) the need for lawyers, legislators, judges and citizens to recognise the importance of international and regional human rights law and for them to be familiar with its provisions. To this end, the following proposals were made:
- judicial education. In particular, the communique called ‘for all judges to
engage in an on-going process of comprehensive, in-depth and credible judicial education to integrate CEDAW, CRC and other international human rights instruments into domestic law and decision-making to enhance the social, political and economic lives of women and children and to eradicate violence against them. To that end, participants called on Governments to support the judiciary in these efforts, including through the provision of adequate resources.’ ;
- education for lawyers and citizens on human rights;
- participants urged the establishment of an international judicial education centre "to assist countries in the design, development and delivery of judicial education programmes on international human rights instruments and jurisprudence";
- as well as for "the creation of an international resource centre to advise and assist law-makers, judicial officers, prosecutors and lawyers in developing specific practices and processes required to implement and integrate international human rights instruments into their domestic legal systems. This resource centre should assume responsibility for the collection of significant human rights decisions and make them available to judges worldwide through all available means, including the Internet."

The Colloquium gave me insights into the energy and dedication devoted by many people internationally to improving women's quality of life. However, it also made clear how difficult this task is. We have adopted a Constitution which makes it plain that women are entitled to equal rights and may not be unfairly discriminated against. We have ratified CEDAW. We have a parliament with, in international terms, a high proportion of women members. We have enacted a range of legislation seeking to further the rights of women. All the evidence suggests however that much remains to be done. We all bear a responsibility for ensuring that what can be done to achieve these important constitutional goals is done. I wish you and your committee well in this important task.

Appendix 2
Presentation from CERSA (Women’s Health): Medical Research Council

Introduction
The bottom line in violence against women is that it is men who abuse women. Most of the research and intervention programmes have focussed on the factors which increase risk of being abused and support for victims of abuse. The other half of the equation, the men who perpetrate the abuse, has been given very little attention. Consequently very little research has been conducted on male abusers, either here in South Africa or internationally. There is still comparatively little data on factors that increase the risk of men becoming perpetrators of gender violence and, in particular, factors which have the potential for change. Another oversight is the way men have not been engaged in preventive strategies and few intervention programs are available for men who abuse.

The research study
The study presented here was conducted amongst men working at 3 municipalities in Cape Town. The overall aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of abuse as reported by men and to identify risks factors associated with abusing women and risk associated with being abused. The study only focussed on intimate relationships between heterosexual partners and therefore did not include abuse of women occurring in other contexts such as stranger rape etc. The men were asked to identify all the partners with whom they had meaningful relationships within the last 10 years. They therefore reported on current partners as well as previous partners. By asking questions about arguments and how arguments and conflict ended we were able to illicit whether a man was a perpetrator. We interviewed 1 394 men using a questionnaire.

Findings
Forty four percent of the men reported having physically and/or sexually abused a partner within the last 10 years. In other words, almost 1 in 2 of the men interviewed. We also asked men about abuse in the previous year and more than 8% of men said they had used physical violence against a partner within the last year.

One third of the men who reported abuse said they had raped or attempted to rape their partner. In other words, 1 in 7 of all men interviewed. Interestingly rape was reported more often than attempts to rape.

These figures only reflect physical violence and sexual violence. I did not include physical threats but the men who reported abused used physical threats 3 times more than the other men. We also asked about psychological, verbal and economic abuse. The study showed that the men who reported physical and sexual abuse was five times more likely to also report using psychological abuse, verbal abuse was used 4 times more common, and economic abuse was twice as common compared to the other men.

We also wanted to know about men’s attitudes to women and asked the men if there were circumstances in which it was OK to hit a woman. Three quarters of the abusers said yes but more interesting more than a quarter of men not reporting abuse also agreed. A question then arises. Who are these men that did not report abuse but said hitting women was OK? One explanation lies in the circumstances the men gave for when its OK to hit.. Some of the common circumstances were : " when she neglects her responsibilities"; "when there are no clean clothes"; "when she come home late"; "when she don’t listen"; "when she is cheeky". It is thus possible that women were not abused because they were perceived as "good" by the men for example they were not "cheeky". Or stated more correctly these men was successful in dominating and controlling their partners.

Aren’t these just dysfunctional relationships?
I think this is a legitimate question to ask. We all know and accept that conflict does happen at times in most relationships. But the reasons for conflict were different in abusive relationships. It was not just a matter of the man saying that the woman is nagging or she is ‘working on his nerves". This list of reasons for conflict was formulated from a earlier qualitative study in which I spoke to men in focus groups discussions. It was obvious that reasons for conflict in abusive relationships reflect the men’s perceptions and views of women and the association with patriarchal ideas of gender roles. In this table I show the risk ratio associated with each reason. A risk of one means there is no difference between the two groups. The risk for being an abuser was higher for reasons such as "sitting on a mans’ head’ or when she answered him back . This translate into men perceiving that the woman was undermining his authority as the head of the household.. The other common reasons relate to men wanting to control the partners sexuality such as conflict arising over sex and when she spoke to other men.

Factors associated with abuse
We asked the questions on a range of factors and using statistical tests we tried to see if any of these factors were associated with being an abuser. Abuse was reported by all race groups and age groups but was more likely to be reported by younger men and Coloured men. We also looked at education. Education was a protective factor. Men who reported no abuse were more likely to have had schooling beyond Standard eight and some training after school. The men who reported being active in religion was also less likely to report abuse. Men who had had multiple partners both in the past and at the time of interview were more likely to have reported abuse.

The role of alcohol has always been emphasised in abusive relationships and in this study the drinking of alcohol was once again found to be associated with violence against women. The association was even stronger for the men that reported that their alcohol drinking was a problem. Similarly was the using of marijuana.

Some researchers have said that men who abuse women have been abused themselves in their past. We asked men questions about their childhood. Receiving physical punishment as a child was not associated with being an abuser. It was a common feature in both groups. Witnessing abuse of their mothers by their fathers as a child was associated with being an abuser. This is in keeping with the social learning theory of the inter-generational cycle of violence. During the interview many of the men became emotional when talking about their childhood and the abuse of their mothers and many said they had never had the opportunity to talk about it before.

What about relationships between abuse and involvement in crime? We asked about criminal activities and involvement with police. Abusers were more likely to have been to jail, have been arrested, belonged to a gang and been involved in fights at work and in their neighbourhoods. This finding suggests links between violence against women and the broader spectrum of violence in society.

Conclusion
In conclusion this study has provided important pointers for intervention with at risk groups and the challenge is to develop and test primary level interventions aimed at all men and secondary interventions for perpetrators.

Recommendations
- multi-sectoral interventions aimed at men
It is recommended that multi-sectoral interventions aimed at men is developed. Intervention within one single area will not make a difference e.g legislative reform on its own is ineffective. Interventions are required at all the levels ranging from personal level changes to addressing the historical, economic and social realities of a deep rooted patriarchal society. Changing men’s perceptions and behaviour should be part of the South African transformation process and be accepted as mainstream in political, social, educational, economical, health and labour sectors. There is a need for both primary prevention and for secondary prevention such as abusers programmes.

Employee organisations and trade unions should be targeted to engage in the fight against violence against women such as to mobilise people and resources. They should implement programmes at work aimed at raising men’s awareness of gender equality and violence. More than anything else we should not forget the women who experience the violence. Interventions directed at men should not distil the resources critically needed for women.

- the need for research
Finally there is a need to develop and to test interventions and monitor its impact on men scientifically.