November 25 International Day Against Violence Against Women.

Gender-based violence is violence "linked to the unequal distribution of power and the asymmetrical relationships established between men and women in our society that perpetuate the devaluation of the feminine and its subordination to the masculine." (1)

This type of violence is expressed in many different ways: sexual violence, harassment, psychological violence, conjugal violence, sexual exploitation, trafficking in women, etc. It is present in most societies and affects women of different ages, educational levels and socioeconomic circumstances.

For centuries hidden beneath a cloak of complicit silence, this problem finally emerged in recent years and is now recognized publicly as one of the worst violations of women's human rights. Though it has been slow in coming, this recognition is the result of the determined and heroic efforts of those women who organized to exert pressure on the international community to acknowledge the full extent of violence against women.

In the last three decades of the 20th century, gender-based violence has been condemned worldwide as the most extreme form of discrimination against women, one which restricts women's and girls' full participation in human development. The proclamation of November 25 as the International Day Against Violence Against Women--during the First Latin American and Caribbean Feminist Encounter in Columbia in 1981--played a crucial role in achieving this recognition. Indeed, from that time onward and thanks to the many activities developed within the framework of this international event, violence against women has been denounced in the streets, in our communities, in institutions and within families. We have broken the bonds of secrecy and privacy, permitting abused women themselves to speak out against the violence that they endure and to ask for help.

This day of activism has gained such prominence that in 1999 the United Nations officially declared November 25 the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Some governments also have followed suit and instituted official celebrations of this event.

Violence and Health

Today, it is well known that gender-based violence has a profound immediate and long-term impact on women's and girls' mental and physical well-being. However, only recently has this problem come to be considered a public health priority which needs to be diagnosed and viewed from a gender perspective.

Likewise, the women's health movement also has worked to raise the awareness of professionals in the health, legal and police services to ensure that they provide the necessary attention to abused women. These agencies frequently lack specially-trained staff in this area, and women's complaints are often given low priority.

The Latin America and Caribbean Women's Health Network has become increasingly involved in this issue and participates with other sectors of the women's movement--especially those involved in human rights--in denouncing violence against women as a violation of women's fundamental human rights and an attack upon their comprehensive health. Beginning in 1996, this involvement has taken the form of coordinating campaigns of activism and advocacy which have united hundreds of organizations and networks at the regional level.

November 25 Campaign Themes and Calls for Action

* 1996--"For the Right to Live Without Violence."

* 1997--"For the Right to Live Without Violence," with the Call for Action: "Let's Protect Our Health by Saying NO to Violence."

* 1998--"For the Right to Live Without Violence" repeated the 1997 Call for Action. This year the campaign was linked to the Global Campaign for Women's Human Rights, "Celebrate and Demand Women's Human Rights," organized by the Center for Women's Global Leadership (USA).

* 1999--"Violence Against Women, Everybody's Problem" with the Call for Action: "Know Your Human Rights, Reject All Forms of Violence."

* 2000--"Violence Against Women, Everybody's Problem," with the Call for Action: "Know Your Human Rights, Reject All Forms of Violence."

* 2001--"Violence Against Women, Everybody's Problem," with the Call for Action: "Sexual Violence: Recognize it to Stop it"

* 2002--Regional Contest "For Women's Health and Against Gender Violence" to recognize experiences to prevent sexual and domestic violence and to support victims.

* 2003--Reviewing the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence Against Women, the "Belem do Para" Convention.

Campaign Achievements

In an analysis presented at a meeting of regional women's health networks held in August 2003 in Bolivia, LACWHN board member Ana Maria Pizarro, director of the Nicaraguan group SI Mujer, identified the following achievements and challenges to LACWHN's advocacy and activism campaigns:

* The campaigns have given the Network visibility and a presence in the public arena. The campaigns have been featured in the press in all the countries where activities have taken place. Over the past seven years, 635 groups and organizations with representation from 19 different countries have participated in the May 28 campaign. Over the past six years, 832 groups and organizations representing 19 counties have participated in the November 25 campaign.

* The campaigns have encouraged the involvement of rural women's groups, the emergence of new female leaders in communities, and the active participation of young women.

* The events have also allowed LACWHN members to develop and distribute a range of materials, to share information and experiences, and to catch up on aspects of feminist debate, generating informal and formal networks of local and regional communication.

* The campaigns have also facilitated dialogue with the State, allowing the movement to introduce priority issues in women's health at the decisionmaking level. Without the campaigns, these fora would have been much harder to secure.

* Likewise, the campaigns have provided LACHWN members the opportunity of proactively improving their capacity to freely exercise their citizenship at all levels by providing opportunities for civil participation and by monitoring the actions of governments in concrete areas of formal public policy, especially legislation that deals with women's health, education and violence against women.

Main Challenges

An evaluation--or re-evaluation--of the campaigns reveals with greater precision the extent to which we are able to reach those sectors identified as priorities, within and outside of the regional women's movement.

By measuring the impact of the campaign within the women's health movement at the regional, country and organizational levels, we can honestly evaluate how successful we have been in fulfilling our objectives, and we will see if we need to redefine certain areas and how to make changes in our strategies.

Likewise, we should ask ourselves if the campaigns only develop a momentum that has a "start" and a "finish" with respect to our agendas and are limited to certain times of the year. Or have we successfully generated an ongoing effort that informs and enriches the awareness of women's rights throughout the region?

LACWHN should follow up on the activities of those groups and organizations that take part in the campaigns and include reports on the campaigns in the Network's regular publications--not limiting coverage only to groups that receive our grants. LACWHN should analyze the current campaign efforts in their entirety, keeping in mind that the total number of participants in the annual campaigns number far more than the groups that receive funds. We should continue to provide specific support but avoid encouraging dependency.

Given the wide distribution and varying characteristics of member groups and organizations in the 19 participating countries, we need well-defined mechanisms that will provide us with more information about the participating groups to avoid accusations of clientelism, which complicates the decisionmaking process.

The Network hopes that the campaigns will encourage increased coordination among groups and organizations at the country level since LACWHN does not have focal points or national chapters. As a result, we must work hard to promote greater efforts to coordinate at the local level.

Surely all Latin American feminists agree that the campaigns are not only necessary but are priorities in our regional work.

One of our greatest challenges is the need to have a decisive impact on the large-scale national processes which currently threaten our basic rights: globalization and the neoliberal model. These "market" politics have transformed the fundamental human right to health into a consumer good, which promotes the lowest common denominator, e.g., the "basic package" of health services.

It is up to us to reject the fundamentalisms of the market which are promoted in numerous national "health sector reform" programs. In these scenarios, health is not a right but a mathematical equation based on cost-effectiveness and "out-of-pocket spending," a euphemism used by the World Bank and its partner agencies to downplay its intent to require the poorest populations of our continent to pay for their health care.

It is also up to us to challenge religious fundamentalism that currently controls issues of sexuality and reproduction in our countries, given that--despite the nominal separation of Church and State- public officials are susceptible to the dictates of the bishops who have transformed themselves into a new class of legislators, meddling in education and health policies, violating freedom of choice and threatening the lives of women and young people.

We also have to challenge political fundamentalism. Plan Puebla Panama and Plan Colombia rob us of the opportunity for peace, social democracy, autonomy and the free exercise of citizenship.

LACWHN's strategies endeavor to reaffirm the consensus of the 9th International Women and Health Meeting which urges that we:

* Take an explicit stand against neoliberal policies and the neoliberal model of development implemented by our governments, identifying them as devastating for the quality of life and health of women and children throughout the world.

* Systematically denounce all policies and direct attempts to colonize women's bodies and to violate our human and civil rights.

* Review the basic concepts that nurture our efforts and enrich, broaden and debate them with the wider feminist movement in the search for gender justice.

* Strengthen, develop and build alliances with other groups and organizations to defend our rights and the gains we have made and to improve the situation of women's rights, democracy and citizenship.

* Confront health sector reforms and their impact on women's comprehensive health.

* Eradicate traditional practices that violate women's and girls' human rights.

To this end, the regional campaigns continue to strengthen the women's health movement, to reinforce our capacity to make demands and undertake advocacy, and to place renewed value on the importance of women's civic participation at all levels of decisionmaking, nationally and internationally.

The response to these challenges is in our hands.

Many women are insulted, offended or treated as "stupid," "useless" or "crazy" by their partners ...

Many women are threatened, manipulated and controlled to the point that they are no longer free to go to work, to study, to visit family members or friends ...

Many women are forced to engage in sexual relations that they do not desire ...

Many women have partners who forbid them from wearing what that want or who destroy their clothes ...

Many women are humiliated, raped, beaten and murdered ...

Violence has many faces ...

November 25. International Day Against Violence Against Women and Girls. Join the On-going Campaign for the Eradication of Violence Against Women and Girls. Forward this message to others ...

November 25 Campaigns: Participating Groups and Countries *

1996           1997           1998           1999

27 groups      42 groups      125 groups     138 groups
12 countries   15 countries   15 countries   11 countries

Argentina      Argentina      Argentina      Argentina
Bolivia        Bolivia        Bolivia        Bolivia
Brazil         Brazil         Brazil         Brazil
Chile          Chile          Chile          Chile
Colombia       Colombia       Colombia       Colombia
Costa Rica     Costa Rica     Costa Rica     Costa Rica
Ecuador        Dominican      Cuba           Dominican
               Republic                      Republic
El Salvador    Ecuador        Dominican      Ecuador
               Republic
Mexico         El Salvador    Ecuador        Mexico
               Guatemala      El Salvador    Nicaragua
Nicaragua      Mexico         Mexico         Peru
Peru           Nicaragua      Nicaragua
Puerto Rico    Peru           Peru
               Puerto Rico    Uruguay
               Uruguay        Venezuela

2000           2001

158 groups     315 groups
12 countries   16 countries

Argentina      Argentina
Bolivia        Bolivia
Brazil         Brazil
Chile          Chile
Colombia       Colombia
Costa Rica     Costa Rica
Ecuador        Cuba
Mexico         Ecuador
Nicaragua      El Salvador
Paraguay       Honduras
Peru           Mexico
Uruguay        Nicaragua
               Paraguay
               Peru
               Uruguay
               Venezuela

* table prepared by Ana Maria Pizarro, SI Mujer

Notes

(1.) Nieves Rico, Violencia de Genero. Un problema de Derechos Humanos. Santiago, Chile: ECLAC, 1996.