THE NO TO VIOLENCE JOURNAL

E N D I N G M E N ’ S V I O L E N C EA G A I N S T W O M E N A N D C H I L D R E N

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THE NO TO VIOLENCE JOURNAL

E N D I N G M E N ’ S V I O L E N C EA G A I N S T W O M E N A N D C H I L D R E N

A U T U M N 2 0 1 4

Contents

1 Introduction

7 A feminist critique of men’s violence against women efforts Tracy Castelino

37 The Caledonian System: An integrated approach to address men’s domestic violence and improve the lives of women and children Rory Macrae

59 The ideology of patriarchy behind adolescent girls’ violence Donna Swift

78 Men’s behaviour change programs: Education, therapy, support, accountability, ‘or’ struggle? Rodney Vlais

114 Considerations for partner contact during men’s behaviour change programs: Systemic responses and engagement Catherine Opitz

143 Male leaders: Community organising for gender equality Scott Holmes and Elizabeth Wheeler

159 Addressing intimate partner sexual violence in men’s behaviour change work Gayle Fulford, Joel Davis, Jill Duncan, Susan Bradborn and Elizabeth Wheeler

177 The men’s domestic violence intervention sector in Queensland: Current issues and future directions Paul Monsour 203 Insights from a leading Batterer Intervention Program in the USA David Garvin and Jeffrie Cape

227 The use of critical reflection processes in group work Carlos Clavijo

245 Contributors

Tracy Castelino 7

A feminist critique of men’s violence against women effortssTracy Castelino, ShantiWorks, Victoria Acknowledgement: I greatly appreciate the editorial support and insightful critique provided by Megan Grigg It is critical that all members of the community are engaged if violence against women is to be eliminated. Violence is complex, it is contextual, and it is subjective. It requires a multi-level response, across government and across sectors. I argue that men need to be involved in the process of change. In fact, I contend that men’s efforts are critical to challenge and change the broader community’s attitudes and responses.

There is much debate about the roles and responsibilities of men: men perpetrating violence, men working to eliminate violence against women and men’s response as part of the wider community. This debate interests me because as men enter the terrain of work to eliminate violence against women, women’s roles, voices and experiences change.

In this paper I argue that it is important to examine men’s roles in violence prevention work from a gender perspective. I then illustrate such gender analyses using the Violence Prevention Gender Audit Tool (VPGAT) (Castelino, 2011). The VPGAT provides a way of reviewing and analysing men’s roles in anti-violence work and the impact their involvement has on the experiences of women’s anti-violence workers. This process brings to light the ways in which men engage in the prevention of violence against women, how such engagement is named and understood, and what discursive practices are used to formulate the various discourses

IntroductIon – the changIng terraIn of antI-vIolence work In my doctoral research I examined the influence of gender discourses on local government violence prevention efforts (Castelino, 2011)1. One of the key findings from this research was that there have been significant changes

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in men’s roles and responsibilities in family violence prevention efforts2 both locally and globally, and that several issues have arisen with these changes. Firstly, conversations about the topic are no longer only about the women who have been and are being abused, but are also about those who perpetrate the violence and the abuse. Secondly, the issue of family violence is now being discussed by men, who until recently have been reluctant to recognise the underlying violence that exists within masculine cultures. Thirdly, we now focus not just on the individual man but also on particular constructions of masculinity (masculinities) and on male culture that support and perpetuate men’s violence.

These revisions to men’s roles impact on women, their experiences of anti-violence work and their partnerships with the men’s family violence sector. This issue intrigues me.

The Violence Prevention Gender Audit Tool (VPGAT) developed through my doctoral research (Castelino, 2011) enables me to verify the processes by which gender is constructed, named and performed in various violence prevention policies, and provides a thematic framework for collating information and questioning practices around four key components in gender violence prevention work. These components are: shared understandings of key concepts, organisational cultures and structures, gender violence prevention policies and processes, and partnership relationships. The VPGAT outlines the four components with localised enquiry questions and then identifies actions and areas for future work in order to reap the benefits of men’s promising role in gendered violence prevention.

the crItIcal role of gender analysIs In all vIolence preventIon work

Feminist post-structuralist thought is a critical lens through which to scrutinise the concepts of gender and violence, and to interrogate the discourses of women’s and men’s experiences. Feminist post-structuralism enables the exploration of the state as a site of power and the key actors as fluid, complex, agentic beings (Grosz, 1994; Butler, 1990) who engage in the construction, deconstruction and reconstruction of discourses. This framework takes into account the local and diverse nature of gender power, and therefore can examine the discursive practices that occur between community and state, between public and private, between women and men, and between diverse groups of women and diverse groups of men. This discourse of gender includes

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women’s multiple and varied experiences and is located within diverse social, political and ethnic contexts.

I use Bacchi’s (1999) influential work throughout this paper as it assists in better understanding that gender is fluid and constructed and reconstructed according to many discursive practices. She poses questions around how the problem is constructed and represented in policies and impacts on the paths taken for reforms.

How gender is conceptualised and articulated impacts on the development of violence prevention policies and programs. Further, how the masculinity of men who engage and participate in violence prevention is named and performed transforms the actual partnership work. Examining gender power relations in operation within violence prevention work can inform action to address these inequalities that arise from the different roles women and men take up, and the consequences of these inequalities on their lives and their work.

Some men who have joined the gender debate have provided a lens through which to see how gender shapes masculinity (Connell, 1995; Hearn, 1997; Messerschmidt, 1997). There is also a growing body of work on men and masculinities that presents and explores men’s place in anti-violence work (Connell, 1995; Hearn, 1998; Kaufman, 2004; Katz, 2003, 2006; Pease, 2008). These pro-feminists cover such issues as: the politics of gender and masculinities; the socialisation process of men and its impact on the individual man, women and the community; and individual and political responses to gender inequality.

There is a critical space for men to do men’s work. Pro-feminists, through their writings and practices, offer new gender roles and multiple versions of masculinity. Men are given new options for relating to women as equals and leaders worthy of respect and love. Hearn (2008) and Pease (2008) argue strongly for men taking responsibility for their personal, political and professional power and present what new and transformative gender relations might look like for men in their everyday lives.

Hegemonic masculinity is a very useful concept developed by Connell (1995) to name and explore power and political leadership and public and private violence; it contributes to the gender order of society and is embedded in specific social environments. It represents a way in which men position

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themselves to the detriment of other men and the exclusion of women (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005, p. 830). Hegemonic masculinity defines agendas for being a man which shape how men and women act, how institutions work, and how culture operates (Connell, 2006).

In any given culture and community there may be a different hegemonic masculinity, depending on the power structures and what holds dominance. In Western cultures the concept of masculinity is oriented around particular performances, such as sport, competitiveness, heterosexuality, physical prowess, sexism and the subordination of women (Beasley, 2005, 2008; Connell, 2005, 2008). The concept of hegemonic masculinity can assist our thinking on engaging men in the process of change, so that we can better understand and manage the masculinities presenting in the anti-violence sector. By focusing on masculinities, the concept of gender becomes visible to and relevant for men. It makes men more conscious of gender as something that affects their own lives as well as those of women, and is another step towards challenging gender inequalities and eliminating violence against women. This visibility allows us to examine how men’s gender interests are socially constructed and psychically embedded, and how they might influence their performances and practices in anti-violence work (Pease, 2002; Flood & Pease 2005; Hearn & Pringle, 2006).

In this paper I highlight three dominant presentations of men’s anti-violence work in the sector:

• men who focus on changing the behaviour of individual men through workshops, trainings and community-based programs

• men who mobilise other men to engage in broader struggles for social and gender justice, and

• men building partnerships with men to build gender equality.

These presentations pervade gendered violence prevention efforts in different ways and require various responses. Finding critical dialogic spaces to review these presentations of men’s anti-violence work enables feminists to develop accountability mechanisms. Further interrogation of these presentations and their various intervention techniques may allow men the opportunity to reflect on and critique their presence and contribution to gendered violence-prevention efforts. In this way a feminist critique starts to conceptualise how

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gendered discourses and presentations play out in the everyday realities of gendered anti-violence efforts.

A number of feminists (Bacchi, 2004; Cornwall, 2004; Sawer, 2003, 2008; Women’s Resource Centre UK, 2007) and pro-feminists (Hearn, 1998, 2001; Pease, 2008; Flood, 2010, 2011) have registered concerns and dilemmas with uncritical men’s involvement in family violence prevention work. There are five main concerns.

Firstly, it is argued that programs or services for men have taken resources that would previously have been allocated to women’s programs or services. Secondly, that women’s services are required to make significant compromises when joining and working in partnership with men or men’s services. Thirdly, that there has been a detraction or shift of the focus away from women and onto men. For example, the White Ribbon Campaign3 is now the focus for the men’s anti-violence movement, with strong social marketing and branding, while the 16 Days of Activism to Eliminate Violence Against Women4 is neglected or not even mentioned. Fourthly, it has been problematised that men’s anti-violence work tends to be about new ways of masculinity rather than equality for women and changing women’s realities. And finally, men’s engagement in preventing violence against women becomes normalised and thus depoliticises alertness to the gendered power relations that are critical to the work. Men’s engagement can be equalised to women’s engagement in preventing violence against women by giving equal airplay to the various struggles that both men and women face, and by calling for a community and partnership response that does not name and examine the varying experiences, efforts, visibility and representation of women and men in the anti-violence space (Cornwall, 2000; Hearn, 2001; Hearn & Pringle, 2006; Pease, 2008).

These concerns are real. I contend that learning masculinities is important to better understand gender power relations. I do not think gender is about women only and domestic violence is about women only: it is a community issue; it is a state issue. However, the process of men’s participation is crucial; otherwise we are at risk of replicating patriarchal power relations and practices. We need to look at the power relations between women and men at all levels and in all partnerships, not just apply a gendered analysis to intimate partner violence.

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vIolence preventIon gender audIt tool

A Gender Audit Methodology (GAM) is an evaluation methodology recently developed to assess the implementation of gender policies, strategies and programs. Gender audits have been developed from initiatives to achieve the Beijing Platform for Action objectives of gender equality and the empowerment of women (Moser, 2005).

There are four widely regarded aims for a gender audit:

• to create a picture of people’s understandings of gender in their organisation

• to examine the extent to which policies and processes are gender sensitive

• to provide a forum for discussion of the key issues, and

• to develop an action plan for gender equality and integration (ILO, 2002, 2007; Rubin & Missokia, 2006).

Over the last 10 years, several organisations such as the International Labour Office (ILO, 2007), the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) (Mikkelsen et al., 2002), the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA, 2000), and Interaction (American Council for Voluntary Action, 2000) have devised different assessment tools to evaluate gender inequality and gender integration.

I developed the VPGAT throughout the research process of my PhD (Castelino, 2011). I revised Moser’s gender audit methodology (Moser, 2005) to include other international development gender analysis tools (Oxfam GB, 2004; ILO, 2002, 2007), and then shaped it to suit the particularities of the area of violence prevention.

The VPGAT can be used within a variety of settings, including a particular issue, an organisational response, policies or programs. It can be used both in the general field of violence prevention, or in the specific area of prevention of violence against women.

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The final structure of the VPGAT provides a thematic framework for collating information and analysing gender issues. It contains four areas of participatory exploration: shared understandings of key concepts, organisational cultures and structures, violence prevention policies and processes, and partnership relationships. All four components are interrelated and contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the materialisation of gender in violence prevention efforts in any given context. Within each component area, questions can be tailored to the specifics of the organisation or partnership.

In the next section, I will expand on each of the four component areas of the VPGAT, giving examples of the types of questions that may facilitate exploration of that component area and explaining why each area is important. In practice, the specific questions within each component area are tailored to the particular circumstances. For the purposes of illustrating the components, I have offered specific questions that can be applied to a program, policy or organisational process.

vpgat component 1: shared understandIng of key concepts

There is almost universal agreement that violence against women is wrong and should not be tolerated. Most people share the value that violence against women is appalling and requires a state and community response. Governments have been specific in articulating protecting the victim, offender accountability and the promotion of gender equality (Castelino & Whitzman, 2008; UN Women, 2011). However, throughout my doctoral research and my experience in the women’s sector, I have seen time and again that workers or organisations who share a mutual concern about the macro problem, often do not agree on the micro details. There are often significant disagreements about the causes of violence, strategies for change and responsibilities and roles in anti-violence partnership work.

Family violence is emotive and controversial; definitions are conflicted and unclear, and there needs to be robust and hard discussions about how women’s services and men’s services, courts and police understand the causes of domestic violence and the consequences for non-criminal and criminal intimate partner violence. Continually being alert to new members’ understanding on key issues such as gender, women’s safety and offender accountability, and generating a space for discussion, allows for genuine and transformative collaboration.

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shared understandIng of key concepts

Example questions:

What is your understanding of gender?

What is your understanding of gender violence prevention?

How did you develop these understandings?

How do they influence your work?

Creating spaces for dialogue and debate on gender discourses within the violence prevention context is vital to expose the various understandings of partnerships, good will and good intention, shared meanings, and the assumptions of a level playing field and equal expertise in anti-violence efforts.

vpgat component 2: organIsatIonal cultures and structures

Each organisational context varies and influences the problem construction and therefore the branding of particular policies and their implementation. The VPGAT offers space to explore the particularities of organisational structures and processes in relation to gender analysis, by analysing disaggregated data and examining every facet of an organisation (policy and service provision) for its consideration and impact on women and men.

Data can be collected, for example, regarding attendance at events focusing on White Ribbon Day or the 16 Days of Activism to Eliminate Violence Against Women. How many women and men attended the events? Who bought the social marketing products? Who organised, catered for, administered and led the events? Which events – White Ribbon Campaign or the 16 Days of Activism – received more publicity?

Another example might be to analyse the use of sports and recreational services. Do women and men access services equally? Which services are used more by women and by men? How many women’s and men’s sporting clubs are there? How are they funded and resourced?

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These questions allow identification of where gender justice and gender equality sit within every policy, program and organisational project, including those policies and programs where they are absent.

The areas of enquiry within this component will vary according to the roles of the participants. For example, with people in a leadership position, senior policy advisors or councillors, there might be more detailed questions about embedded gender equality in organisational mission statements, recruitment procedures and in formal and informal processes. For direct practitioners or health promotion workers, questions might focus on how gender is manifested in staff meetings, management–staff relationships and human resources policies. In this research, senior policy advisors, local council administrative staff, domestic violence sector advocates and community sector workers (family services, community legal centre staff), all had a different relationship to policy, their influence on changing and shaping the political direction and their engagement with the political process.

organIsatIonal cultures and structures

Example questions:

What are the principles of the organisation?

How does the organisation prioritise gender issues?

How is gender covered in the organisation’s mission statement?

How are gender issues noted in organisational meetings?

vpgat component 3: vIolence preventIon polIcIes and processes

The third component of the VPGAT emphasises the significance of examining the impact of new policies and programs for their attention to power relations between women and men, analysing people’s perspectives, their accounts of their work and the links to the stated goals.

The White Ribbon Campaign is a useful example to explore the presentation of gender constructs in policy and program development. The campaign

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offers men more positive opportunities to respond to the issue of violence against women. There is a focus on projects supporting education, training and engagement of men to take a leadership role in challenging violence-supportive attitudes. This campaign is a powerful and well-marketed positive program. As mentioned earlier, it targets men in a particular way, men as allies and champions for change, and it constructs the problem in a specific way with the message that ‘not all men are violent’ and ‘men can be part of the solution’. The campaign has become part of gendered violence prevention territory; White Ribbon Day on 25 November is replete with anti-violence and positive male leadership activities.

I argue that currently there is a limited feminist critique of the White Ribbon Campaign and an overwhelming positive marketing of the brand. I experience many practice and philosophical dilemmas with this positive anti-violence social marketing campaign. Each year I receive requests to present at a White Ribbon event. To these requests, I offer information about the history and rationale behind the White Ribbon Campaign, specifically that it is about men taking care, taking charge and speaking out about men’s violence against women. However, I struggle with the number of women engaged in secretariat and other support roles to men who are contrived as the allies of women.

A final concern is the actual experience of and impact on men who take the White Ribbon Day pledge, and their relationships. I spoke with a young man who participated in the ‘I swear’ campaign, circulating this pledge on Facebook and Twitter. He was ridiculed by his mates, and had no support or skills to respond and therefore was shut down. I appreciate that this is one young man’s story. There are many stories of men taking the pledge, wearing the white ribbon and going about their day. However, the reality is that there are pledges in abundance during November each year. What is the pledge? What does it mean for individual men in their everyday lives and relationships?

Behaviour must change – this is the crux of social marketing campaigns – and this occurs through a series of targeted activities. Increased awareness and better understanding of violence against women are not sufficient to make a social marketing campaign successful; there has to be a change in behaviour (Castelino, Colla, & Boulet, 2013). Neglect of this bottom line can lead to enormous waste of scarce resources, and a mis-focus on education and information provision rather than on social change. I note that the White Ribbon Campaign has responded to criticism of their use of male ambassadors who have not best represented the brand of being a respectful man, by developing criteria, assessments and accreditation processes (WRC, 2012).

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More often than not, leaders and participators in White Ribbon Campaign events endorse and grow the campaign without fully comprehending its historical development and meaning. Policies and programs are not gender-neutral and require vigilance through a gender lens. I suggest an interrogation of the White Ribbon Campaign and the webs of power relations and alliances that develop through this men’s violence-prevention social marketing operation. As a woman activist in this work, I ask – how does it translate into action? And further at an organisational level, how is success being measured?The VPGAT can be used for men’s involvement in violence against women work at the macro and micro levels. Within the context of men’s participation in the prevention of violence against women I have developed some localised enquiry questions which respond to specific issues in order to identify action areas for future work. To illustrate the points, I have applied some questions to a general White Ribbon Campaign.

vIolence preventIon polIcIes and processes

Examples

Who is being served by the new program endeavour? And how? For example, who is the target audience of the White Ribbon Campaign?

How is the White Ribbon Campaign serving the safety needs of women?

How does the White Ribbon Campaign contribute to changing public attitudes, institutional responses, cultural norms and values, and to the reduction of violence overall?

Is the White Ribbon Campaign effect sufficient to warrant further funding and support?

Did the White Ribbon Campaign meet the objectives?

What are we expecting from the White Ribbon Campaign? For example, do we expect the reduction of violence, the total cessation of all forms of violence and abuse or a growing understanding and challenging of sexist attitudes?

What changes should be made to improve the White Ribbon Campaign outcomes and accountability?

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This sample of a localised, program-specific enquiry needs to be instituted at the beginning of any new men’s violence against women campaign. We need to build in evaluation processes for each White Ribbon Campaign, not seek funding for evaluation when a program is under way as there is less incentive, limited accountability, and it is increasingly difficult to challenge once embedded in state and local frameworks.

vpgat component 4: partnershIp relatIonshIps

Over the last 20 years, community coordinated responses have been argued as the key approach to enhancing women’s and children’s safety and holding perpetrators of violence accountable for their violence (Busch & Robertson, 1993; Balzer, 1999; Shepard & Pence, 1999). This new discourse has formalised men’s involvement in perpetrator of intimate partner violence work through multi-sectorial partnerships. More recently the partnership discourse has been circulated as the most effective strategy to prevent violence against women.

Responding to violence against women as a human rights issue, a social justice issue, not solely a women’s issue, is more effective and ethical as gender equality is a community issue (UN, 2001; Erturk, 2004; VicHealth, 2007, 2008). Globally and locally there was a shifting discourse that argued for a community response to prevent women being violated in their private and public spaces. There were calls for shared power and responsibility between women and men and bringing men as leaders and as allies into the anti-violence space (Erturk, 2004; VicHealth, 2007). There are advantages and disadvantages to this partnership work.

Community and government partnerships can offer a more effective response to family violence and violence against women. Partnerships are better suited to developing creative targeted interventions because they include a diverse group of individuals representing a diverse range of organisations with different philosophies of intervention. Representing different organisational cultures and services, partnership members bring more new ideas and resources to the problem-solving arena. Further, multiple interventions by different agencies create the opportunity for the target group to be exposed to more than one intervention and thus experience cumulative effects.

But these partnerships bring new actors to the political arena, each with their own values and priorities, which shape the socio-political framework

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and relations and processes between collaborators. Through a feminist lens, I would ask, who decides on the partners and the roles and responsibilities? And what processes are in place to monitor the gender issues involved in these partnerships? The process of the VPGAT allows a localised partnership enquiry, in order to examine these issues. The very presence of men, who are committed to preventing violence against women, influences policy initiatives.

For example in Victoria, Australia, the men’s family violence sector has introduced in policy frameworks such terms as ‘men who use violence’ instead of ‘perpetrators’, and ‘men’s behaviour change programs’ instead of ‘batterer’ or ‘perpetrator’ programs (see NTV, 2005; OWP, 2009, 2010). Through these changes the problem of men’s violence against women has been reconstructed to remove naming the person and the act through a criminal language lens, and instead preferring language that is grounded in welfare or counselling frameworks.

There isn’t an actual consensus in the Victorian family violence sector about what term to use for perpetrators and men’s behaviour change programs. What does it therefore mean for No To Violence (NTV), the men’s family violence prevention body, to be privileging its preferred term? Is this about NTV taking ‘leadership’, or about discounting women’s sector voices and expertise outside of NTV? In my opinion it is vital to ask how, and whether, this reconstruction of language enhances the safety of women and transforms community attitudes on men’s violence against women.

Men’s roles within family violence community coordinated partnerships impact on the work of these partnerships, and on women’s experiences and roles in the work. There are costs and compromises on an everyday practical level for women’s organisations that are sitting at the partnership tables with men’s services and other mainstream stakeholders who do not hold a feminist analysis of violence against women.

The challenge is to explore how gender has been taken into account in the development of partnerships between women’s and men’s services and programs. There needs to be an exploration of the complexities of response, as there is a divergence or lack of understanding on the details of key words such as ‘responsibility taking’, ‘accountability’, and even ‘gender analysis of power and control’. In Victoria these terms have been named in family violence policy documents, such as the Women’s Safety Strategy 2002–2007 (OWP, 2002), Reforming the Family Violence System in Victoria Report (SSCRFV,

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2005), A Right to Respect: Victoria’s Plan to Prevent Violence Against Women 2010–2020 (OWP, 2009) and A Right to Safety and Justice 2010–2020 (OWP, 2010).

These policies consistently dictate multi-sector partnerships as the most effective local response to men’s violence against women in their homes. However, if each partner has a different understanding and practice of gender analysis and accountability how do the partnerships negotiate these differences? These new partnerships require new thinking and new practices as gender is a relational construct and thus is performed between partners and at the partnership table.

These are new and exciting times, where changes are required from all key stakeholders in order to hold perpetrators accountable for their violence and enhance the safety of women and children. There will be mistakes, and learnings. With the use of tools such as the VPGAT, it is my hope that the potential issues can be identified and addressed in order to maximise the benefits of these partnerships.

Among the many concerns about the inclusion of men in violence prevention work, is the disqualification of women’s voices and roles in gendered violence prevention. I will explore this issue further in the next session.

partnershIp relatIonshIps

Example questions:

How are cross-sector partnerships negotiated?

What are the benefits and compromises?

How are men engaged in the process of change?

What language needs to be used in policies to manage cross-government and feminist bottom-lines?

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fIndIngs of research

From my doctoral research into the influence of gender discourses on local government violence prevention efforts and my practice experience in the Victorian family violence sector, I have noticed a number of examples of the silencing of women’s voices as a result of the inclusion of men in violence prevention work. I refer to these examples as follows: adding to women’s work, ‘we are good men’, all men are not perpetrators, and devaluing the experience of women. I will describe each of these issues in turn, and then present some possibilities to move towards a more respectful and equitable framework for partnerships.

1. Adding to women’s workAs part of my research, I identified and examined the various ways in which women domestic violence workers managed meetings in four local community family violence partnerships. I noticed that it was commonplace for women to overtly thank or praise the men for their involvement in violence prevention, and a number of women noted that at times they managed the way they spoke so that they did not offend male colleagues (Castelino, 2011). Three examples of this type of comment are as follows:

The man on the committee is a real gun when it comes to keeping women’s issues on the agenda.

We have worked hard for the last three years and now these senior advisors [men in the government of community development, police and justice] are on board … The men’s sector is making an effort … we need to acknowledge the work that is being done.

The above quotes from my doctoral research exemplify the care women use when speaking about male colleagues in the work. This narrative is based on the beliefs that these are the good men so we should be grateful, take care and reassure them that we are not blaming all men (Marchese, 2008). This effort has now become another aspect of our work, women’s work in our partnership and collaboration with men on violence prevention and violence against women work. Women in meetings are now cognisant of men’s efforts and therefore tend to alter our arguments, our expression.

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This additional care that women domestic violence workers use when speaking about or to male colleagues is an additional workload on top of all the other issues they are managing in such meetings. It is also a divergence of energy or focus from the subject of violence prevention. This additional work materialises in a few ways: there is concern with men’s defensiveness and therefore women manage or censor their responses or keep silent; women often have to manage the interpersonal space between them and male workers in order ‘to get the job done’ and lastly, women manage their responses and share their appreciation for working with ‘the good men’ (see below).

2. ‘We are good men’The second example is a position often taken and spoken by men in this violence prevention work, illustrated by the two examples below:

We are all part time in this work [perpetrator programs] … we work really long hours ... with limited resources and support… I contact women partners [of the men in the perpetrator program] … it is important to me ... it makes me a better worker ...

Conceptualising men who work in violence prevention as ‘good men’ is very different to conceptualising them as pro-feminists who choose to advocate for gender justice and the safety of women. Surely a feminist analysis of this difference must ask what are the costs to women, and to the work, when this becomes the dominant masculinity in violence prevention work? This again diverts attention from the issue of violence prevention and instead focuses it on the care for the men in the room, the efforts they are making and the role and responsibility they are taking. Once again, the pro-feminist politics of the men participating is overshadowed by concerns for their emotional wellbeing.

In addition, this position casts men as either perpetrators or ‘good men’, which renders ‘good men’ immune from conversations about how their behaviour may be impacting on women’s experiences of the partnership. The VPGAT provides questions to study the complexities of masculinities. For example, a possible line of enquiry is exploring how men engage in conversations with female colleagues and debate their philosophies and understandings of masculinities, gender power relations and male privilege and entitlement in family violence partnerships.

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3. ‘Not all men are perpetrators’The third example is illustrated by the social marketing that galvanises rather than alienates the ‘good men’ by being clear that not all men are perpetrators. Michael Kaufman is a key proponent of this mantra. He is a founding member of the White Ribbon Campaign in Canada, and has been a strong advocate of men taking responsibility for men’s violence against women and being allies to women activists in this area.

There are two concerns with this mantra that I would like to explore. First, Kaufman (2012) asserts that we know that a majority of men in Canada, and around the globe, did not use violence in their relationships, that they had never committed sexual or physical assault against their girlfriend or partner. There are concerns, however, with focusing on violence against women as only covering the physical and sexual forms, and further, with the failure to delineate men’s roles, responsibilities, privileges and entitlements in a patriarchal society. We know that women’s experiences of violence and abuse are more than physical, and thus the perpetration of violence encompasses power and control, emotional torment, harassment, and other demeaning, painful acts. The mantra ‘not all men are perpetrators’ excludes all the violence-supportive attitudes and behaviours that might be considered minor, subtle and local, yet are institutionalised and thus embedded in every aspect of our culture. Thus we are all, including men who are not perpetrators of physical and sexual violence, shaped by them.

Second, Kaufman argues that language that leaves men feeling blamed for things they have not done or for things they were taught to do, or feeling guilty for the violence of other men, will alienate men and boys and promote a backlash (Kaufman, 2004, p. 25). Rather than blaming men, he argues that we need to engage them with positive messages. Examples of this can be seen on posters for the White Ribbon Campaign, which seek to affirm the positive, reaching out to men with messages like ‘You have the power to end violence against women in your community’. All men are not perpetrators of violence and abuse. However, we do all live in a society constructed around patriarchal power relations, and therefore are all influenced by male entitlement and male privilege. Emily Marchese (2008) talks about how the feminist agenda becomes side-tracked in the rape debate as pro-feminist men start with making it clear that “there are good men … men are not all bad … most men are not violent … in fact they are inherently good ...” p. 66).

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This again changes the focus from the discussion of the effects of family violence upon women, to the effects of the violence prevention work upon the men who are doing that work.

Because men are part of the dominant position, alliances with women will always be complex and nuanced; they occupy a different position in relation to the dominant power structures and they are speaking from their experiences as men. Again, vigilance and critical interrogation of the work, the responses and the implications are required.

The origins of the White Ribbon Campaign and pro-feminists’ intentions denote a critical new path forward. This paper does not represent a damning criticism of all that is White Ribbon Campaign related. Rather, it seeks to offer a gendered critique of its currency and influence, and to offer gendered questioning about the campaign using the VPGAT.

4. Devaluing the expertise of women in the sectorThe fourth example of the ways in which men’s participation in violence prevention work silences women’s voices is the invalidation of the women’s sectors’ expertise in this arena.

The women’s movement has played a critical role in advocating for women’s rights, making domestic violence a public issue and progressing the policy agenda. Feminist activists joined women together publicly, fighting against inequality, injustice and violence. In Western countries, women’s voices were given political acknowledgement, credibility and space (Pateman, 1986; Dominelli & McLeod, 1989; Weeks & Gilmore, 1996). Feminists in this Western context urged women-centred policy and practice (Dominelli & McLeod, 1989; Weeks, 1994).

While there are various interpretations of feminism, there are baseline principles on the continuing need to address the unequal distribution of power between women and men, expose and change women’s restricted access to social, political and economic power, and to stress how social practices and structures continue to reproduce power inequalities. The history and development of the women’s sector have ensured grassroots activism and strong domestic violence support networks that have direct knowledge of women’s experiences of assault by their male partners.

Tracy Castelino 25

As there have been changes to the approach to family violence work, through the introduction of new partners, the recognition of this women’s expertise has been invisiblised. There seems to be an assumption that because everyone is working together to eliminate violence against women, everyone’s knowledge and skills in this area are the same.

It is clear that each sector has expertise in carrying out its roles and responsibilities; in partnerships, one of the noted benefits is the shared knowledge and specialised skills to enhance the service system response to family violence. However, the expertise of the women’s sector is not blurred by other mandates and agendas – their brief is to enhance the safety of women and children. Domestic violence services for decades have been working on enhancing women’s safety, and advocating for women’s rights to gender justice – clearly this is a specific expertise. I contend that there needs to be recognition of the women’s sector’s knowledge and expertise in partnerships, policies and processes.

In line with this argument is recent research that stresses the vital role of women’s services in violence against women responses. Htun and Weldon (2012) assert that women-focused organisations specifically articulate and champion issues of prevention of rape and intimate violence in formal public settings, such as legislatures. In fact, feminist organisations and activists have defined the very concept of violence against women, raised awareness, and put the issue on national and global policy agendas. These women’s services play a key role in gender justice and social transformation, and their expertise needs to be recognised and be a central guide in men’s engagement in anti-violence work.

gender transformatIon Is possIble

Engagement with men in the process of change is a key strategy identified for effective societal transformation of gender relations. There are varying degrees of partnerships, tensions and achievements around women’s safety and men’s violence against women (Castelino & Whitzman, 2008; Pease, 2008). This is a paradigm shift: there has been the acceptance of men’s involvement in violence prevention and family violence efforts. The women’s sector recognised that engaging perpetrators could enhance women’s and children’s safety, if managed in a coordinated and accountable service system (Hague & Malos, 1998; Shepard and Pence, 1999; Laing, 2000; Shepard, Falk, & Elliott, 2002).

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These new discourses of partnership have potential to transform macro and micro violence prevention practices. However, without an analysis of gender power relations, the dominant patriarchal paradigm that is present in organisations, policies and structures is rendered invisible (Hearn, 1992; Weeks & Gilmore, 1996).

Engaging men is a crucial component in transforming society to eliminate violence against women, to build respectful, safe and fun relationships, and to educate and support new and multiple versions of masculinities. It is vital to reflect on and assess how this engagement with men in anti-violence work is undertaken. I have highlighted the achievements and efforts, the risks and dilemmas. This is complex and nuanced territory and requires navigation with care and respect for those who have gone before.

Through my research I created a checklist to be used to develop a feminist and critically reflective partnership between women’s and men’s services. This checklist is a guide for examining a program or policy. It allows the construction of questions to explore understandings and practices of gender.

Tracy Castelino 27

checklIst for the development of femInIst and crItIcally reflectIve partnershIps between women’s and men’s servIces

One or more gender experts are employed in the men’s violence against women efforts. The role and responsibilities of this gender expert are guided by the safety of women

Gender accountability networks are established at both the national and local levels. These reference groups or networks meet regularly and systematically to analyse and report on the gender dimensions of each area of work, as well as gaps and progress of programs in achieving its goals

Gender accountability structures are developed and formalised through policies, procedures and memorandums of understanding

Disaggregated data is collected, analysed and used in planning and implementing policies and programs

Gender analysis and sex-disaggregated data are a routine part of an agency’s reporting mechanisms

Each sector has a gender action plan and routinely reports on the status of gender indicators

Gender dimensions are integrated into the training provided to all sectors.

concludIng wIth a challenge

This paper identifies the significance and implications of critically examining women’s and men’s changing roles as men increasingly engage in violence prevention efforts. Women and men entering the new partnership terrain need to create space for a gender dialogue, review the institutionalisation of cross-sector family violence collaborations, embed gendered frameworks into policies and procedures, and notice and respond to the shifting power relations.

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The study of gender relations, feminism and masculinities is critical to the influence of policies and programs. Uncritical acceptance of men’s involvement in violence prevention efforts could replicate patriarchal power relations through diverting focus to men, men taking over the campaign, or the very issue of violence against women being side-lined by a focus on engaging men in a change process (Bacchi, 2004; Pease, 2008). It is essential to consider how gender perspectives are understood and applied by the various stakeholders as this will influence how policies are formed, and programs implemented (Costello, 2005; Phillips, 2006, 2008; Sawer, 2008). This work needs critical interrogation from feminist perspectives, with an analysis of the gender hierarchies, gender power relations and the strategic benefits for women and men.

As a feminist watching this new terrain, watching men engaging in gender violence prevention efforts, I am mindful of Audre Lorde’s warning “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”5. Men’s work in this terrain is vital but warrants feminist critique about their processes of accountability, their potential construction of another patriarchal space, their appropriation of women’s space and resources, and their misrepresentation of women’s issues, feminist issues.

Good intentions and good will are important but not enough.

endnotes

1 The Australian Research Council and the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation funded my doctoral research. The Australian Postgraduate Award as project LP0667605 supported the thesis. The GLOVE Project, under the leadership of the Chief Investigator, Associate Professor Carolyn Whitzman, gave me the opportunity to explore this critical issue in gender violence prevention.

2 In Victoria, Australia, men’s family violence prevention is used to denote men’s engagement in gender-based anti-violence work.

3 The White Ribbon Campaign is now the largest global male-led movement to stop men’s violence against women. White Ribbon Day was established by men on the second anniversary of one man’s massacre of 14 women in Montreal. On the afternoon of 6 December 1989, a man walked into the Ecole Polytechnique University in Montreal and massacred 14 of his female classmates. His actions traumatised a nation and brought the issue of violence against women to the forefront of our collective consciousness. Two years later a handful of men in Toronto decided they had a

Tracy Castelino 29

responsibility to speak out about and work to stop men’s violence against women. As a result, the White Ribbon Campaign in Canada became an annual awareness-raising event held between 25 November and 6 December. In 1999, the United Nations General Assembly declared 25 November as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, with a white ribbon as its iconic symbol. The White Ribbon Campaign began in Australia in 2003 as part of UNIFEM (now UN Women), and formally became a foundation in 2007. It is Australia’s only national male-led violence prevention campaign.

4�5IF����%BZT�PG�"DUJWJTN�"HBJOTU�(FOEFS�7JPMFODF�PSJHJOBUFE�GSPN�UIF�ÜSTU�8PNFO�T�� Global Leadership Institute held at the Center for Women’s Global Leadership (CWGL) in 1991. The 16 Days Campaign runs annually from 25 November (International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women) through until 10 December (International Human Rights Day) to make the symbolic statement that violence against women is a human rights issue. The 16 Days Campaign is a mobilising tool for activists with a variety of objectives: to raise awareness at the local, national, regional and international levels; strengthen and link local and global work to end violence against women; provide a forum for dialogue and strategy-sharing; pressure governments to implement commitments made in national and international legal instruments; and demonstrate the solidarity of activists around the world to end violence against women.

5 These words were delivered by Audre Lorde in 1979 at the international conference for the thirtieth anniversary of Simone De Beauvoir’s book The Second Sex.

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