Interventions against domestic violence by grassroots women

Michigan State University, East Lansing MI

Investigators

Abstract

Despite a renewed interest in addressing violence against women (VAW) in the United States and across the globe, questions about how to end VAW remain unanswered. This research will compare alternative program models that seek to empower women; specifically, economic programs aimed at economic empowerment compared to programs that focus on leadership building to change the lives of community-based leaders and community women. In doing so, the project looks at how grassroots women work against gender inequality through their everyday interventions against VAW. Focusing on domestic violence, the project will advance our understanding of agency, independent decision-making, and awareness of one's own rights as tools that women use to fight against social conditions that produce gender inequality. The project will contribute a nuanced theoretical and empirical understanding of how empowerment programs transform the lives of ordinary women into community actors who combat violence against women (VAW). The project will analyze a diverse set of interviews collected from women using the life history calendar method that helps interviewees recall key events in their lives leading to their transformation and emergence as community leaders. The respondents will also be asked about building agency in others, imparting agency to survivors, changing community attitudes towards women, and pushing boundaries of gendered norms over time. Specifically, the project will investigate how former participants from various empowerment programs take their leadership training back to their communities and help women survivors of domestic violence achieve justice. As not all participants are trained to intervene against domestic violence, the women often develop independent innovative strategies to navigate the complicated local patriarchal caste and religious structures that support such abuse. The research will be conducted in Gujarat, a state in India where violence against women remains high, but it is also a region that has a reputation for pioneering women's organizations.