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Gender, Place & Culture: A Journal of
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Violence against women in Ethiopia
a
Abbi Kedir & Lul Admasachew
b
a
Department of Economics , Astley Clarke Building, University
Road, University of Leicester , LE1 7RH, UK
b
Institute for Health Services Effectiveness, Aston Business
School, Aston University , Aston Triangle, Birmingham, B4 7ET, UK
Published online: 08 Jul 2010.
To cite this article: Abbi Kedir & Lul Admasachew (2010) Violence against women in Ethiopia,
Gender, Place & Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography, 17:4, 437-452
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2010.485832
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Gender, Place and Culture
Vol. 17, No. 4, August 2010, 437–452
Violence against women in Ethiopia
Abbi Kedira* and Lul Admasachewb
a
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Department of Economics, Astley Clarke Building, University Road, University of Leicester, LE1
7RH, UK; bInstitute for Health Services Effectiveness, Aston Business School, Aston University,
Aston Triangle, Birmingham, B4 7ET, UK
Investigating the experience of violence against women and exploring women’s coping
strategies is a crucial component of re-tailoring the provision of services for
victims/survivors. This article explores violence against women in the context of
culture, theory of fear of violence and literature on spaces perceived to be ‘safe’ or
‘dangerous’ by women victims/survivors of violence in Ethiopia. To collect the
relevant data, we conducted 14 semi-structured interviews with Ethiopian women who
are victims/survivors of violence and three interviews with gender experts in Ethiopia.
Our group of women suffer in ‘silence’ and confide only in friends and relatives. They
did not resort to institutional support due to lack of awareness and general societal
disapproval of such measures. This contrasts with claims by experts that the needs of
these women are addressed using an institutional approach. Culture, migration status
and lack of negotiating power in places of work are key factors when considering
violence. The majority of the respondents in this study occupy both public and private
spaces such as bars and homes and have experienced violence in those spaces.
The social relations and subsequent offences they endured do not make spaces such as
these safe. Education of both sexes, creation of awareness, sustainable resource
allocation to support victims/survivors, ratification of the Maputo protocol and
effective law enforcement institutions are some of the practical strategies we propose to
mitigate the incidence of violence in Ethiopia.
Keywords: violence; women; Ethiopia; victim/survivor
‘Saet ena aheya dula yewodale’ is an Ethiopian adage, which translates into English as
‘Women and donkeys love being battered’.
Introduction
The purpose of this article is to investigate the experiences, coping mechanisms and the
role that culture plays with regard to Ethiopian women who are victims/survivors1 of
domestic violence. We attempt to address three main research questions by interviewing
both victims/survivors of violence and gender experts. These are: what are the experiences
of victims/survivors of violence? What are the various coping and survival mechanisms
adopted by victims/survivors of violence? What is the role of culture in facilitating
violence against Ethiopian women? In addition to a critical discussion of the above issues
in the context of our research findings and existing literature, we attempt to suggest some
strategies for addressing the problem of violence against women in Ethiopia.
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
ISSN 0966-369X print/ISSN 1360-0524 online
q 2010 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/0966369X.2010.485832
http://www.informaworld.com
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438
A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) (2005), violence against women
is a universal phenomenon that persists in all countries of the world, and the perpetrators
are often well known to the victims/survivors. Yet over the past two decades the analysis
of violence against women has predominantly come from the perspective of radical
western feminist movements (Milner 2004; Schwartz 2005). Moreover, the critiques
within feminism by women of colour and Third World women have highlighted emerging
epistemological debates to transform the nature of feminist thinking. Violence against
women can be defined either broadly or narrowly. It can either encompass a variety of
behaviours that are referred to as violence or simply behaviours that are specific to a given
societal and/or geographical context (Dobash and Dobash 1998). Principally, physical,
psychological, sexual, emotional and financial abuses are usually incorporated into these
definitions (Mirrlees-Black 1999; Palmar, Sampson and Diamond 2005; WHO 2005).
Some women might not even realise that they are victims/survivors of violence and may not
consider certain behaviours as violent2 (Evans, Young, and Wallace 1994; Easteal 1996).
Yet just because an abused woman accepts a violent behaviour as normal, society in general
would not agree (Mirrlees-Black 1999). Even so, the question of who decides what counts as
victimisation and its definition, meaning and seriousness varies tremendously across
countries (e.g. Somalia) (Kelly and Radford 1998). In this sense, places or place-based
identities are not stable, singular or essential (Bondi and Davidson 2005). Rather, the key
bodies in non-state societies include kinship networks, communities (especially women’s
networks), and religious institutions while in state societies, government, professional
bodies and the justice system (Johnson 1998). While gender is one salient dimension in these
experiences and associations, so too are age, class, ethnicity and many other factors
(Bondi and Davidson 2005). Overall, the conceptualisation of violence is also dependent on
social relations, as well as geographical spaces and places (Nelson and Seager 2005).
When the ‘self’ is constructed within a system of societal beliefs that normalises
violence on a socio-cultural level, the welfare and capability of victims/survivors can be
compromised (Burman, Smailes, and Chantler 2004). For instance, Ethiopian community
leaders and elders who mediate disputes usually advise abused women to stay in their
marriages or jobs even under extremely difficult circumstances. Ethiopia is a country in
which violence against women is deeply entrenched and is accepted rather than challenged
(Kelly and Radford 1998). For example, a recent study by the WHO (2005) showed that
71% of Ethiopian women experience either physical or sexual violence. Despite this high
prevalence of violence, not many women are aware of their rights and do not report such
incidents to the police.
Many structural features of Ethiopian society inherently encourage violence.
For instance, there is a widespread tolerance of violence perpetrated against women at
individual, family, community, peer-group, school, religion and state levels. There is also
a culture of abducting young girls for marriage in several regions of the country (and this is
a view that is supported by our research findings). In most regions of Ethiopia, there is a
tradition of early marriage arrangements against the wishes of girls and protest from a
prospective bride is often met with violence. Such harmful practices can result in rape,
physical assault and even the death of girls. Our quote at the beginning of this article is a
strong reminder of socially and culturally sanctioned beliefs about violence in Ethiopia
which have historically legitimised men’s domination over women.
It is also important to note that Ethiopia has been a war-torn country for more than 30 years,
covering the period 1960 to 1990. Ethiopia also has an ongoing feud with its neighbour
Eritrea. Some argue that the effects have had a negative impact upon interpersonal
relationships and occurrences of violence (see Garrett 1999; Sullivan et al. 2005).
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Gender, Place and Culture
439
Currently, Ethiopia has a large army, with demobilised soldiers of the past regime, veterans
of the current regime and displaced civilians that are regularly being resettled and migrating
to different parts of the country. Even though we do not know the original residence and
occupation of perpetrators of violence, we believe that the military history of the nation has a
direct or indirect effect on the incidence of sexual assaults in the country.
In such a society, it is useful to realise that the women who have been subjected to
violence and abuse often comply with their abusers by becoming silent observers. These
individuals are usually the friends and supporters of the violent male who retain the status
quo by keeping silent and face much personal risk if they intervene by acting on behalf of
the victim/survivor (Johnson 1998; Schwartz 2005). Therefore, victims/survivors have a
very limited support base to bring an end to the abuse (Sullivan et al. 2005; Bhuyan and
Senturia 2005).
Violence against women can be facilitated by a variety of factors, such as isolation due
to migration and the alienating tendency (behaviour) of violent men, family members of
violent men and employers. In this research, the majority of our informants had migrated
from the rural part of Ethiopia to the capital, Addis Ababa. Isolation is a function of weak
social bonding, which reduces the extent to which victims/survivors of violence are able to
sustain attachments through friendship and community networks and receive social
support to mitigate violence (Johnson 1998). In several cases, fear and shame of detection
lead battered women to voluntarily withdraw from community and family interactions.
As it stands, patriarchal societies in Ethiopia include a level of power and control,
where traditionally perceived masculine roles are more likely to involve abuse against
their female counterparts (Vass and Gold 1995; Milner 2004, Boonzair 2005; Mahalik et al.
2005). In such cases, abusive and controlling behaviours are congruent with their
construction of masculinity through their interaction with women. Research indicates that
over a quarter of adult abusers reported that their violence served to intimidate, frighten or
force the victim/survivor (Dobash and Dobash 1998). In addition, a violent behaviour
emerges as something that can be overlooked or even excused for cultural reasons, as a
homogenised absence; or alternatively as a pathological presence (Burman and Chantler
2004).
Indeed, the general better economic standing of abusive men and their extended family
members enables them to engage in financial abuse (Dobash and Dobash 1998;
Burman et al. 2004). Emotional as well as sexual abuse is exercised by manipulation,
coercion and using the subservience of women which is common in some cultures
(Evans, Young, and Wallace 1994; Eastel 1996). Among others, the ill effects of violence
against women include damage to physical and mental health (e.g. depression, anxiety and
psychosomatic systems); damage to reproductive and sexual health; and can also lead to
eating disorders (WHO 2001; Sullivan et al. 2005).
Safe and dangerous spaces
Space, place and gender are interconnected, and it is through these factors that inequalities
and oppressions are forged and perpetuated (Bondi and Davidson 2005). In the context of
this study, the construction of space into ‘safe’ and ‘dangerous’ places has some relevance
(Pain 1997). By this, we mean that space plays a role in the reproduction of patriarchal
structures and ideologies vis-à-vis violence against women. For instance, Valentine (1991)
discusses the geography of women’s fear. A significant number of incidents of violence
against women take place in the home or other private and semi-private places. These
places, however, are generally perceived as safe.
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A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
Here we use the notion of place to imply a sense of belonging, safety and well-being.
We use home to refer to a place where safety is expected to be stronger, with the opposite
expectation for spaces outside home. This is mainly due to the fact that power relations are
different in these two places. Place can be conceptualised in different ways in the context
of our study. For example, place can be made material through occupation and use of
space, it is a product of social relations, and it is also a product of negotiations of power,
such as those between a sex worker and a client; a house servant and an employer.
In the tradition of feminist geographers, we analyse landscape by deconstructing the
binary categories of work and home. There is a strong belief in Ethiopia that the latter
space traditionally belongs to women. Hence, the way women are treated when they are
in spaces away from home greatly depends on this belief. However, belonging to a given
space does not guarantee the absence of violence as the large volume of literature on
violence shows. This is particularly the case in the oppressive cultures that exist in
Ethiopia.
The participants involved in this study work as sex workers and servants. Hence they
occupy spaces such as bars and homes. The unequal power relations between men and
women are important in these spaces and they are crucial elements in explaining the
violence endured by the women studied.
Collecting and analysing data3
The fieldwork for this article was conducted in December 2006 and January 2007 in Addis
Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia. Seventeen women were interviewed, of whom 14 were
victims/survivors of violence. The remaining three interviewees were gender experts
working on violence-related issues in Ethiopia. We were able to meet a ‘housewife’, house
maids and women sex workers by visiting one informal employment agency four times.
The agency is situated in the heart of Addis Ababa.4 A briefing session was conducted with
both the staff of the employment agency and with potential informants.5 The selection
process of the 14 informants was based on the fact that they have been victims/survivors of
violence at one point in their lives.6
As pointed out above, we conducted interviews with two groups of women, i.e. with
victims/survivors of violence and with women aid workers or gender experts. When
interviewing victims/survivors, we took two of the informants out of the employment
agency to a nearby café and conducted interviews. The idea behind taking the respondents
away from the employment agency was to make them feel relaxed and to maintain their
privacy. These women, however, later explained that they felt unsafe and pointed out that
they might be losing out on potential employment opportunities by leaving the
employment agency premises. Thus, the remaining 12 interviews were conducted in the
privacy of the garden or office of the employment agency. Most of the informants chose
not to be tape-recorded. As a result, we took notes while conducting the interviews.
We took all necessary precautions to conduct the research with ethical clarity, empathy
and impartiality. All informants were compensated modestly for each completed or
partially completed interview (Zink and Putman 2005). The interviews were conducted in
Amharic (the official language of Ethiopia) and we later transcribed and translated the
interview text into English. The transcripts were thematically discussed using the three
themes identified for this research. These are the experience of violence; coping
mechanisms of the victims/survivors; and the roles of culture vis-à-vis violence.
We acknowledge that the sample size is small and it is not feasible to discuss the
specific positions of housewives in Ethiopia based on only one informant. Therefore,
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Gender, Place and Culture
441
it should be recognised that our study cannot be generalised to all Ethiopian women
although it gives in-depth insights which aid in our understanding of wider Ethiopian
society.
All concerns, questions and comments raised by the agency staff and informants were
addressed. Moreover, informed consent and avoiding any sense of the women being
deceived were given special emphasis (De Laine 2000; Leach 2006). Over the course of
the fieldwork, overlapping and multiple roles emerged. This was due to the sensitive
nature of the research, the difficulty of laying down social science research guidelines in
countries like Ethiopia and the identity of the field researcher7 (Leach 2006). These
created complex and unavoidable ethical dilemmas. In this article, three of these dilemmas
are highlighted (De Laine 2000). First, the identity of the field researcher facilitated ‘going
native’ in many instances. However, there were occasions during which certain identities
created mistrust and tipped the scale of power within the relationship. For instance, on one
occasion the field researcher was viewed as a tabloid journalist and a highly paid expatriate
from Britain. Such an identity could jeopardise the success of the fieldwork and have the
potential to impact upon the establishment of trust between researcher and participants.
In this instance, immediate action was taken to clarify the identity of the researcher and the
purpose of the research work. This was done by providing a detailed debriefing session to
those present at the research site. Second, in relation to the first point, there were times
when the field researcher was perceived as a ‘money pot’ by most of the employment
agency staff and a few of the job seekers. Faced with a dilemma, we chose to comply with
some of the expectations. This helped in terms of keeping such individuals at bay and
facilitated the overall research process. The research site is a place where brokers meet and
several of them aided in facilitating our data collection efforts. However, they were also
very persistent about receiving a reward in return. Therefore, they were offered some
money by the researcher.8 Third, in a few instances some participants expressed their deep
emotional distress when discussing their experiences. In such situations, the researcher
tried to comfort them by being friendly and providing advice.9 Moreover, careful
consideration was given to ethical issues, such as the balance in power relationships; the
right to withdraw; confidentiality and anonymity.
As is the case in many existing studies, our research was limited in its sample size and
the issues that it was able to explore. Overall, the design and execution of the research and
data collection proved to be time-consuming, challenging and costly10 (Zink and Putman
2005). In contrast to a more structured interview, semi-structured interviews were used in
this research. This allowed for the emergence of thematic content from the interviews
(Kulkarni 2006).
To recap, a total of 14 victims/survivors of violence were interviewed. One was
a housewife, nine worked as sex workers, and four worked as housemaids (servants).11
The three gender experts work for Addis Ababa University, British Council-Ethiopia and
EWLA.12 Semi-structured interviews were conducted with gender experts. Each of these
interviews was conducted in English and undertaken in places preferred by the experts.
The average duration of each interview was approximately 40 minutes and all were
tape-recorded. Later the interviews were transcribed and analysed thematically.
The interviewees had a vast array of work and research experience in the area of
violence against women and consulting with these experts proved to be valuable in terms
of getting a cross-section of institutional views regarding violence against women,
victim/survivor support and culture.
In our profile of informants, the average age was 26. The youngest and oldest in the
group were 18 and 53 respectively. Almost all of the informants came from relatively large
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A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
families where they had three or more siblings. All except two of the interviewees were
single and three had been co-habiting at some point in their lives.13 Two women were
single mothers, one of whom had left her child with her abusive ex-husband due to her
poor financial situation. Before they migrated to the capital city, many of the informants
had a livelihood that depended on agriculture. Most of these migrants had lived in the
capital city for over five years and some of the main reasons for their migration were
poverty and running away from potential arranged marriages. In the main, the informants
have elementary level education, with only three having completed high school (i.e. 12
years of schooling) and one who had attended a college (i.e. two more years after
completing high school). Most of these informants indicated their keen desire to work and
remain self-sufficient.
To integrate the views of the experts with the victims/survivors, we ensured
consistency by asking their opinion on the same three research themes. In the remainder of
this section, we discuss each theme in turn, putting our results in the context of the existing
literature coupled with some critical reflections based on our experience.
Experience of violence: causes and consequences
Violence is commonly experienced by the sex workers and domestic servants that were
interviewed14 (Burman and Chantler 2004). Almost all of the informants understood
violence against women to be ‘an abuse which has physical, emotional, financial and
sexual dimensions’. Despite the fact that ‘domestic violence’ alone accounts for 54% of
violence-related crimes in Ethiopia, few individuals discussed it openly. Among our
interviewees, only two women had discussed it thoroughly. This finding alone can be seen
as a reflection of the secrecy surrounding the problem15 (WHO 2005). Except for one
woman, all other informants experienced violence at work. Those who were abused at
work were relatively young and had a limited experience of co-habitation or marriage.
Indeed, it is important to note that domestic abuse is underreported due to factors such as
silence, secrecy, culture and the perceived shame (Burman and Chantler 2004). Even when
women disclose their experiences, they tend to be selective, choosing when they need help
because of safety concerns and not knowing who to trust when attempting to seek help
(Zink et al. 2004).
Attempted rape is the main problem experienced by informants working in the sex
industry. Many resented their jobs but felt they had to continue in order to escape abject
poverty. A 22-year-old sex worker indicated that sexual violence is the worst crime she has
ever experienced. At the time of the interview, she had a broken nose and a black eye. She
described sexual violence and its profound health dimension as follows:
The fact that women have to work as sex workers is an abuse by itself. When people (male
clients) get drunk, they can become very cruel and abusive. Battery and name calling is very
common in my work. For me, the main concern is the fact that some men do not want to use a
condom at all. This is very damaging, as it affects my physical and mental health.16
As can be seen based on the experience of this sex worker, there are unwanted physical
health consequences of violence on women. It is obvious that sexual assaults and rape
can lead to unwanted pregnancies, illegal abortions and also the transmission of sexually
transmitted diseases. These hidden health consequences of violence complicate the
lives of numerous women in Ethiopia and elsewhere (Heise, Pitanguy, and Germaine
1994). The majority of the informants also discussed the emotional consequences of
violence. This is consistent with the finding of UNICEF (2000) which listed, among
Gender, Place and Culture
443
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other things, stress, post-traumatic stress syndrome, depression and sleeping disorders as
consequences.
Further, the women expressed their frustration over third parties (such as friends,
parents, elders, etc.) who comply through silence. They revealed that such actions
represent a double blow to them. For instance, an informant who used to work as a bed
maker in a small hotel was threatened with rape by her employer’s son. When she reported
this to his parents (i.e. the owners of the hotel) they tried to protect their family name and
dignity by labelling her a liar and imposing their silence. Several of the other women
remembered occasions when wives and other women took sides with their husbands or
male clients against them. This often resulted in either exacerbating or disguising the
problem (Panos Ethiopia 2001; Schwartz 2005). This view is supported by the British
Council gender expert, stating:
Unlike the western world, women tend to put up with it. This is usually due to poverty. If a
marriage breaks down, usually a woman has nowhere to go. Then, the Shemageles [elders]
would say ‘You behave yourself, you behave yourself, go back and live together’.
One informant who used to work as a housemaid articulated her experience of starvation
and sexual abuse induced by her employers, who were a young couple living in a military
camp in Addis Ababa. She said:
I have experienced starvation for over a month. My employers were eating nutritious food but
only allowed me to eat grain mixed with water.17 As I could not taste the food let alone eat it,
I reached a point where I lost all my energy. I wanted to leave because I could not stand the
starvation and the flirtatious manner of the male employer. Yet, his wife would not allow me
to leave. In the end, I had to run away leaving my salary and clothing behind.
Informants experienced battery, psychological and financial abuse. Anita18 is a 53-yearold housewife, and indicated that she suffered from a temporary paralysis as a result of the
physical violence she had endured at the hands of her husband of 32 years. She indicated
that his financial abuse was so harsh that she was sometimes forced to rely on the
assistance of her relatives in order to feed and support her seven children.
The interviews with victims/survivors indicate the multiple forms of violence faced by
Ethiopian women. They show the severity and complexity of the problem in the country.
This is supported by the views of the experts, who have indicated that the cause of violence
against women is multi-faceted. The experts also discussed a number of interesting points
such as the role of culture and the impact of violence on children’s behaviour. The British
Council gender expert explains:
A boy who grew up looking at his mum being beaten up is more likely to be an abusive adult.
I also think that in a majority of situations, it [violence] is a financial situation. . . . It is also
sexual incompatibility. There are multiple factors that cause it. It is never one thing or another;
it is caused by a multitude of factors. Culturally it is okay to beat up a wife without seeing the
impact it has on people. In some parts of the country, it is believed that a man that does not
beat his wife does not love her.
The experts indicated that Ethiopian culture encourages women to be submissive. As a
result, men think that women are not equal to them and resort to abusive behaviour to show
their authority and superiority. Furthermore, the experts explained that early marriage and
the abduction of young girls results in violence when they attempt to escape. In many
of these cases, women are not welcome to return to their families due to the shame
associated with the loss of their virginity or their divorcee status, which might be a factor
that perpetuates the existing levels of violence. As a result, the forced isolation of women
gives power to their perpetrators to do whatever they choose to do.
444
A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
In addition, the experts indicated that lack of education leaves women unemployed,
impoverished and powerless. As Tadiwos (2001) highlights, violence perpetrated against
women will continue unabated because women have little bargaining power both at home
and in the larger community.
According to research conducted by EWLA, victim/survivor women have a tendency
not to report violence (EWLA 1997). Yet the EWLA gender expert said that in recent
times women are starting to break their silence. The EWLA alone gets around 25 women
reporting violence on a daily basis. On the whole, the gender experts believed that
Ethiopian women from different walks of life tend to be affected by violence mainly due to
poverty which is often an outcome of lack of skills and education.
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Coping mechanisms of victims/survivors
Understanding the coping strategies of the victims/survivors of violence is crucial.
Generally, the rhetoric by institutions of policy legislation and service provision claims
that the needs of victims/survivors are being met. However, further understanding of
women’s coping strategies from the perspective of the victims/survivors themselves would
give insight into whether or not this claim is defensible. Identifying whether the women
relied on relatives and friends or institutions is essential in order to understand what
constructs their ‘coping trajectory’.19
The main coping strategy for all women was to leave their jobs. Leaving is a simpler
alternative for sex workers and house servants than it is for wives. However, the only
housewife interviewed in our study preferred leaving as a strategy to avoid violence.
Except for Anita, none of the other informants addressed violence as a crime to be reported
to the police.20 In addition, none of the other informants went to any institution which
deals with violence-related issues or sought any medical attention for the physical or
emotional pain they endured. Such a trend can be the direct consequence of a lack of
awareness, culture and confidence in dysfunctional institutions or a preference for dealing
with abuse as a private matter. All of the informants, including Anita, relied on their
relatives to get moral support and for ‘a shoulder to cry on’.
During the course of the interviews, it was revealed that migration to the capital city
Addis Ababa and its immediate effect of isolating women created opportunities for
perpetrators. Many informants believed that they would not have been victims/survivors of
violence had they been close enough to their families. Indeed, there were some informants
who used telephones to communicate with their families though it was not easy mainly due
to lack of infrastructure, financial constraints and the isolating behaviours of their abusers.
Therefore, women’s subordinate social and economic status played a key role in their
oppression (Pain 1997). For instance, a migrant from rural Ethiopia who used to be
married to an abusive man indicated that her in-laws made it difficult for her to
communicate with her family members. She explains, ‘they [my in-laws] unplug the
phone and made me sit at home like I am some kind of prisoner. I had nobody but myself to
rely on’. This woman’s experience reveals the inability to rely even on family support
when violence is deeply rooted in a society such as Ethiopia. This is in line with our
discussion of the role of third parties in perpetuating violence.
In this vein, two sex workers who are originally from Addis Ababa and who had their
family members close by indicated that physical proximity to family members did not save
them from abuse. They suffered in silence mainly because of the shameful, stigmatising
and taboo nature of their work. However, they were able to share their pain and gained
moral support from close friends. Unsurprisingly, our findings suggest that the proximity
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Gender, Place and Culture
445
of the place where the abuse takes place relative to where family members reside does
seem to have a link with a reduced probability of experiencing abuse for married women
as opposed to commercial sex workers. For sex workers, however, this is not always
the case.
Faced with the reality of violence and abuse, several women chose to become
more compliant with their abusers. This is a psychological response consistent with
the ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ (Speckhard et al. 2007). This syndrome states that
victims/survivors show signs of loyalty to the abuser in spite of potential danger. One
sex worker indicated that the best way for her to go forward was to change the way that she
reacted towards abuse. Indeed, her case clearly shows that the depth of abuse and/or
violence can distort the psychological condition of victims/survivors. If such defence
mechanisms of victims/survivors are widespread in Ethiopian society, it can only be
detrimental to the effort put in by institutions and other groups which are attempting to
mitigate and alleviate current levels of violence.
Prayer and crying were identified as cushions against the impact of violence. Overall,
the responses provided by the informants tended to focus on personal remedies to defy
violence. We found that Ethiopian women more readily confided in those whom they
trusted and who they felt understood them better than institution-based aid. Moreover,
women originating from ‘non-state’ supported countries may not have developed the
culture of approaching and making use of institutions in one way or another. Clearly, there
is an acute lack of awareness and knowledge about one’s rights and the availability of
institutional support.
However, even if victims/survivors are aware of the existence of support, there is
limited help, as the experts discuss below. Given the lack of widespread societal support
and the recent nature of initiatives designed to help victims/survivors, coping via
institutional support is not common. For instance, EWLA has started to provide a
temporary refuge in addition to the free legal advice it is providing to victims/survivors of
violence.21 Victims/survivors are eligible for temporary shelter if they are willing to sue
the perpetrator and prove that they are destitute. In many cases the women are very poor
and have nowhere to go. At the time the research was conducted EWLA’s refuge could
accommodate only six women.
The gender expert from EWLA explained the problems related to the provision of
temporary shelter and states:
Most of the perpetrators are victims/survivors’ husbands, partners or fathers. So the
victims/survivors have no other place to go back to. So it will be essential to help them . . . As
you might probably know, running a shelter diverts us laywers from our professional
engagement. It is a job for social workers or other professionals. So we are in a kind of
problem in giving this temporary shelter . . . The term ‘temporary’ is also a difficult concept.
How temporary is temporary? Is ten years temporary or is it two years? They do not have any
means of survival so how long will you keep them for?
The experts believe that violence against women should be addressed mainly through the
criminal justice system. The gender expert at EWLA added that there were difficulties in
terms of proving violence for court cases. As is well known, perpetrators usually strike
when there are no eyewitnesses. However, EWLA is not discouraged by this. Rather it
actively collaborates with other law enforcement bodies, such as the police, to bring the
abusers to justice through the criminal justice system.
On the whole, raising awareness is the major way in which the British Council and
EWLA are attempting to tackle violence against women. Both organisations have been
providing educational training, workshops and seminars to women and other professionals
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A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
(e.g. the police). The gender experts from EWLA and the British Council indicated that the
training they provided for the police is aimed at teaching that violence goes beyond a
private space. The view or attitude of the police is unhelpful and discouraging to
victims/survivors and this shows the lengths to which patriarchal societies and institutions
will go in order to protect the status quo of men (Panos Ethiopia 2001).
As a sustainable alternative which makes victims/survivors financially independent,
the gender experts pointed out the importance of providing loans or working capital to
women via micro-finance institutions. This is in agreement with the economic
development objectives of many poor countries and it is believed that such an effort
will help many victims/survivors to break free from abuse (Bondi and Davidson 2005).
Despite their education and exposure through work, all of the gender experts were
sceptical about the provision of counselling services as a remedy. This is because the
awareness and acceptability of such provision is minimal in Ethiopia. Most of all, there are
not enough trained psychiatrists in the country. In the entire country of approximately
80 million people, there are only 20 psychiatrists, one psychiatric hospital and fewer than
200 psychiatric nurses. Recently, there have been attempts to expand services offered by
other professions such as social workers.
In contrast to the views of victim/survivor informants, all of the experts believed that
Ethiopian culture encourages men to be violent. The fact that young boys grow up in an
environment where they witness the constant abuse of women only increases the
probability that they will perceive these acts of violence against women as normal. This in
turn points to the behavioural consequences of violence across generations. In addition to
being potentially violent in the future, the clinical psychology literature indicates that
children might also suffer from psychological problems if they witness violence
(Jaffe, Wolfe, and Wilson 1990). Given the sample size of this study, which is skewed
towards sex workers and house servants, the consequences of violence on children is
tangential to our argument but an important one for the study of violence in Ethiopia.
Culture
Before discussing the role of culture and westernisation, we will briefly explain their
meaning in relation to the Ethiopian context and this study. Here, we draw on an
understanding of culture as a collection of norms, beliefs and societal perceptions
regarding the status and roles of women. We argue that culture has a direct bearing on the
way women understand or react to violence. For instance, in many parts of Africa and also
in other parts of the developing world, it is normally assumed that a husband has the right
to discipline his wife and this might include physical violence. In the following paragraph,
we briefly distinguish between different cultures of patriarchy.
In many African countries, violence is often embedded within patriarchal societies and
because of poverty, religion, limited education and cultural values it is not only embedded
but firmly entrenched. Other patriarchal cultures exist within broader and more liberal
cultural frameworks, which co-exist to offer some women more freedom and equality, but
where violence is used against women to uphold men’s dominance. In these environments,
women have far more institutional mechanisms in place, but in Ethiopia there are many
reasons, such as poverty, stigma, fear and police bias, which prevent women from using
local institutional services. We observe that the low status attached to women in Ethiopian
societies leads to a presumed tolerance of abuse or violence which is directed at them.
Informants were questioned as to what they considered to be the major causes
of violence against women.22 Their responses included substance abuse; jealousy; lack
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Gender, Place and Culture
447
of love and respect for women; the ways in which boys are raised; and the irrational
behaviour of some men who have been wronged by their former wives or partners.
Overall, except for a handful of outliers, most of the women did not blame culture. Many
did not believe that men could be violent and that they expected women to be subservient
as a result of Ethiopian culture. However, the nature of violence against women in
Ethiopia is strongly related to cultural beliefs. Many local cultures in Ethiopia perpetuate
violence, for example, wife beating is considered to be an acceptable act and this is in
agreement with observations made elsewhere in Africa (Amoakohene 2004). Such
harmful beliefs work to encourage women to be submissive to men and compliant with
abuse. For men, the belief affords an undue sense of supremacy. Villages or communities
are intensely patriarchal, with households ruled by men, and women are seriously
disempowered in all spheres of life. In other words, Ethiopian women have been living
within this hierarchical social space for generations.
According to Panos Ethiopia (2001) the historical background of Ethiopia (where war
and conflict were part of life for many) is reflected in individual behaviour, especially that
of men. Moreover, western technology such as video and access to the Internet tends to be
blamed for the increase in sexual crimes. None of the informants, however, expressed any
of these views.
Most of the women suggested that privileges for men such as attending good schools,
university and travelling around the world might make men less prone to violence.
However, in practice women found men to be violent whether they are exposed to these
privileges or not. This is not surprising given the fact that some Ethiopian men who talk
publicly about liberty, equality and freedom are the very people who commit violence
(Panos Ethiopia 2001). One of our expert informants from the British Council reflected on
this:
Being well read, educated or travelling the world is a fact which is not linked with eliminating
violence against women. It is just wealth, it’s nothing more, nothing less.
The discussion so far indicates that domestic violence exists in a variety of sectors of
society regardless of race, culture and living spaces.
As indicated above, the gender experts focused on culture-blaming. They all believe
that raising awareness is the main route to eliminating or dramatically reducing the
problem. They also all agreed that, in principle, people who are educated should not be
violent. This is due to the fact that educated individuals are expected to set an example and
behave in a manner that is better than others. Like the victims/survivors, the experts were
sceptical about the positive impact of education and travel experiences that are a part of
cultural life for people in other countries. The gender expert working for the British
Council expressed a view about the widespread nature of violence as follows:
Has violence stopped in the western world? It should have stopped by now because there are
so many campaigns and adverts by different organisations . . . A doctor husband and a doctor
wife, that is to show you the highest level of education, they are fighting all the time . . . When
you go down to society’s structure, it gets worse.
This quote supports the idea that violence occurs everywhere but there are different
degrees of violence within different cultures and different countries.
Conclusion
Over recent years, the literature on violence has expanded dramatically. However, there
are still gaps in our understanding of this complex phenomenon in countries such as
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A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
Ethiopia (Jasinski 2005). This study provides a detailed account of victims’/survivors’
experiences and their needs in urban Ethiopia. It clearly indicates that the experiences
and needs of victims/survivors are context specific (i.e. gender, place and culture specific).
We attempted to show that women’s attitudes towards violence and their coping strategies
are highly reliant on several factors, which include their beliefs, culture, trust mechanisms,
financial independence, emotional strength and individual utilitarian equilibrium.
Our findings have profound implications for the strategies that need to be adopted in
order to reduce violence and support victims/survivors. In the remainder of our concluding
remarks, we highlight the policies, programmes and educational initiatives that might be
useful in tackling the problem of violence against women.
From our findings, we note that different types of context-specific prevention and
intervention approaches are needed (Jasinski 2005). The first and foremost beneficial
strategy is to educate younger generations about the harmful impacts of violence in order
to influence and change their social attitudes. This is likely to take time but it can be done
via mainstream school curriculums, intensifying awareness campaigns, stories and plays.
In addition, both governmental and non-governmental organisations need to invest in
providing a supportive infrastructure for fleeing women. As our research indicates, there is
a huge, yet unmet need for accommodating victims/survivors.
For the efficient provision of support, there is an urgent need to coordinate the activities
of police, social workers and lawyers, which will effectively bring perpetrators to justice,
and also aid in the recovery of victims/survivors from their ordeals. Furthermore, educating
law enforcement institutions such as the police is of paramount importance. Other measures
include ratifying the Maputo protocol,23 asserting the equal status of women in society,
exercising severe punishment on perpetrators, targeting migrant women and providing
sustained financial support for aid organisations. Victim/survivor women currently have
minimal support and a limited number of resources to depend upon, and require special
attention by service providers.
The Ethiopian government passed a bill in January 2009 which restricts the activities
of foreign and foreign-funded organisations in areas relating to matters such as gender
issues, children’s rights and the rights of disabled people. Obviously, this is very damaging
to existing efforts to deter violence against women and such bills need to be carefully
reconsidered by the government in light of protecting vulnerable individuals such as
women and children.
In future research, it would be useful to investigate further why Ethiopian women tend
to prefer non-institutionalised solutions in addressing violence and forming their own
coping strategies (Jasinski 2005). We also need to explore further how support through
informal arrangements can be provided to victims/survivors. If women suffer from
multiple forms of violence, there should also be multiple intervention projects.
We recommend further multi-method and longitudinal studies in this area.
Acknowledgements
We are very grateful to the editors and all the referees of our paper. Many thanks also to Noel
Admasachew who helped in the data collection effort for this research.
Notes
1. Victims are defined as women who are still enduring violence and survivors are those who have
managed to move on. Often women fit into both categories at different times and in different
spaces; hence, we have used the terminology victim/survivor throughout this article.
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Gender, Place and Culture
449
2. In some extreme cases, victims who suffer from ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ may identify with their
abusers.
3. The interviews were carried out by one of the co-authors of this article who used a broker
of the employment agency to contact the women who finally consented to be interviewed.
The researcher is Ethiopian. See discussion of ethical issues in the text for further
information.
4. The housewife interviewed in this study was recruited by a tip-off from one of the gender experts
who was involved in this study. The opportunity to involve 20 more housewives was explored
but it was not pursued due to time constraints.
5. Note that the agency staff members were not well informed about the major focus of this study
mainly for safety and confidentiality reasons (WHO 2001).
6. Over 50 job-seeking men and women spend their mornings at the employment agency waiting
for an approach from a potential employer. In Ethiopia employment agencies for unskilled
labour are run informally, predominantly by male agents. The recruitment process is ad hoc and
no contract is signed between the agent, employee and employer. The staff members of the
employment agency and managers we approached played a vital role in spreading information
about the purpose of our research. The agency staff and the research informants (except for the
gender experts) were compensated for their time and cooperation in the form of a modest
payment (Zink and Putman 2005).
7. The field researcher was a 31-year-old Ethiopian woman who speaks the official Ethiopian
language Amharic as her mother tongue.
8. The money given was not part of a research fund budget for the study. It was simply what the
researcher felt was appropriate to give to the persistent brokers.
9. There was an occasion on which an informant cried over the fact that she had lost her job due to
the abusive behaviour of her ex-boss. On this occasion, the researcher proposed to take her out
for a treat and provided information about the work of Ethiopian Women Lawyers’ Association
(EWLA) and its support for victims of abuse.
10. The researchers self-funded this study. Conducting the study was difficult due to the sensitive
nature of the content.
11. Many of these women, especially those working in the sex industry, found it difficult to
reveal their employment status. In addition, recruiting housewives through a neighbourhood by
word-of-mouth proved difficult as such women found it shameful to indicate that their intimate
partners abuse them.
12. EWLA is a non-statutory body working in gender-related issues and which provides free legal
advice for women in seven different parts of Ethiopia.
13. These women have been victims of arranged marriages, which are commonly practised
especially in the northern part of Ethiopia. Violence often results when the women object to the
traditional arrangement of marriage. The violence can come from the future husband, his
relatives or relatives of the victim/survivor herself.
14. Domestic servants can be abused by both men and women. Here, we discuss only the violence
perpetrated by men.
15. Both of these women indicated that their status as mothers has made it difficult to break free.
In Ethiopia there is a great degree of stigma attached to children who are raised without a father
figure.
16. HIV is a highly prevalent sexual health problem in Ethiopia.
17. In Ethiopia, it is common for housemaids to eat the leftovers of their employers or only food that
they are permitted to eat.
18. The real names of informants have been changed for confidentiality reasons.
19. As will be highlighted in the remaining part of this article, in Ethiopia there is not much
institutionalised provision for victims/survivors of violence.
20. Despite the fact that her husband battered her several times, Anita has never reported such
incidents to the police. The worst-case scenario was when he threw her and their seven children
out of the house they jointly owned. She sued him under property law, which enabled her and her
children to live in the house. Suing him under property law however does not involve reporting
him to the police.
21. To our knowledge, this is the only women’s refuge in Ethiopia.
22. In essence, our research was conducted to encourage the formulation of themes based on what
the informants thought rather than reflecting other ‘ideals’.
450
A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
23. This is a protocol in the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on women’s rights
which is designed to harmonise national laws with international standards and take all necessary
measures to fight against violence against women. This is done particularly by tackling
discrimination which encourages such violations and which perpetuates the marginalisation of
women, particularly as regard to their access to justice.
Notes on contributors
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Abbi Kedir is a lecturer at the Department of Economics, University of Leicester, UK. He trained as
a development economist at the University of Nottingham (UK) with a substantial microeconometrics component. His research interests include household food security, poverty, public health,
environment, international trade, maternal health and child anthropometrics. Given the
interdisciplinary nature of his work, his papers appear in various international journals in
economics, statistics, epidemiology, environmental science and demography.
Lul Admasachew is Research Fellow at the Institute for Health Effectiveness, Aston University (UK)
and advisor at the Centre for Applied Research and Evaluation International Foundation (Careif).
Lul’s research interests include health, gender discrimination, children’s wellbeing and domestic
violence.
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ABSTRACT TRANSLATION
Violencia contra las mujeres en Etiopı́a
Investigar la experiencia de la violencia contra mujeres y explorar las estrategias de éstas
para enfrentarla es un componente crucial de la readecuación de la provisión de los
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A. Kedir and L. Admasachew
servicios para las vı́ctimas/sobrevivientes. Este artı́culo analiza la violencia contra las
mujeres en el contexto de la cultura, la teorı́a del miedo a la violencia y la literatura sobre
los espacios que son percibidos como ‘seguros’ o ‘peligrosos’ por las mujeres
vı́ctimas/sobrevivientes de la violencia en Etiopı́a. Para recabar los datos relevantes,
llevamos a cabo 14 entrevistas semiestructuradas con mujeres etı́opes que son
vı́ctimas/sobrevivientes de violencia, y tres entrevistas con expertos en género en Etiopı́a.
Nuestro grupo de mujeres sufren en “silencio” y sólo confı́an sus experiencias a amigos y
parientes. No recurrieron al apoyo institucional debido a la falta de conciencia y la
desaprobación social general de dicha medida. Esto contrasta con lo dichos por los
expertos de que las necesidades de estas mujeres son encaradas utilizando un enfoque
institucional. La cultura, el estatus migratorio y la falta de poder de negociación en los
lugares de trabajo son factores claves cuando se considera la violencia. La mayorı́a de las
encuestadas en este estudio ocupan tanto espacios públicos como privados tales como
bares y los hogares y han experimentado violencia en esos espacios. Las relaciones
sociales y las subsecuentes ofensas que padecieron hacen que estos espacios no sean
seguros. La educación de ambos sexos, la creación de conciencia, la designación sostenida
de recursos para apoyar a las vı́ctimas/sobrevivientes, la ratificación del protocolo de
Maputo y unas instituciones efectivas que hagan cumplir la ley son algunas de las
estrategias prácticas que proponemos para mitigar la incidencia de la violencia en Etiopı́a.
Palabras clave: violencia; mujeres; Etiopı́a; vı́ctima/sobreviviente