How is economic security linked to gender-based violence? New insights from the Sexual Violence Research Initiative Forum 2019

The relationship between economic insecurity and gender-based violence is complex and poorly understood—here, we round up evidence from the recent biannual Sexual Violence Research Initiative (SVRI) Forum in Cape Town Oct. 21-25 to highlight what is new and where we go next.

^{Grant Johnson/Graphic Harvest}

Violence experts have long acknowledged the link between economic insecurity and gender-based violence (GBV). Although GBV cuts across geography and socioeconomic status, the poor face disproportionately high risks. Globally, economically insecure individuals tend to live in locations with more conflict, fewer support services, and weaker legal systems. At the same time, economic insecurity or chronic poverty makes individuals and households themselves more likely to experience acute stress and resort to risky coping strategies that increase the risk of GBV. Acknowledging this relationship, the World Health Organization-led RESPECT framework for preventing violence against women, launched in May, includes “P for Poverty Reduced” as one of its seven strategies.

Based on rigorous evidence, RESPECT says that economic transfers (including cash, vouchers, and in-kind) are a key promising approach for reducing violence against women in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). But it indicates that more evidence from LMIC settings is needed regarding labor force interventions and that the evidence thus far suggests microfinance or savings interventions alone are ineffective (due at least in part to the fact that most studies are unable to disentangle the effects of bundled interventions that include microfinance or savings components).

Despite some initial insights, the effects of economic programming on GBV remain poorly understood overall. This is partially due to an overreliance on correlational evidence, as well as to the disciplinary divide between development economists (who typically evaluate economic programming) and public health experts (who typically study GBV). Meanwhile, however, economic interventions are highly promising if effective, as many are already implemented at scale in LMICs. Thus, there is a compelling need for more evidence.

The SVRI Forum, the premier international conference on GBV, explored the latest evidence on this important front. As members of the multi-disciplinary Cash Transfer and Intimate Partner Violence Research Collaborative (hosted by IFPRI), we closely followed the diverse presentations on the role of economic strengthening—including but not limited to cash transfers—for GBV prevention. Here, we summarize notable evidence presented across four categories of economic-strengthening-related research:

Conceptualizing and measuring relationships. New work dives into the complexity of theories between economic security and IPV—as well as helping to unpack measurement issues around male provider roles and economic empowerment.

• Economic insecurity and IPV: The links between economic insecurity and IPV are complex and operate at the individual, relational and societal level—with multiple interactions and feedback mechanisms—and are supported by diverse (many!) theories across disciplines (#theory, Stöckl et al.)
• Men’s role as providers in Uganda: Based on expectations around the male role as the provider, authority, and control (and women’s economic dependence), a “Male Provision Belief Scale”—a 25-item scale with 5 sub-domains—was piloted and tested (#measurement, Stoebenau et al.)

Economic transfers. More evidence was presented that cash transfers in developing settings reduce IPV, including when they are targeted at men and at post-intervention—however, there was less promising evidence for adolescent girl-focused programming, or in short-term programs in fragile settings where risk mitigation remains the main objective.

• WFP’s Transfer Modality Research Initiative in Bangladesh” Cash transfers to women paired with intensive nutrition behavior change communication (but not transfers alone) resulted in 4-year post-program effects, reducing physical IPV by 33% relative to controls—due to increases in women’s bargaining power, household members’ emotional well-being, and men’s cost of perpetrating violence (#RCT, Roy et al., bonus: full paper).
• Government of Mali’s Jigisémèjiri: Cash transfers given to men over two years resulted in 38% less physical IPV, 37% less emotional IPV, and 23% less controlling behaviors among polygamous households—with minimal impacts in monogamous households (#RCT, Heath et al., bonus: full paper)
• Girl Empower in Liberia: An 11-month gender transformative mentoring and cash transfer program targeted to 13-14-year-old adolescent girls resulted in positive changes in gender norms, life skills, and sexual experience/marriage over a two-year period—but no change in reported sexual violence—addition of cash support yielded larger impacts on sexual experience/marriage (#RCT, Ozler et al., bonus: baseline report)
• Government of Tanzania’s Cash-plus for adolescents: Using baseline data from the evaluation of a livelihoods plus live skills training for adolescents living in households participating in the national cash transfer program, 1 in 5 adolescents aged 15-19 started relationships for financial reasons, often with the promise of a “better life,” but girls who got pregnant were often abandoned by partners—midline/endline results forthcoming (#RCT + #qual, Kajula et al., bonus: Cash plus materials)
• International Rescue Committee Multipurpose Cash in Syria (no public presentation): Women benefiting from a three month unconditional cash transfer in Raqqa Governorate showed increasing trends in economic security alongside increasing trends in reported IPV (#pre-post, Falb et al., bonus: WhatWorks Report)
• Safer Cash in Afghanistan: The International Rescue Committee presented scoping, formative research, development, and testing of a toolkit to mitigate against risk in multipurpose cash assistance (#toolkit, Sharma et al.)

Microfinance. No new evidence was presented on impacts of microfinance initiatives on IPV; however researchers leveraged existing trial data to analyze relationships between economic factors and diverse IPV outcomes.

• Intervention with Microfinance and Gender Equity (IMAGE) cohort study in South Africa: The economic situation of women who received microfinance loans plus 10 sessions of participatory gender training has variable associations with different types of IPV—for example, not earning enough to cover costs associated with increased physical/sexual IPV, but taking new loans associated with increased emotional and economic IPV (#Correlational, Ranganathan et al.: full paper)
• MAISHA social empowerment trial in Tanzania: Women’s higher income is associated with decreased risk of both physical and sexual IPV; however in households where the relative financial contribution of the woman exceeds that of her partner, women are at increased risk, possibly because these households are the most disadvantaged, with poorer relationship dynamics at the start. (#Correlational, Abramsky et al., bonus: full paper + qual findings)

Entrepreneurship, livelihood strengthening and other economic programming. A welcome expansion into diverse economic programming across settings; however, no studies were able to both identify causality and unbundle program impacts

• Stepping stones and Creating Futures in South Africa: Young men and women participating in 21 sessions of gender transformative programming plus training on livelihood strengthening over two years showed increases in economic security, but different results on violence by gender—men reported decreased perpetration of IPV—while no significant change in experience of IPV was observed for women (#RCT, Gibbs & Washington, bonus: Which men change behavior? & Qual results).
• Women for Women International in Afghanistan: Women participating in a 12-month multifaceted program composed of economic (including vocational training, financial literacy, cash stipends and savings), and social empowerment components showed changes in risk factors, but no change in IPV on average—possibly due to post-conflict challenges experienced in trial setting (#RCT, Corboz et al.)
• Sunrise Campaign in South Africa: A pre-post test of a 12-month multi-faceted entrepreneurship program targeted at GBV survivors, including life skills and enterprise training, mentorship and access to finance showed decreasing trends in GBV, as well as increases in income, savings and assets (#pre-post, Rama).
• UNDP’s pilots integrating GBV into non-traditional sectors: Insights on process (but not yet impacts) from formative research on innovative pilots in Uganda, Lebanon, Iraq, and Bhutan that aim to integrate GBV prevention into a variety of programming on climate mitigation, livelihoods, economic empowerment—responding directly to understanding that large percentages of participants are affected by violence, which limits potential program uptake and impacts (#pilotstudy, Gevers et al.)

What can we conclude from this new evidence? First, with the exception of economic transfers, we still have insufficient understanding of the causal impact of widely-implemented economic programming alone on GBV. Although a number of studies look at bundled interventions that include economic components—for example, financial literacy, employment, livelihoods, or microfinance—none of these evaluations can tell us the causal effects of that component alone. This is a more general issue: Most “economic plus social empowerment” programs evaluated in the literature cannot distinguish the independent and synergistic effects of the program components. While it is encouraging to see examples where these bundled programs led to promising effects, the next generation of research should build in the ability to unpack mechanisms, triangulate with qualitative evidence, and investigate the relative costs of each component in such programs.

Second, no studies allowing causal inference showed an increase in GBV from economic programming. However, correlational and pre-post evidence reinforces the need to expand the evidence base for causal studies to more diverse settings (including humanitarian contexts) and target populations to ensure that we mitigate against potential harm.

Third, we need to invest in more evaluations of diverse economic strengthening interventions—including broad-based social protection, inheritance and property rights , agricultural interventions, asset transfers, and employment-related programs—that are increasingly implemented at scale. Although standard economic interventions are largely not designed with gender (or GBV) in mind, incorporating a gender lens into these designs may improve program take-up and success given non-negligible violence rates within many target populations.

We understand that poverty is a driver of GBV, thus interventions that increase economic security, particularly at scale, may be a promising solution to reducing GBV at scale. To act on this potential, we need to understand much more than we do about what kinds of economic programming—alone or in combination with other interventions—are effective for GBV prevention. We look forward to more innovative research on economic programming and GBV at upcoming SVRI Forums to help guide future programming efforts.

Amber Peterman, Shalini Roy, and Meghna Ranganathan are members of the Cash Transfer and Intimate Partner Violence Research Collaborative, an interdisciplinary research consortium hosted by IFPRI. The collaborative aims to understand and leverage the potential of cash transfers for IPV reduction. More information and resources can be found on the project page.