Teaching Against Violence. The reassessing toolbox

This volume is the result of an analysis carried out by various scholars working at the international level on the issue of Gender-Based Violence (GBV). It pays particular attention to domestic violence, as in this field feminism has tenaciously sought to change the condition of women and, as a result, many international policies have promoted a significant social transformation. Despite these positive steps, which have increased the self-determination of women, allowing them to improve their agency in every domain of private and public life, the problem still exists. Therefore we question, with pain and bewilderment, but also with determination to continue advancing, how it is possible—after the Declaration of Human Rights and the development of feminism—that violence against women is still so deeply rooted in every culture and even in Western countries. If we consider social policies as a fundamental factor that signals individual and social awareness and action, the political commitment against GBV that is now more than four decades long should have accomplished more. In fact, political action against GBV began in 1979, when the United Nations (UN) drafted the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and defined “discrimination against women” as any distinction, exclusion, or restriction made on the basis of sex that has the effect of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment, or exercise by women of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, and civil dimensions. The application of the CEDAW agenda, in 1981, required that the ratifying states incorporate gender equality into their specific legislation, abolish all discriminatory references in their laws, and enact new specifications to fight such discrimination. Then in 1994 the UN classified GBV as any act resulting in physical, sexual, or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion, or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether in public or in private life. Furthermore, it emphasized that violence against women is a global health and development issue, entailing a host of policies aimed at changing public education and promoting action programs around the world. This political ideology has been accepted, and it paved the way for the European Istanbul Convention, which since 2011 has been working to create a series of specific social measures and promote the “four Ps”: prevention, protection, support of victims, and prosecution of offenders...