The social contract is not working for women and girls in many places. This think piece focuses on the situation in India and highlights innovative solutions using technology to crowd-source data and mobilize communities to prevent violence against women and girls. Such bottom-up approaches and new forms of solidarity will be key in developing a new eco-social contract.
"For most of history, Anonymous was a woman”
Adapted from Virginia Woolf
My country, India, ranks low on many indexes measuring the treatment of women. In 2021, the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index listed India 140 out of 156 countries. Georgetown University’s Women, Peace and Security Index listed it at 148 out of 170 countries.
Because of the deep-rooted patriarchal culture across the country, women are often treated as second-class citizens, despite the right to equality and a life of dignity and safety guaranteed them by the Indian Constitution. This inequity is evident from birth, with sex selective abortions resulting in only 899 female births for every 1000 male births. There is also poor representation in political leadership: only 8.4 percent of the members of the State Legislative Assembly are women. Female participation in the labour force is low and falling, from 26 percent in 2005 to 20.3 percent in 2019. And violence against women and girls is pervasive. For instance, National Crime Research Bureau statistics indicate there is a rape reported every 15 minutes.
Because of this discrimination, women and girls have fewer options, choices and opportunities for schooling and work, which in turn affects their financial security, independence and well-being. It is apparent that the social contract between individuals, communities and government institutions is not working for women and girls. Clearly, we need to rethink the social and systemic structures that enable this culture of violence and discrimination. It’s not right, and it’s detrimental to a country’s progress and future to exclude almost 50 percent of the population.
Crowd-sourcing women's empowerment
My organization, Red Dot Foundation, works to address some of these inequities We encourage people to share incidents of sexual and gender-based violence that they experience on our Safecity platform. Thus far, we’ve documented over 40,000 reports in total, 88 percent of which were from women, across both urban and rural areas. This data is then collated as location-based trends and visualized on a map as hotspots. Our volunteers analyse the dataset at the neighbourhood level in their cities to look for patterns and understand the local factors contributing to the violence. Individuals and communities are then empowered to use this information to develop relevant interventions and prevent the violence.
To accompany this work, we also hold workshops and advocacy campaigns in schools, workplaces and communities, where we educate people on their sexual and reproductive rights, violence prevention, challenging harmful gender norms and unconscious bias, strategies for safe intervention as by-standers, and we encourage them to report violence formally to the police but also on the Safecity platform.
Over the last seven years since I co-founded the organization, we have engaged urban and rural youth and women to use their local datasets to learn about the nature of gender-based violence, engage their communities in dialogue on conscious and unconscious bias and harmful gender norms, work with institutional service providers like the police, campus administrations in schools and colleges, and civic authorities to find solutions that will prevent and/or address the violence. Our work has given women access to information which they can use to reclaim their agency and access opportunities for their personal and professional advancement. Three stories illustrate what I mean.
Story 1: Convincing the Sarpanch
In a rural village in the Satara district of Maharashtra, the women were reluctant to engage the men of their village in dialogue on sexual and gender-based violence. But when they presented the Safe-city data for their village to their Sarpanch (head of village), he insisted that they use a religious community gathering to discuss the issue. With his endorsement, their confidence to break the silence and engage in discussion increased. They formed support groups, and held meetings with the community police to address domestic violence and educate the villagers on their rights.
Story 2: Holding institutions to account
In a community in Pune, the women and girls did not leave their homes after seven in the evening as they were told it was not safe. After analysing the Safecity data for their area and studying the physical infrastructure, they were able to identify poor street lighting as part of the problem. They engaged in dialogue for the first time with not only their elected representative but also the local police. The street lights were fixed and now women in this community feel confident staying out later at night. The additional hours outside the home allow them to access more opportunities―extra school classes, taking up small jobs, having more time for chores, or simply meeting friends.
Story 3: Challenging toxic masculinity
Engaging men and boys is also critical. Take for example, Mohan in Sanjay Camp, New Delhi. He and his friends had placed a couch outside the only women’s public toilet in the neighbourhood. The boys would hang out there and crack jokes when the girls came, often taking pictures and videos of them without their consent. This made the girls feel extremely nervous, and many even limited their water intake to avoid using the toilet. When these incidents showed up in our dataset, we asked the girls what they wanted to do. They bravely invited the young men, including Mohan, to a meeting. On seeing the data and hearing how the girls felt, he realized the impact of his behaviour. He joined the campaign on safe neighbourhoods with the girls, became a peer educator―and convinced his friends to remove the couch.
Changing cultures of violence
Micro projects like this have resulted in girls returning to school, women taking up employment, and women having increased confidence to talk about taboo topics around sexual and reproductive health; they have begun to question conscious and unconscious bias and harmful gender norms, and negotiate for greater freedoms. Vital support is also provided by our programmes which match young girls with established women leaders as mentors. These relationships offer a network of support as the young girls explore new options, giving them a role model to emulate and a sounding board for aspirational goals. Many girls from these programmes have ended up pursuing higher education, starting their own organizations, taking higher paying jobs, and following their dreams like writing a book.
The SafeCity programme works because changing cultures of violence is partly about policies, but it’s also about giving people a voice. By making it easy for people to share their stories, report incidents of sexual and gender-based violence and transparently showcase data, we can also hold institutions accountable. And while the Indian Government has several schemes for women’s empowerment, including the Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao (educate the girl, save the girl), they do not go far enough.
Learnings for a gender just social contract
What is needed is a renewed gender contract which mandates investment, radical cooperation and partnerships to create equitable and safe societies. Some learnings from our work are:
Invest in resources to end gender-based violence:
Fund more disaggregated data collection to track violence and build in accountability from institutions;
Comprehensive education on women’s rights starting from a young age;
Stricter implementation of laws and quality infrastructure for survivors of sexual and gen-der based violence.
Engage men and boys to be allies. Educate them to promote women’s rights and safety, and challenge conscious and unconscious bias.
Commit two percent of GDP to scale up gender-based violence prevention, protection, and response programming domestically and internationally, with some funding earmarked for care policies.
Address the digital divide. Utilize technology for remote work, remote education and remote networking, and governments must invest in good digital infrastructure and safety protocols to foster a safe environment.
Encourage women’s economic participation. Create diverse jobs for women in urban, rural and semi-rural areas and set up networking opportunities and support groups.
By revisiting the gender contract in our communities and having a gender perspective in policies and laws, we can meaningfully increase the active participation of women in society, economic activity and leadership. The time is now to put women at the centre of development not only because it is sustainable, but it is the right thing to do.