This book investigates the widespread and persistent relationship between disasters and gender-based violence, drawing on new research with victim-survivors to show how the two forms of harm constitute ‘layered disasters’ in particular places, intensifying and reproducing one another.
The evidence is now overwhelming that disasters and gender-based violence are closely connected, not just in moments of crisis but in the years that follow as the social, economic and environmental impacts of disasters play out. This book addresses two key gaps in research. First, it examines what causes the relationship between disasters and gender-based violence to be so widespread and so enduring. Second, it highlights victim-survivors’ own accounts of gender-based violence and disasters. It does so by presenting findings from original research on cyclones and flooding in Bangladesh and the UK and a review of global evidence on the Covid-19 pandemic. Drawing on feminist theories, it conceptualises the coincidence of gender-based violence, disasters and other aggravating factors in particular places as ‘layered disasters.’ Taking an intersectional approach that emphasises the connections between culture, place, patriarchy, racism, poverty, settler-colonialism, environmental degradation and climate change, the authors show the significance of gender-based violence in creating vulnerability to future disasters. Forefronting victim-survivors’ experiences and understandings, the book explores the important role of trauma, and how those affected go about the process of survival and recovery. Understanding disasters as layered casts light on why tackling gender-based violence must be a key priority in disaster planning, management and recovery. The book concludes by exploring critiques of existing formal responses, which often ignore or underplay gender-based violence.
The book will be of interest to all those interested in understanding the causes and impacts of disasters, as well as scholars and researchers of gender and gender-based violence.
Author(s): Nahid Rezwana, Rachel Pain
Series: Routledge Studies in Hazards, Disaster Risk and Climate Change
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 176
City: London
Cover
Half Title
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Figures
Tables
Boxes
Preface
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1: Layered disasters and gender-based violence: A global perspective
1.1 Gender-based violence within layered disasters
1.2 Disasters and gender-based violence around the world
1.3 Patriarchy as disastrous: explaining the relationship between disasters and gender-based violence
A feminist approach
Patriarchy, gender and disasters
GBV, poverty and disasters
1.4 Disaster planning, management and recovery: multiple actors responding to GBV
Prevailing disaster management plans and GBV
Trauma, survival and recovery
1.5 Methodological challenges and prospects
1.6 The structure of the book
References
Chapter 2: Gender-based violence before, during and after cyclones in the coastal region of Bangladesh
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Background: disasters and GBV in Bangladesh
2.3 Aims, study area and methodology
The study area
Methodology
2.4 GBV in Barguna during non-disaster periods
Domestic violence against wives and its causes
Dowry
Poverty
Extra-marital relationships and extra marriages
In the name of tradition
Child marriage
Additional marriages and wife abandonment
Rape, abuse and eve-teasing
Trafficking
GBV and male survivors
2.5 GBV before, during and after disasters
Rape, sexual abuse and threats during disasters
During the warning period before the cyclone hits
During the disaster: GBV at cyclone shelters
Sexual harassment during the post-disaster period
Post-disaster poverty and domestic violence
Child and forced marriages after disasters
Social crisis and abuse in the post-disaster period
2.6 The impacts of GBV: health, socio-economic position and vulnerability to future disasters
Physical and mental health impacts of physical violence
Researcher: ‘Did you get any treatment?’
GBV and changes in socio-economic status
2.7 Conclusion: women, the ultimate victim-survivors of GBV and disasters
References
Chapter 3: The impacts of disasters and gender-based violence: Flooding in Rangpur, Bangladesh
3.1 Introduction: studying GBV on the banks of River Jamunashawari, Rangpur, Bangladesh
3.2 Background: the concurrence of flooding and GBV
3.3 Aims and methodology
3.4 Study area: demographic and socio-economic characteristics of Kashiganj village
Demographic characteristics (age, sex, education and occupation)
Household income and poverty
3.5 Socio-cultural and gendered aspects of GBV in village life
Child marriage, dowry and culture
Domestic violence
Sexual abuse, harassment and rape
3.6 GBV during flooding and its aftermath
Women's experiences of GBV in shelters
Women’s experiences of GBV in flooded houses
GBV after flooding: the most crucial time for survival
Domestic and dowry violence
Child marriage
Forced prostitution
Migration and trafficking
Flooding and male abuse survivors
3.7 Gendered power relations and GBV
Masculinity, women’s empowerment and cultural aspects of gender-based violence
Male approval as a precondition of women’s empowerment, in relation to GBV
Social status, power and GBV
Poverty, flooding and GBV – a vicious cycle
3.8 Conclusion
References
Chapter 4: Flooding, mental health and crime: Women’s experiences in England
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Gender-based violence and disasters in the UK context
4.3 Study area
4.4 Methodology
4.5 The impacts of flooding on housing and financial status
4.6 The impacts of flooding on physical health, caring responsibilities and mental health
4.7 Flooding, crime and GBV
4.8 Conclusion
References
Chapter 5: Disaster patriarchy in hyper-isolation: Covid-19 and gender-based violence
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Covid-19 and gender-based violence: global impacts
5.3 The social and regional stratification of the risks of GBV during the pandemic
5.4 Hyper-isolation during the pandemic
5.5 Racialised disaster patriarchy and the pandemic
5.6 Conclusion
References
Chapter 6: Analysing the relationships between gender-based violence, disasters and place
6.1 Introduction
6.2 Place and culture in GBV and disasters
Similarities and differences: an intersectional approach
Place matters
Poverty, structural violence and place
6.3 The role of trauma within layered disasters
Psychological impacts of GBV and disasters
Psychological impacts of domestic violence and its complexity
No place to go
Powerlessness and frustration
6.4 Gendering violence
Pathways to becoming a perpetrator or victim: explanations and examples
Men’s controlling power and societal support: experiences from the field
Women as victims: power imbalances and self-confidence
Men's violent behaviour in disasters: explanations from the field
Stress and tension in disasters and social acceptance
Powerlessness
Controlling women and money
When women abuse men and other women, and men are victims
Power dynamics and GBV
When women abuse women
6.5 Conclusion
References
Chapter 7: Responding to gender-based violence during disasters
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Victim-survivors’ strategies: growing resilience or living as victims?
‘I tolerate everything’
Taking financial responsibility
Escaping and resisting violence
Reporting gender-based violence to the authorities
7.3 The limits of formal responses to layered disasters
7.4 Recommendations for policy and practice
Poverty alleviation
Increasing law enforcement and legal support
Introducing and enhancing awareness programmes on gender and gender-based violence
Men as allies
Community involvement and women's participation
Healthcare facilities for GBV victim-survivors in disasters
Gender-sensitive disaster management plans to improve GBV prevention and response
Gaps in knowledge
7.5 Conclusion: responses to layered disasters
References
Index
