Description
Book SynopsisSouth African women's still-increasing presence in local, provincial, and national institutions has inspired sweeping legislation aimed at advancing women's rights and opportunity. Yet the country remains plagued by sexual assault, rape, and intimate partner violence.Hannah E. Britton examines the reasons gendered violence persists in relationship to social inequalities even after women assume political power. Venturing into South African communities, Britton invites service providers, religious and traditional leaders, police officers, and medical professionals to address gender-based violence in their own words. Britton finds the recent turn toward carceral solutionswith a focus on arrests and prosecutionsfails to address the complexities of the problem and looks at how changing specific community dynamics can defuse interpersonal violence. She also examines how place and space affect the implementation of policy and suggests practical ways policymakers can support street level worke
Trade Review“Britton’s sobering book offers an incisive, comprehensive view of what works and what doesn’t work in South African efforts to stop gender-based violence. Not only does this book document practical ways to end gender-based violence, but it also advances transnational feminist research on the subject. This is a must-read for anyone who cares about eliminating gender-based violence.”—Ashley Currier, author of
Out in Africa: LGBT Organizing in Namibia and South Africa”A very important book. The contribution lies in its thorough empirical research with communities, stakeholders, feminist activists, the places where violence takes place, and the police. This is the first research that is so encompassing, giving us a view of gender-based violence from the ground up.”—Amanda Gouws, coeditor of
Gender and Multiculturalism: North-South Perspectives
