16 Days Against Gender Violence

By Micheline Hazou

The 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence is an international campaign emanating from the first Women's Global Leadership Institute (WGLI) sponsored by Rutgers University Schools of Arts and Sciences' Center for Women's Global Leadership (CWGL) in 1991.

I am surprised not to see any activities planned in the region, where reports about gender violence abound. Or maybe there are activities in the pipeline of which I am unaware.

I was happily brought up in a family without violence, where females were loved, respected and treated on a par with males. I was fortunate to enroll at university, although my academic pursuits were cut short by civil war. I was also lucky to realize a childhood dream by landing a career in journalism and falling on an editor who believed in gender equality.

It was not easy for a woman to be accepted as a full-fledged journalist in the early Seventies in the Middle East. On the job, my female colleagues and I were often derided, looked down upon and mocked. We repeatedly came back to our magazine workplace in tears because of the way we were treated. But we persisted and rapidly earned the respect of our readers and of the people of public interest we were writing about and interviewing.

The 16 Days Campaign participants chose November 25 (I nternational Day Against Violence Against Women), and December 10 (International Human Rights Day) to symbolically link violence against women and human rights and to emphasize that such violence is a violation of human rights.

This 16-day period also highlights other significant dates, including November 29, International Women Human Rights Defenders Day; December 1, World AIDS Day; and December 6, which marks the Anniversary of the Montreal Massacre.

The 16 Days Campaign calls for the elimination of all forms of violence against women by:

• Raising awareness about gender-based violence as a human rights issue at the local, national, regional and international levels


• Strengthening local work around violence against women


• Establishing a clear link between local and international work to end violence against women


• Providing a forum where organizers can develop and share new and effective strategies


• Demonstrating the solidarity of women around the world organizing against violence against women


• Creating tools to pressure governments to implement promises made to eliminate violence against women.

Since 1991, over 3,700 organizations in approximately 164 countries have participated in the 16 Days Campaign.

Patricia, Maria Teresa and Minerva Mirabal*

International Day Against Violence Against Women was first declared in 1981 by the first Feminist Encuentro for Latin America and the Caribbean to commemorate the violent assassination, by the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic, of the Mirabal sisters on that date in 1960.

As a result of extensive marshaling by women's rights organizations, the UN General Assembly officially designated November 25 as International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women [A/RES/54/134] in 1999.

The theme for 2011 is: From Peace in the Home to Peace in the World: Let's Challenge Militarism and End Violence Against Women!

To explore some of the deeper social structures that promote and perpetuate violence against women and girls, the CWGL last year launched a multi-annual campaign theme on the intersections of militarism and violence against women. While there are many different ways to define militarism, “our working definition outlines militarism as an ideology that creates a culture of fear and supports the use of violence, aggression, or military interventions for settling disputes and enforcing economic and political interests,” says the CWGL.

“Current world events -- including military interventions, femicides, attacks on civilians participating in political change, ongoing conflicts etc. -- exemplify the distinctive way in which militarism influences how we see our neighbors, our families, our public life, and other people in the world,” it adds.