Overcoming Endemic Violence against Women in South Africa

Abstract

there is now, more than ever, a need to develop comprehensive and constructive dialogue around transformation of the present social conditions. It has often been the case that issues concerning women's rights have been overlooked when broad-based economic and political planning has taken place. This article seeks to ensure that gender oppression, and in this case particularly the problem of violence against women in South Africa, is given the consideration it deserves in the construction of a new democratic so? ciety free of oppression. To define the parameters of violence against women, the incidence and origins of such phenomena in South Africa need to be detailed. Having estab? lished the relevant terrain, several strategies for overcoming such violence are then discussed. Abuse and violence against women have been with us for the duration of recorded history. Such abuse appears to be a virtually universal phenomenon, although anthropologists have recorded some exceptional societies in which violence toward persons and women in particular is virtually non-existent (Oakley, 1981). Abuse seems to be related to women's general status and value in particular communities. However, discussion of endemic violence conveys the premise that such violence is widespread, common, and deeply entrenched in most societies. This is certainly the case in the South African context. So prevalent and widely tolerated is such violence that it has come to be perceived almost as normative and to a large extent accepted rather than challenged. This article seeks to address the question of how one attempts to overcome abuse and vi Defining the Terrain

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